Designing for wellbeing

needs to get “out there” and build a personal relationship between the place,
their own reality and their professional standpoint. We found it difficult
to represent the final result because the creative process was an integral
part of the result. We do not know how to re-contextualise the ideas to be
exciting also for those who did not take part in the fieldwork. We tried
traditional presentations, storytelling, video making and leaflets, but we
are not happy with the agency of presentations. However brilliant the
presentations are, they are only shadows of having had the experience.
All we can say is that we believe the joint design ethnography of the
future opens novel paths for suburban development. The students did
not give answers, let alone polished design objects, but instead raised
fresh and meaningful questions to be reflected upon further. Complex
changes in society, which suburban development is definitely about, call
for sophisticated methods. The sophistication does not need to mean
going and improving drawing and model-making skills or the meticulous
application of a carefully designed set of research methods. Instead, one
needs to cultivate social skills to encounter and engage with people, find
a location to act as a designer, and collectively re-imagine the every day.
The design studio in the field is about being involved in a change.
98 · Design studio in the field