The center opened in the summer semester of 1995, under the direction of Karin Hausen. Prof. Dr. Hausen had until then worked as a professor for economic and social history from 1978-1995. She then taught as a professor for interdisciplinary women and gender studies at TU Berlin from 1995-2003. 

After a year and a half, the Board of Trustees of the TUB decided, on December 18, 1996- with 20: 0: 1 votes - to set up the ZIFG in the Department I of the TU Berlin for an initial 3 years. This was followed by a scientifically and politically intensive and extremely productive phase for the ZIFG, which led to its continuation in 2000. In 2001, the student project "Techno-Club", which was initially funded by the Berlin Equal Opportunity Program, was founded. It was then integrated into the regular funding structure of the TU in 2007.

Karin Hausen headed the ZIFG until her retirement in 2003. In the years 2003-2009, the professorship was held as a visiting professorship position by historian Regina Wecker, political scientist Brigitte Kerchner, philosopher Cornelia Klinger, sociologist Sabine Hark and cultural scientist Dorothea Dornhof. 

In 2009, Sabine Hark was appointed to the Chair of Interdisciplinary Women and Gender Studies at the Faculty I of the TUB and took over the leadership of the ZIFG. In 2010, the ZIFG hosted the founding congress of the Gender Studies Association (Gender e. V.), whose first chair was Sabine Hark from 2010-2014 and whose office has since been based at the ZIFG. In 2012, the certificate program Gender Pro MINT for STEM students started at TU Berlin. As of August 2017, a second Chair, Gender in STEM and Urban and Regional Planning. Feminist Studies in Science, Technology and Society (Feminist STS), integrated the center and was appointed to Petra Lucht.