Design games as a tool, a mindset and a structure Kirsikka Vaajakallio

collage material, first created to meet the particular needs of Active@work,
in several co-design gatherings. Although they were initially project-specific,
their ambiguity allows using them from one project to another (Figure 19).
Fig.19
The same Make Tools kit has been utilised for example in “Situated Make Tools”, “Co-design
among young children” and “Co-design as embodied practise” (The images are in chronological
order).
When Iacucci and Kuutti (2002) conducted the “on the move with the
magic thing” experiments, they used a simple mock-up, a magic thing, to
support users’ thinking and acting. The magic thing is open in nature, and
it can do anything the user can imagine, in a manner similar to the dream
device in our Situated Make Tools’ study. In the study presented by Halse
(2008), the mock-up provided had already a certain form and features
based on the earlier phases of the design process, whereas in our case the
ageing workers built their dream device from scratch. Thus, our approach
was closer to the generative methods utilised by Sanders (e.g. 2006).
Fig.20
Ageing workers built their dream devices from the provided Make Tools material instead of
receiving mock-ups done by others.
Generative tools include design representations, which are ambiguous to
encourage people to express their needs and dreams through building simple
mock-ups or visual collages. Thus, Make Tools can vary from visual collages
to three-dimensional artefacts, but the basic idea remains: according
to Sanders (e.g. 2006), these toolkits work as scaffolds for experiences. By
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