Design Research Society Digital Library
Not a member yet
4839 research outputs found
Sort by
A Designer’s Ethic: An Art in Balance
No full textDesigners are increasingly becoming involved in areas that were once considered silos. From healthcare to technology and government, designers are shared custodians for addressing large-scale, complex problems. With this shift towards more interdisciplinary work and blurred boundaries between fields, a designer\u27s role takes many forms. As we navigate the landscapes of interdisciplinary practice and confront issues that affect our society and planet unprecedentedly, the responsibility to act ethically primarily rests on the individual. Without general, agreed-upon ethical guidelines, like the Hippocratic oath for doctors, we explore ways to establish shared values for the design community. Drawing from design justice and community-oriented design practices, we use the metaphor of a ‘mobile,’ an artistic sculpture comprising delicate components suspended in the air and moving in response to air currents or motor power to spark our imagination and discover ways to adapt, prioritize, and balance the tensions between our values and our practice
Designing relations all the way down: Hyperlocal eco-social arcs of care and roleplay
No full textWe use the relational as a lens to examine how a workshop, created to inspire sensitivity to the interdependent nature of all life, is itself a nest of relations—shaped by intentions, co-created content, and outcomes beyond organisers’ influence. With a practical mission to decentre humans and acknowledge interdependencies – in a turn to more-than-human ethics and a commitment to the hyperlocal eco-social – the workshop employs live action roleplay (LARP) to engage a small English town in facing future uncertainties. We explore the place of care, solidarity and collective agency in confronting readiness to deal with coming challenges. Linking theories of relationality and practices of relating, we conclude that the workshop can be an example of how, if we want meaningful change, locally-embedded agentic care relations can be made fractal through all our engagements and encounters
Proceedings of EKSIG Conference 2025: Data as Experiential Knowledge and Embodied Processes
No full texthttps://dl.designresearchsociety.org/conference-volumes/1067/thumbnail.jp
Wedding rituals: Shedding light on the hidden values of rituals to design better services.
No full textService design often aims to create meaningful experiences, while rituals offer ways to structure their symbolic, emotional, and cultural dimensions. Understanding rituals in context can help designers co-create culturally respectful solutions that transcend boundaries. This paper explores how values embedded in wedding rituals can inform the design of more inclusive and meaningful services. Drawing on an international workshop with designers, we used a specially developed template to explore wedding rituals in a multicultural context. The study identified three overarching themes: the end of an era, patriarchy, and future prosperity. The mapping activity supported participants in reflecting on underlying rules, norms, and beliefs. We argue that the template can act as a boundary object, fostering dialogue across cultural perspectives and supporting the co-design of significant life events. While the study is exploratory and limited in scope, it offers early empirical grounding for incorporating ritual design into service development
Activating Community Through Transmedia Storytelling: A Service Design Case Study of the Life as Theater Project
No full textIn the context of declining sustainability in traditional placemaking practices, this study explores how transmedia storytelling, when integrated with service design logic, can function as a replicable and adaptive mechanism for community activation. Grounded in a media–platform–role framework, this research takes Alipay’s Life as Theater project as a case study to examine how narrative-driven tasks, distributed media touchpoints, and platform-mediated coordination work together to mobilize user participation. Through service design analysis, it identifies how digital platforms serve as both structural orchestrators and narrative translators, aligning user behaviors, merchant interactions, and platform logic into a coherent activation pathway. This study contributes to current literature by advancing a model of mechanism-driven engagement that emphasizes low-threshold participation, scalable design, and stakeholder co-creation. The findings suggest that transmedia storytelling can serve not only as a content strategy but also as an infrastructural logic for participatory service systems in community contexts
Cultivating Cross-Cultural Community through Counter-storying: The Power+Place Collaborative
No full textThis article offers a feminist pragmatist vision for service design educators and practitioners that seeks to cultivate participatory place-based systemic change through cross-cultural and intergenerational counter-storytelling efforts. After summarizing the story of the Power+Place Collaborative as a service design case study, the article outlines findings from a four-year, mixed-method study. Findings from this initiative indicate that feminist pragmatist practices can cultivate significant changes across social systems when such service design initiatives are sustained over time. Based on study findings, the article concludes by recommending a range of strategies found to be most useful for scaling cross-sector, participatory systems change
Improving last mile transport connectivity in rural India: A case study of Village Sangurdi
No full textLast mile connectivity in rural India is a major issue which grapples majority of the Indian population. Particularly, transport connectivity towards last mile (final link between public transports to residence) in rural India is not properly addressed, which leads to hindrance in smooth functioning of daily lives of individuals. This paper aims to put forward an approach towards finding a solution to this problem, using service design methodology, ethnographic research and community driven service solution model. For creating the solution framework, a village named “Sangurdi” in Pune district of Maharashtra, India is taken as an example to understand the issues of villagers and different stakeholders facing transportation issues. With multiple interactions and ideation sessions with different stakeholders, a framework to address the issue is proposed, named “Amhi Sarathi”, a community driven vehicle cooperative to cater specific needs of the villagers
Bridging Service and Seva for Living Built Heritage: Systems Thinking for Human Centered Design (HCD) and Community Co Management of Temple Festivals.
No full textThis paper examines the synthesis of Human-Centered Design (HCD), service design principles, community co-management, Seva (selfless service), and living built heritage, considering the significant role of temple festivals within a systems thinking framework. Hyderabad\u27s Brahmotsavams, Bonalu, Rathotsavams, and Hanuman Jayanti are the life and vitals of this culture. As these significant events become increasingly complex, we are challenged to rethink how they are organized in a way that effectively combines classical seva with modern principles of service design and systems thinking. Through systems mapping, the research suggests a framework to organize better festivals, foster delight for attendees, and ultimately sustain economic and social viability for the commune. The study presents key considerations for effectively implementing these principles in the context of temple festivals, supported by a survey and analysis of fifteen temple festivals in Hyderabad. The discoveries provide meaningful recommendations for shaping and executing collaborative, flexible systems that respect cultural traditions and respond to modern issues
