Co-Design

Altering participation through interactions and reflections in design

by Nicola J Bidwell

Heike Winschiers-Theophilus, Nicola J. Bidwell and Edwin Blake
CoDesign: International Journal of CoCreation in Design and the Arts. Vol. 8, Nos. 2–3, June–September 2012, 163–182

In this paper, we illustrate through a set of examples how our own conceptualisation of participatory design (PD) and... more In this paper, we illustrate through a set of examples how our own conceptualisation of participatory design (PD) and associated tools and techniques transforms within the design process itself. Co-designing with African rural communities has brought to light our many assumptions and intentions underlying commonly used methods and principles of PD. While genuinely striving for user involvement these same methods can hinder a truly participatory approach to design. We have learned much through our encounters and continuous reflections in various projects with southern African rural communities and seek to share our experiences in one particular, current project which led us to interrogate and revise our existing conceptions of PD. We also aim to infuse the evolution of PD with insights from Africa and cross-cultural design so that PD can better serve diversity globally.

Collaborative Museums: An Approach to Co-Design

by Wallace Ugulino

Moura, H.; Cardador, D.; Vega, K.; Ugulino, W.; Barbato, M.; Fuks, H. Collaborative Museums: An Approach to Co-Design. Proceedings of ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW 2012) , pp. 681-684. Seatle, WA: Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), 2012. ISBN 978-1-4503-1086-4. DOI: http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/2145204.2145307.

This paper describes a systemic approach to co-design of collaborative museums, using ethnography, co-creation... more This paper describes a systemic approach to co-design of collaborative museums, using ethnography, co-creation workshops and fast prototyping, amongst other Social Science and Human Centered Design methods. Focused on the creation of immersive and collaborative museum experiences, it provides a rationale for involving carefully selected multidisciplinary teams and users in the entire design cycle, and presents a process that supports this task, from research to development, pointing its value and limitations. In order to bring the discussion into context and exemplify the use of a group of methods that can support collaborative design, it introduces the case of a Brazilian Planetarium and Science Museum.

Co-designing Collaborative Museums using Ethnography and Co-creation Workshops

by Wallace Ugulino

Published in the 8th Brazilian Symposium on Collaborative Systems

The paper presents a human centered approach to co-design of groupware and socialware for collaborative museums, using... more The paper presents a human centered approach to co-design of groupware and socialware for collaborative museums, using ethnography, co-creation workshops and Blank Model Prototyping. It discusses the concepts and processes of human centered design, participatory design, ethnography, concept generation and iterative prototyping - pointing their value to the support of group systems design, in comparison to other approaches. It also gives an overview of the state of the art of museums around the world. Next, it describes a case study conducted in a Brazilian Planetarium and Science Museum, highlighting details of the context, process and results. The intent was to implement a system for collaborative museums that supports an integrated user experience before, during and after the visit - through groupware, socialware and cross reality technologies - for continuous engagement, co-construction of knowledge, intergenerational interaction, multimodality, sharing of ideas, and emergence of mentorship networks.

Read more: http://groupware.les.inf.puc-rio.br/work.jsf?p1=8432#ixzz1kNUWvBZt

On Wearing: A Critical Framework for Valuing Design's Already Made

by alison gill

With Abby Mellick Lopes. Published in ‘Design and Culture’ (the journal of the Design Studies Forum) Vol 3, Iss 3 (November 2011): 307-27.

A sustainable material culture is perhaps more about making new relationships than making new things. This paper... more A sustainable material culture is perhaps more about making new relationships than making new things. This paper explores the topography of what we are calling “Design's already made,” including the artifacts, practices, and perceptions, via the lens of practice theory and in response to the problem of the largely unsustainable material cultures of design. Our investigation is framed by the term “wearing.” Wearing – as a recurrent form of engagement between bodies and designed artifacts or as an index of use and duration – is a multimodal concept that brings abstract time into specific material and aesthetic relations. We contrast “wearing” to the “object time” (Baudrillard 1998) of material and symbolic systems that make new, purportedly improved , but “inexperienced” things available to us in consumer culture. Wearing induces a critical practice of attending to those things that are declining from object time, which in this era of destructive wasting, need to be recalled, repaired and repurposed. Wearing reveals that design, in spite of the widespread practice of trading completed designs, is better characterised as unfinished, potentially open to the value-creating processes of its users. We elaborate on this idea by drawing on a range of examples across the design disciplines. 

Co-designing for dementia: The Alzheimer 100 project

by Lauren Tan

Published in the Australiasian Medical Journal (AMJ) in November 2009. This paper was co-authored with Deborah Szebeko, Founder of thinkpublic and Senior Producer of the Alzhiemer 100 project

This paper will profile the Alzheimer 100 project and illustrate design practice utilised in a health context. more This paper will profile the Alzheimer 100 project and illustrate design practice utilised in a health context.

More specifically the paper will discuss:

· Co-design: The approach used by design consultancy thinkpublic to involve a dementia community throughout the project;

· Key design-led methods used: Including the establishment of a dedicated project website, film-making and a Co-design Day;

· The project’s results: Including a film, signposting service concept and range of product and service prototypes;

· The project’s legacy: Spanning multiple levels including a legacy at a policy level; and

· The project’s key learnings: Which provide important insights into how design can work effectively in a health context.

Designers and design-led methods can bring innovative solutions to healthcare, but just as importantly, its approach places key healthcare stakeholders at the heart of developing these solutions. Projects such as Alzheimer 100 provide us with practical case studies to deepen our understanding of how designers, design-led methods and approaches can be applied to meet challenges facing healthcare today.

Co-designing for Society

by Lauren Tan

Published in the Australasian Medical Journal 2010. Co-authored with Deborah Szebeko

Healthcare is the issue that touches the lives of everyone. Adapting, changing and continually innovating healthcare... more Healthcare is the issue that touches the lives of everyone. Adapting, changing and continually innovating healthcare is a complex undertaking requiring contributions from many different stakeholders including governments, professionals, carers, patients and the general public. But how do these groups come together, work together and share ownership in identifying challenges and creating and delivering solutions for the future of healthcare?

thinkpublic is a multi-disciplinary social innovation and design agency. We aim to design better healthcare and develop lasting skills and capacity among service providers and users. We do this by using an approach called co-design. Our approach of co-design is grounded in understanding the real life experiences, ideas and skills of people, who use, need and run services. In the first Design + Health edition of the Australasian Medical Journal (AMJ) we presented Alzheimer100 a project where co-design was used to collaboratively identify issues in dementia and develop a range of innovative responses that addressed them.

In this paper, we build and elaborate on co-design, outlining in more detail its approach, tools, processes and practices.

'Information in context': Co-designing workplace structures and systems for organisational learning.

by Zaana Howard

Co-authored with Dr Mary M Somerville. Published in proceedings of the Information Seeking in Context Conference (ISIC 2010), University of Murcia, Spain, 28 September - 2 October, pp. 311 - 321.

With the aim of advancing professional practice through better understanding how to create workplace contexts that... more With the aim of advancing professional practice through better understanding how to create workplace contexts that cultivate individual and collective learning through situated ‘information in context’ experiences, this paper presents insights gained from three North American collaborative design (co-design) implementations. In the current project at the Auraria Library in Denver, Colorado, USA, participants use collaborative information practices to redesign face-to- face and technology-enabled communication, decision making, and planning systems. Design processes are described and results-to-date described, within an appreciative framework which values information sharing and enables knowledge creation through shared leadership.

Open peer-to-peer design. Massimo Menichinelli, participated future

by Bertram Niessen

This is an interview with Massimo Menichinelli, founder of the on-line platform openp2pdesign.org. The interview deals... more This is an interview with Massimo Menichinelli, founder of the on-line platform openp2pdesign.org. The interview deals with topics connected to innovations in the fields of design and-metadesign, with a particular attention towards open source and p2p dynamics. The interview takes into account the more recent developments in the fields of DIY design and personal fabrication, questioning about their consequences in terms of social and economical transformations.

Keywords:

Open Source Design, Open Design, P2P design, peer-to-peer design, personal fabrication, desktop manufacturing, co-design, service design, innovation

Draft of Lahti, H & Seitamaa-hakkarainen P (2005), Towards participatory design in craft and design education. CoDesign, 1, 103-117.

by Pirita Seitamaa-Hakkarainen

Draft: Lahti, H & Seitamaa-hakkarainen P (2005), Towards participatory design in craft and design education. CoDesign, 1, 103-117.

The purpose of the present study was to analyze the differences and effects of user participation in university level... more The purpose of the present study was to analyze the differences and effects of user participation in university level students’ collaborative design processes. The study focused on how intended users (i.e., frequent conference-goers) participated in a product design process (designing conference bags) and how
much influence these conference-goers had on students’ design solutions. The data were derived from a collaborative learning environment (Future Learning Environment, FLE2), which provided a distributed database for students’ and users’ dialogue. The study employed qualitative content
analysis of users’ written messages posted on the database. The analysis indicated users’ contributions to the functional, expressive and aesthetic design solutions. From the students’ standpoint, it was challenging to treat contradictory information produced by users and to find optimal design solutions.

Claystation - Design Modelling and Creativity

by Alex Milton

Co-authored with Ben Hughes.

Published in Crossing the Design Boundaries, Editors, P. Rodgers, L. Broadhurst, D. Hepburn, Taylor and Francis, London 2005, ISBN 0415391180

This paper explores the use of playful, collaborative design modelling as a catalyst for creativity. Play is an... more This paper explores the use of playful, collaborative design modelling as a catalyst for creativity. Play is an unavoidable and essential element in the design process, but one which is largely ignored. The dry, reductionist view of design that seeks to promote the designer as an objective, emotionless entity struggles when looking for explanations of recent design trends.

Traditional design methodologies and disciplines focus on design realisation. The paper argues that the playful use of symbolic, conceptual and physical models is an essential
part of the design process, and one that is ignored at great cost. This is illustrated through a series of mass-participation creative educational workshops entitled Claystation.

Claystation is a mass-participation format for creative experimentation. The Design Transformation Group (DTG) devised it as a means of encouraging normally passive audiences in active participation. It is heavily influenced by theories of play, which the creators believe is key in the development of creative thought. The paper will display and discuss the design methodologies developed by the group and employed within its cross-disciplinary workshops and events, and begin to explore the role of an audience in the appreciation of design practice, theory and thinking. Suggesting that sole authorship is not always everything, and that design creativity can be explored through the playfully ephemeral.

Seats of Learning - A Template for Design Modelling

by Alex Milton

Co-authored with Ben Hughes.

Published in Educating Designers for a Global Context, Editors, B. Rothbucher, M.Kolar, B.Ion, A.Clarke, Hadleys, UK 2006, ISBN 0955394201

This paper critically analyses and presents the participatory design modelling methodologies developed for a series of... more This paper critically analyses and presents the participatory design modelling methodologies developed for a series of exhibitions at leading design institutions and events entitled 'My Chair', and their use as a creative tool for design education within the realm of public design exhibitions and the design curriculum.

It describes the use of design templates as a teaching tool that could enable novice and expert designers alike to sketch, model and build 3D physical representations of design concepts. The paper goes on to discuss the projects' impact and the Design
Transformation Groups continued strategies to provoke and promote new thinking in design through symbolic, virtual, physical and scenario modelling.

Early Exploration of Cloud Computing for Design Practice and Education

by Mark Whiting

Co-authored with Soumitri Varadarajan
Published in the Proceedings of IASDR 2009.

Cloud Computing, a phrase originally coined to represent telephony grids, is now used to generically describe service... more Cloud Computing, a phrase originally coined to represent telephony grids, is now used to generically describe service systems based on distributed computing of some description. In recent years Cloud Computing has gained substantial coverage, partially due to a flood of web- based services and to the move from hardware innovation to network and software innovation in some high tech industries. Although this situation has created the potential for a number of new forms of work practice, social behavior and collaboration, it has also led to a gap in working methodologies. Despite the fact that current research and popular practice have reacted to this shift, the implications to the Design Industry and to designers’ practice has not yet been carefully examined. Additionally, as the shift is still underway, there is potential to make informed assess- ments relating to the expected outcome of this paradigm in the coming decade.
This paper will discuss the experiences of the authors in their journey into existing Cloud Computing technologies and services. The paper will discuss specific case studies and use arche- types of web-based services as a spring-board to speculate upon what design projects, studios, and design education may look like in a Cloud Computing scenario. Of particular interest is the discus- sion of how unexpected uses of tools and services would lead to unexpected use-cases, effecting the eventual workflow in design. Finally, we discuss some suggestions and interesting possibilities for the future of these technologies and tools in addition to lightly reviewing the implications of Cloud Computing related hardware on various aspects of design.
In conclusion, Cloud Computing and tools for its access have significant potential in providing new design methods as well as new ways of teaching and practicing in the design industry. This paper initiates discourse on this matter and shows evidence of related trends.