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The pedagogies of reuse
No full textThe Pedagogies of Re-Use captures the amazing digital gathering of students, academics, practitioners, and activists that happened at the International School of Re-Construction. Involving over 100 people, from countries as far apart as Brazil, Canada, Ireland, UK, Spain, Germany, Greece, UAE, and China, the participants spent two weeks working in eleven teams to consider architectural propositions responding to the current climate and ecological emergency. This book documents the work of the eleven teams, considering the themes they pursued, the student projects proposed, and the final design ideas developed by each group. Supplemented with images of the work, the book also includes leading academics and professionals who supported the school and contribute their voices to these crucial issues of deconstruction, re-use, and adaptation. It is ideal reading for students and academics looking at the issues created by the climate emergency to which architecture must respond. The Pedagogies of Re-Use is part of an EU ERDF £4.33 million Interreg NWE project entitled ‘Facilitating the Circulation of Reclaimed Building Elements’ (FCRBE), Interreg NWE 739, October 2018– December 2023. Online publication: June 2024, London. The FCRBE project aims to increase the amount of reclaimed building elements in circulation within its territory by +50% (in mass) by 2032
Examining clothing repair practices, core competences, techniques, tools and community structures involved in extending the life of garments
Get PDFThe rise of fast fashion as a feature of post-industrial societies has distanced people from many of the habitual practices associated with caring for and valuing clothes. This includes both acquiring and applying the skills to make and mend clothes and understanding fibres and fabrics to develop deeper connections to materials. The principles advocated by a circular economy require societies to recover these once held values and restore our relationship with materials and practices to keep clothing in use for as long as possible and to reduce consumption. Such Circular Economy practices will require our societies to align with current socio-technical developments, where people are increasingly adopting technologies (through e.g. applications, tutorials), to support making and mending practices, and to play and express themselves creatively whilst keeping apparel in use. The study aims to examine self-repair practices and repair services from practitioners' viewpoints, evaluating available support, and identifying challenges and opportunities to integrate repair practices more widely in society. The results suggest it is critical to develop the skills to mend and customise the garments people own and provide additional support for people to become custodians of clothes. This study is part of a larger project to identify opportunities where technology could intervene in a repair process and facilitate opportunities for people to reconnect with materials and acquire repair skills. To develop this idea, we designed an interview study to investigate practices of clothing repair to determine if and where such support might be welcomed
Exploring new methodological approaches to mapping informal mobilities
No full textThis paper highlights mobility as a methods paradigm through a study focused on socio-spatial mobilities of urban marginalised women (UMW) residing in the peripheral areas of New Delhi, India. It does so by investigating daily survival mobilities of urban poor women who are at social and spatial peripheries of the society and the city. Exploring this dimension of mobility through the lens of gender and urban informality opens up unexplored arenas for new research techniques. The existing research methods do not do justice to the studies relating to the aspects of everyday mobility (Law and Urry, 2004). To understand the complexities of social, economic and political relations it is critical to not only investigate the movement of people, objects, information and ideas but also how they get mobilised when they interact with others (Garfinkel, 1976; Wittgenstein, 2009). This paper discusses mobile methodology including digital ethnography, travel diaries and informal conversations adopted in the study to understand the intertwining elements embedded within the daily mobilities of UMW. It is understood that within the broader spectrum of society, relationships and networks emerge while people are on the move. There is a difference in the kinds of interactions that happen when a person is in motion than when stationary. Being mobile presents different sets of knowledge and identities to people who experience it (Hein et al., 2008). Moreover, Weisner (1966) argues that research questions that engender the complexity pertaining to multi-disciplinary research areas (in this case mobility studies, urban informality, gender studies) cannot be dealt with one single method. This research uses a combination of new technologies along with mobile methods like ethnography to reveal the inter-relationship between social and spatial mobility of UMW. The research analyses the social structures or networks formed while performing the act of travel as a part of the daily routine of the UMW. It involves the study of everyday life or daily mobilities of these women in diverse social contexts (considering Delhi as a city constituting many smaller cities and with different socio-cultural environments). Moreover, the issues pertaining to scale and ethics, geographical boundaries and social imagination, class and gender, and interdisciplinarity are also revealed through mobile methodologies
Serpent symbolisms 2: an interactive inquiry
No full textWorkshop: Gallery Educator Katy Tarbard and artist Wiebke Leister lead a multi-disciplinary workshop exploring snake iconographies in the collection and in our lived experiences. Date: 22 March 2024, 6.30-8.00pm About: Artist Wiebke Leister’s recent research is an exploration of snakes in both our Collection and throughout global traditions of painting across the centuries. This participatory group workshop explores how the varied depictions of serpents have represented both wisdom and deceit, danger and healing, redemption and destruction. Joined by Gallery Educator Katy Tarbard, the two lead a range of activities, including an open discussion based on techniques of philosophical inquiry, thinking through gesture and drawing, tableau vivant re-staging and image clustering. Participants are encouraged to bring their own stories about encounters with snakes as well as images of snakes from art and popular culture to the session to work with. This event was part of the Friday Lates, curated by Joseph Kendra
Serpent symbolisms 3: A performative intervention
No full textAbout: A collaboration between musician David Toop, performance artist Ania Psenitsnikova and artist Wiebke Leister. Date: 21 June 2024, 6.30-7.00pm, The National Gallery, Room 31. Artist Wiebke Leister’s recent research is an exploration of snake iconographies in both paintings from our collection and throughout local art traditions across the centuries. Building upon talks and workshops earlier in the year, this collaboration with the musician David Toop and performance artist Ania Psenitsnikova, is a live manifestation discussions that took place in the Gallery, then extended to the studio. Experience their multi-medial portrayal of serpents and snakes in painting, with particular reference to Nicolas Poussin’s ‘Landscape with a Man killed by a Snake’, through sound, photographic projection and movement. This event was part of the Friday Lates, curated by Joseph Kendra
Design stories / London
No full textAn inspiring panel discussion between designers, educators and researchers to explore how women might move design forward and engender social change through creative practice. Design Stories is a part of the Looking Through Objects - a project exploring women's contribution to change through design and creative practices. The project includes a touring exhibition, lecture series, talks and interviews organised in different locations across Poland, UK, Belgium and Baltics. Design Stories London is a collaboration between Royal College of Art and SWPS University. This project is supported by the British Council and Polish Cultural Institute London and part of Brompton Design District events programme. Participating Speakers: Alicja Bielawska, Ewa Klekot, Joyce Sheau Roei Yee, Teal Triggs. Moderated by: Oli Stratford, Disegno Journal. Project curators: Gian Luca Amadei and Agnieszka Jacobson-Cielecka
Heroic journeys: On design for empowerment and narratives of social change
Get PDFCan empowerment be designed? Designers often claim to empower people and communities they engage with as their ultimate aim. However, a more nuanced discussion on how empowerment by design is articulated, facilitated and achieved through design projects is lacking. In this paper, we reframe the notion of empowerment in design for social change by drawing from social and political theories, and participatory research. We position design research and practice as inherently political, proposing Design for Empowerment principles and a framework co-created with community organisers and social designers through participatory design workshops. Through this approach, we advocate for a shift in designers’ focus from project outcomes to human development, the implementation of power analysis and the adoption of narrative devices to facilitate the elicitation of diverse stories of change in socially engaged design practice and projects
Chronicles of care: A design history of the COVID-19 virus
No full textThe Covid-19 crisis and the designed interventions that the authors have catalogued in this book prove definitively that design does care. The authors documented this as it evolved every day from the 1st January 2020 to 31st May 2020 inclusive. Then they looked at all of this care and caring from the point of view of design and, by the sheer volume of design interventions they have documented, illustrate that design is good in a crisis. What the Covid-19 pandemic illustrated is that for the first time in modern history, capital was totally irrelevant. Money could not save your life. Only design could. Rapidly designed masks, shelters, hospitals, instructional posters, infographics, dashboards, respirators, sanitisers, virtual and local communities emerged to save us. From January 2020, design became king
Textile Robotic Interaction for Designer-Robot Collaboration
Get PDFThis late-breaking report describes lab-based robot experiments involving two robot arms scanning and interaction with a set of 12 novel sustainable materials programmed with handfeel gestures inspired by how designers evaluate textile materials. The aim of gathering this data is to spur research in robot perception of soft materials and to contribute towards human-robot collaborative design systems. The complete dataset including scanned images, video of interactions accompanied by the code to produce robot motion paths are made publically available
Mirror Worlds and “Sweet Ol’ Tatties”
No full textStrangers Things is arguably a cultural phenomenon since it hit our TV screens back in 2016. The character of Eddie Munson in particular was incredibly popular with the established fanbase, first appearing in Season 4 of the show and instantly making him a fan favourite with the viewers. Chera Kee (2023) states that the “mirror world” of the Stranger Things Universe offers us a way to understand the historical “underworld” of the 1980s reflected in our present moment in time. Therefore, this paper will therefore attempt to explore the character of Eddie Munson, interrogating his ability as an ‘outsider’ to offer up a commentary to our contemporary society. He personifies the ‘rebel’, the teenager every 80s parent was afraid of. He is a reflection of fear, doubt and the unknown. Yet contrary to popular perception, Eddie is caring, sweet and kind. He is loyal and brave, fighting to protect the very same community that attempts to “demonize” him. Drawing on the Duffer Brother’s original inspirations, from the Satanic Panic boom of 80s America to the Heavy Metal, Rock and Gothic influences present in Eddie’s iconic looks, this examination will support Klein and Palmer’s 2016 theory that the ‘re-telling” of sequels can be accessed through Gothic elements and conventions. This paper will argue that the amplification of this “mirror world” Klein (2023,) offers an opportunity to correct the past, drawing on the visual aesthetics of Eddie and the contemporary issues that his character represents