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Open design: an actual topic in architectural education

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Abstract

Architecture is never fixed: buildings and (urban) spaces change as their use(r)s and contexts change over time. Even when architectural projects receive recognition of their dynamic nature, it remains unclear how to deal with this during design processes. The need for sustainable building raises interest in this topic in architecture research. This interest converges with discourse on open design in other design fields. Work in human–computer interaction and industrial design engineering is generating more concrete design strategies that bring into view in design processes the dynamic with which artefacts become part of real (end-use) environments. Examples include open-ended design and open script design. We propose such strategies may enrich architectural education particularly in the face of the challenge to move towards a more sustainable architecture that changes meaningfully through time. In this article we explore the value of, and requirements for, teaching open design strategies in architectural education. In the context of a master course on actual topics in architecture we involved architectural engineering students as researchers to explore the value and applicability of these strategies in architectural design. Analysis of focus group interviews and students’ intermediary and final coursework suggests that open design makes explicit a topic that is latently present to these students in their education. They perceive open design as having high societal relevance that will help them in their future practice to approach (design) problems (e.g., including environmental and social challenges) in new ways.

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Notes

  1. Because of political reasons, the status of the “Betonstop” plan remains unclear still today.

  2. Actual topics 2018–2019: media architecture, open-ended design, buildings and energy, sustainable cities and architecture and history.

  3. There are two limitations in the assignment of modules: students are excluded from a module if it is taught by the supervisor of their master thesis (in case of the open-ended design module: the third author), or by the titular of certain elective courses (in case of the open-ended design module: inclusive design).

  4. List of mandatory literature: Meta-design (Fischer and Giaccardi 2006); Designing ‘moralized’ products (Jelsma 2006); The mutual influence of Architecture and the Social in a non-home (Łukasiuk and Jewdokimow 2015); Observeren [Observing] (Mortelmans 2013b); Study 0, Post-factum, Observation (Ostuzzi 2017, pp. 101–141), User-technology relationships (Oudshoorn and Pinch 2008); RE:definitions of use (Redström 2008); How to interest people for the hare instead of the chase (Stam 2014); Unselfconscious interaction (Wakkary et al. 2016); Aspects of everyday design (Wakkary and Maestri 2008).

    List of optional literature: The de-scription of technological artefacts (Akrich 1992); Ambiguity and open-endedness in behavioural design (Boon et al. 2018); Designing for social interaction in open-ended play environments (de Valk et al. 2015); Observed decay (Desilvey 2006); QUAGOL (Dierckx de Casterlé et al. 2012); Growing traces on objects of daily use (Giaccardi et al. 2014); Where are the missing masses (Latour 1992); Interviewen [Interviewing] (Mortelmans 2013a); Open-ended design (Ostuzzi 2017); Social engagement in design (Stam 2015); Aldo van Eyck’s playgrounds (Withagen and Caljouw 2017).

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Acknowledgements

 This research received support from the KU Leuven Department of Architecture. The authors thanks all who contributed to this article, in particular the students for their participation in module and focus group interviews.

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  1. Department of Architecture, Research[x]Design, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Liesbeth Stam & Ann Heylighen

  2. Department of Industrial Systems Engineering and Product Design, design.nexus and Centre of Sustainable Development, Universiteit Gent, Campus Kortrijk, Ghent, Belgium

    Francesca Ostuzzi

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  1. Liesbeth Stam
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Stam, L., Ostuzzi, F. & Heylighen, A. Open design: an actual topic in architectural education. Int J Technol Des Educ 32, 667–693 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-020-09607-9

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