The role of user participation in design decisions (original) (raw)
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’ Design Participation Tactics: enabling people to design their built environment’
This doctoral design research thesis documents a process of rethinking user participation in the design of the urban built environment. It investigates options for the roles of architects and designers as generators and facilitators of design processes that enable designing with people. Its aim is to investigate the tactical knowledge of participation in design and explore how architects’ and designers’ knowledge can be transferred to, shared with and developed together with non-experts. First of all, the theoretical discourse centres on Henri Lefebvre’s distinction between the ‘abstract space’ of designers and experts and the ‘concrete space’ of people and day-to-day life, in spatial practice. This dialectic model of space was developed as an analytical tool to define, understand and re-appropriate the term ‘participation’ in the environmental design field. This new Design Participation analytical tool is then further developed to demonstrate two contributions of this design research. The first contribution is through a critical assessment of different practices of Design Participation, as first defined in the 1971 Design Participation Conference in Manchester (UK) organised by the Design Research Society (DRS), to provide a new viewpoint to understand design practices with participation. Different Design Participation practices were assessed for their appropriateness and effectiveness within past and current contexts, and in different stages and tasks within the design process. Practices within the realm of collaboration between the abstract space of designers and the concrete space of users were tested through a comparative study of design participation projects in three social contexts: Sweden, the United Kingdom (London) and Hong Kong, in which different social attitudes to design prevail. A rethought definition and typology of design participation was developed based on relations between the two ‘worlds’ of experts/designers and users/people. This new understanding of Design Participation is articulated with a new Design Participation Benchmark and Taxonomy. The research endeavours to define Design Participation Tactics that avoid mere ‘tokenism’ and aims at articulating tactics for a transformation of the traditionally conceived process of design. Through action research methodology, the second contribution of this research is to further define the term ‘participation’ within the greater social context and its relation to the subject of design by learning through doing. Three levels of Design Participation Tactics were introduced which are working with three newly defined modes of participation: Community, Public and Design Participation. The Design Participation analytical tool was used to compare different practices between different modes of participation. The relevance and validity of the research is supported through real-world cases involving co-designing with grass-roots user groups, children’s groups and older users, as well as collaboration with professional designers of housing, exhibitions and other types of environments, and other disciplines such as social work and public policy. The re-writing of the roles of designers, architects and other ‘experts’ in the design process is an important component in achieving Design Participation. Positions on the agendas, methodologies and epistemologies involved in the Design Participation process were developed during this study. ‘Agenda’ refers to how the Design Participation process addresses the social context, reflecting social changes and needs. ‘Methodology’ applies to devising holistic Design Participation processes developed through working with users and matching appropriate tactics to each different situation. ‘Epistemology’ evokes the important question of how Design Participation tactics can be transferred to become a foundation and tool for future development. The pursuit of increasing user participation in the design process implies a realignment of designers’ roles (generator, facilitator and developer) from that of producing objects, environments and systems, to that of facilitating innovative collaboration and creating platforms for social inclusion in design practice.
Participatory Design in Architecture: can computers help?
2000
Architectural firms are increasingly relying on computer technology to support design activities, facilitate project management and produce presentation material. However, little consideration has been given to the role computers could play to encourage and support participation of nonprofessionals in design projects. In this paper we discuss two research initiatives designed to promote computer-mediated participatory design: the first one is concerned with the collaboration of client and architect on a residential project, and the second one addresses the issue of community participation. Although very different in nature and purpose, both rely on World Wide Web technology and attempt to appropriate
Participatory Design Approach in Architectural Education, a Field Survey About User Saticfaction
This study aims to emphasize the importance of participatory design approach in architectural education via user satisfaction through recently applied public project.The field study is conducted in 2013, and Kucukcekmece Urban Square Project is chosen to examine the users meanings and the responds of the designs. Observation and interview were used in the study. Following the search, it's seen that majority is not satisfied with the new organization. Users compared the new one with the old square and said that the new square could be better.In conjunction with architectural design education, participatory design approach should be involved to the studio. With participatory design in education, students will learn to respect rights and thought of users and so, there will be satisfied users and this situation will contribute to provide social sustainability.
Participatory Design: A Historical Perspective
2021
Participatory design is an attitude about a force for change in the creation and management of environments for people. Its strength lies in being a movement that cuts across traditional professional boundaries and cultures. Its roots lie in the ideals of a participatory democracy where collective decision-making is highly decentralized throughout all sectors of society, so that all individuals learn participatory skills and can effectively participate in various ways in the making of all decisions that affect them. Increasingly complex decision-making processes require a more informed citizenry that has considered the evidence on the issue, discussed potential decision options and arrived at a mutually agreed upon decision (Abelson et al, 2003).Today participatory design processes are being applied to urban design, planning, and geography as well as to the fields of industrial and information technology. Research findings suggest that positive outcomes are associated with solutions...
User-Participation and the Design Charrette: A Systematic Approach to Furthering Design Process
Arcc Conference Repository, 2014
Research in architecture is a many-splendored thing. Technical questions on energy efficiency or materiality, social inquiry on user habits or satisfaction, and philosophical queries about the sense of space and place, all fall within the accepted realm of architecture and its creation. Much less considered is how the design process itself may purposefully be used as a research tool to elicit information that will adjust its outcome. This is perhaps because design is often considered "intuitive" rather than systematic, but it is nevertheless surprising when one considers the central role that design takes in architectural education, and more surprising still when one discovers that related disciplines, such as geography, have begun to examine pre-design steps for their research applicability. This paper examines how design-in this case the design charrette-may explicitly be used as a research methodology to change the very planning dialog that it is drawing upon for its process decisions, or put another way, how the designer uses focused discussions with user groups to obtain information vital to the planning process, while at the same time using the ensuing product to stimulate discussion beyond what would be possible without the design. Drawing on a case study taken from the teaching environment, this paper takes the position that design, both as an iterative process and as a participatory field-research process in the form of charrettes, may successfully be employed as a methodology to establish a dialog between researchers (in this case student-practitioners) and user groups. The latter provide initial design information to the researcher while at the same time using evolving products of the research to help define further parameters for exploration. This methodological approach has helped to focus the student-architects on genuine aspects of design problems, as opposed to self-fabricated ones.
Journal of Design, Planning and Aesthetics Research
Participatory design is the involvement of people in the creation and management of their built and natural environments. Its strengths are that it cuts across traditional professional boundaries and cultures. The activity of participatory design is based on the principle that the built and natural environments work better if citizens are active and involved in its creation and management instead of being treated as passive consumers. The main purposes of participation are to involve citizens in planning and design decision-making processes and, as a result increase their trust and confidence in organizations, making it more likely that they will work within established systems when seeking solutions to problems; to provide citizens with a voice in planning, design and decision-making in order to improve plans, decisions, service delivery, and overall quality of the environment; and to promote a sense of community by bringing people together who share common goals. A wide range of t...
User involvement in building design – a state-of-the-art review
Pós. Revista do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Arquitetura e Urbanismo da FAUUSP
This paper reports results of a systematic literature review on the definitions and levels of user involvement in the design process. Although many studies have highlighted the importance of user involvement for the quality of both process and final product, the term still lacks a clear definition and different models describe diverse involvement levels, which are detrimental to the advancement of knowledge in the area. The present study focused on the mapping of definitions of user involvement and comparisons of the different proposals of involvement levels for outlining a clear definition of the term, based on the levels of involvement, and contributing to the consolidation of the theory of user involvement in the field of architectural design. Moreover, this research assists architects to find the most appropriate level of user involvement for the design they are developing, improving the practice of involving users in the design process.
Participatory Design Approach in Architectural Education, a Field Survey About User Satisfaction
New Trends and Issues Proceedings on Humanities and Social Sciences, 2017
This study aims to emphasize the importance of participatory design approach in architectural education via user satisfaction through recently applied public project.The field study is conducted in 2013, and Kucukcekmece Urban Square Project is chosen to examine the users meanings and the responds of the designs. Observation and interview were used in the study. Following the search, it's seen that majority is not satisfied with the new organization. Users compared the new one with the old square and said that the new square could be better.In conjunction with architectural design education, participatory design approach should be involved to the studio. With participatory design in education, students will learn to respect rights and thought of users and so, there will be satisfied users and this situation will contribute to provide social sustainability.