Amid all the excitement about transforming social systems through design, there remains a lack of understanding about what design can uniquely offer to support this change. This conceptual paper contributes to the discussion by integrating research on design and systems thinking to develop the concept of aesthetic disruption, highlighting its connection to the alteration of mental models in social systems. With support from empirical illustrations of aesthetic disruption in the context of healthcare, we identify four core components of designing for aesthetic disruption: engagement of the senses, experience of dissensus, exposed assumptions, and reflexive actors. In doing so, we bring aesthetic knowledge to the fore of what design can contribute to social systems transformation and lay the foundation for further research and practice related to aesthetic disruption.