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DRS Conference Volumes

The Design Research Society has been publishing bound volumes of its conferences since 1971, collecting together an historic record of the development of design research and design thinking.

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Proceedings of IASDR 2023: Life-changing Design

Daniela De Sainz Molestina, Laura Galluzzo, Francesca Rizzo, and Davide Spallazzo

This volume is the proceedings of the 10th biennial congress of IASDR, the International Association for Societies of Design Research, hosted by the Politecnico di Milano, 9–13 October 2023. With its overarching theme of “Life-Changing Design” and its diverse thematic tracks, IASDR2023 presented an exceptional opportunity for researchers, scholars, and practitioners to engage with the dynamic landscape of design research. The conference served as a platform for robust discussions, knowledge sharing, and the exploration of innovative solutions to society’s complex challenges. By examining these thematic tracks and their intersection with the central theme, “Life-Changing Design,” the conference contributed to the ongoing dialogue surrounding design research and its transformative potential, fostering a deeper understanding of design’s role in shaping our world.
Proceedings of Inaugural Designing Retail and Service Futures Colloquium

Katelijn Quartier, Bethan Alexander, Zakkiya Khan, Francesca Murialdo, and Mia Münster

These proceedings were created by compiling the papers presented at the first colloquium of the Special Interest Group (SIG) Designing Retail & Service Futures from the Design Research Society (DRS). The SIG was established in 2021. The SIG strives to gain a better understanding of the value of design in the commercial sector, including disciplines, such as interior design, architecture, retail and hospitality, branding, marketing, strategic design, design management and consumer psychology. Design and its value have been a subject of study for many years and from many different disciplinary perspectives (ranging from product design to marketing, business economics, service design, management, environmental psychology, (interior)architecture, etc.). However, these perspectives have been developed in a fragmented way with discrete research methods and results that present limitations to practically applying these findings holistically across the inter-related fields of design, retail, and services
Proceedings of Nordes 2023: This Space Intentionally Left [Blank]

Vanessa Rodrigues, Carl Westin, and Stefan Holmlid

This volume is the proceedings of the 10th biennial Nordes conference, hosted by Linköping University, 12 – 14 June 2023. All contributions relate in different ways to the overall theme, ‘This Space Intentionally Left [Blank]’.

A blank space—a silence, pause, interstice, gap, in-between, opening, punctuation, negative space—can be deliberately or incidentally devoid of content. A space left blank is as much an invitation to notice the void and the structure that surrounds it, as it is a question as to why and how they are per- ceived. Such absence can remind us to seek out conscious or unconscious intentions hidden in plain sight. Philosophies and worldviews that acknowled- ge the importance of ‘absence’, ‘emptiness’ or ‘nothingness’ consider eve- rything to be relational, fluid, dynamic and ‘in-between’, rather than the binary dualism that linger from Cartesian constructs. Do we pay these blank spaces enough attention, as integrated parts of design practice and design research?
DRS2022: Bilbao

Dan Lockton, Sara Lenzi, Paul Hekkert, Arlene Oak, Juan Sádaba, and Peter Lloyd

DRS2022 is the biggest and most ambitious DRS conference to date. The conference brings together over 800 participants and 315 paper presentations which you can find in this volume of conference paper abstracts. DRS2022 extends the field of design research further outwards, bringing new perspectives to disciplines such as anthropology, politics, economics, healthcare, and others. Core subject areas continue to develop, with new methods, approaches, technologies, and philosophies all evident in these proceedings. Also emerging is a focus on how to deal with our uncertain futures, for example through societal transitions, transdisciplinarity, transformations, and pluriversality. The themes that have emerged for DRS2022 represent a rich snapshot of the current state of the art in world design research.
Learn X Design 2021: Engaging with Challenges in Design Education (Volume 1)

Erik Bohemia, Liv Merete Nielsen, Lusheng Pan, Naz A G Z Börekçi, and Yang Zhang
Learn X Design 2021: Engaging with Challenges in Design Education (Volume 2)

Erik Bohemia, Liv Merete Nielsen, Lusheng Pan, Naz A G Z Börekçi, and Yang Zhang
Learn X Design 2021: Engaging with Challenges in Design Education (Volume 3)

Erik Bohemia, Liv Merete Nielsen, Lusheng Pan, Naz A G Z Börekçi, and Yang Zhang
Learn X Design 2021: Engaging with Challenges in Design Education (Volume 4)

Erik Bohemia, Liv Merete Nielsen, Lusheng Pan, Naz A G Z Börekçi, and Yang Zhang
Proceedings of Nordes 2021: Matters of Scale

Eva Brandt, Thomas Markussen, Eeva Berglund, Guy Julier, and Per Linde

This volume is the proceedings of the 9th biennial Nordes conference, hosted by Design School Kolding and the University of Southern Denmark, 15 – 18 August 2021. All contributions relate in different ways to the overall theme, ‘Matters of Scale’.

Designers are often invited to upscale their efforts to help solve the big challenges facing our societies and the planet. But just as often, the idea of upscaling is met with a critical requirement to evaluate, document and account for design-initiated change. Otherwise, the idea easily ends up representing “the overblown claims”, as Geoff Mulgan once called them, that unfortunately stick to design.
Proceedings of Pivot 2021: Dismantling / Reassembling

Renata Marques Leitão, Immony Men, Lesley-Ann Noel, Jananda Lima, and Tieni Meninato

This volume contains the proceedings for Pivot 2021, the 2nd International conference of the Pluriversal Design Special Interest Group of the Design Research Society (DRS). The conference was held in collaboration with the Public Visualization Lab of OCAD University and invited designers, scholars, artists, and changemakers for two days of intercultural conversations about decoloniality and societal transformation. Pivot 2021 aimed to identify tools and practices of dismantling and reassembling that could favour ways of reshaping human presence on Earth and concrete cases of alternative future-making from all around the world.
Proceedings of DRS2020 International Conference, Vol. 1: Synergy, Situations

Stella Boess, Ming Cheung, and Rebecca Cain

The overall theme for DRS2020 is Synergy – the coming together of people and disciplines in design research to create a positive impact. On the one hand, design research champions the uniqueness of disciplinary knowledge and creativity, yet on the other hand, the complex world we now live in demands a more synergistic approach to creativity and problem- solving whereby different mindsets, backgrounds and perspectives come together to realise transformative visions of the future. DRS2020 celebrates these emerging synergistic approaches to design research and seeks to explore their exciting possibilities for addressing multi-faceted problems, supporting participation, and transforming problematic situations into desirable ones.
Proceedings of DRS2020 International Conference, Vol. 2: Impacts

Stella Boess, Ming Cheung, and Rebecca Cain

The overall theme for DRS2020 is Synergy – the coming together of people and disciplines in design research to create a positive impact. On the one hand, design research champions the uniqueness of disciplinary knowledge and creativity, yet on the other hand, the complex world we now live in demands a more synergistic approach to creativity and problem- solving whereby different mindsets, backgrounds and perspectives come together to realise transformative visions of the future. DRS2020 celebrates these emerging synergistic approaches to design research and seeks to explore their exciting possibilities for addressing multi-faceted problems, supporting participation, and transforming problematic situations into desirable ones.
Proceedings of DRS2020 International Conference, Vol. 3: Co-Creation

Stella Boess, Ming Cheung, and Rebecca Cain

The overall theme for DRS2020 is Synergy – the coming together of people and disciplines in design research to create a positive impact. On the one hand, design research champions the uniqueness of disciplinary knowledge and creativity, yet on the other hand, the complex world we now live in demands a more synergistic approach to creativity and problem- solving whereby different mindsets, backgrounds and perspectives come together to realise transformative visions of the future. DRS2020 celebrates these emerging synergistic approaches to design research and seeks to explore their exciting possibilities for addressing multi-faceted problems, supporting participation, and transforming problematic situations into desirable ones.
Proceedings of DRS2020 International Conference, Vol. 4: Education

Stella Boess, Ming Cheung, and Rebecca Cain

The overall theme for DRS2020 is Synergy – the coming together of people and disciplines in design research to create a positive impact. On the one hand, design research champions the uniqueness of disciplinary knowledge and creativity, yet on the other hand, the complex world we now live in demands a more synergistic approach to creativity and problem- solving whereby different mindsets, backgrounds and perspectives come together to realise transformative visions of the future. DRS2020 celebrates these emerging synergistic approaches to design research and seeks to explore their exciting possibilities for addressing multi-faceted problems, supporting participation, and transforming problematic situations into desirable ones.
Proceedings of DRS2020 International Conference, Vol. 5: Processes

Stella Boess, Ming Cheung, and Rebecca Cain

The overall theme for DRS2020 is Synergy – the coming together of people and disciplines in design research to create a positive impact. On the one hand, design research champions the uniqueness of disciplinary knowledge and creativity, yet on the other hand, the complex world we now live in demands a more synergistic approach to creativity and problem- solving whereby different mindsets, backgrounds and perspectives come together to realise transformative visions of the future. DRS2020 celebrates these emerging synergistic approaches to design research and seeks to explore their exciting possibilities for addressing multi-faceted problems, supporting participation, and transforming problematic situations into desirable ones.
Proceedings of Pivot 2020: Designing a world of many centers

Renata Marques Leitão, Lesley-Ann Noel, and Laura Murphy

The virtual un-conference Pivot 2020 invited participants to consider how to design a ‘world of many centers and voices.’ In this forum, the aim was to pivot the discussion around decolonization from a critical perspective to a creative and generative one. The efforts to dismantle structures of oppression and hegemonic narratives have to be coupled with efforts to design otherwise and generate a different world. To refer to this world, the conference adopted the concept of the Pluriverse, proposed by Arturo Escobar (2018), which refers to a “world where many worlds fit”, in contrast to the “universal” single world generated by coloniality/modernity. Within the single world worldview, Western Europe and, subsequently, North America have been viewed as the main focus of what is good, innovative and desirable—namely The Center. The rest of the world, and its countless cultures, ways of knowing and ways of designing, have been peripheral to the main narrative of the world. Currently, as the movement to decolonize design gains strength, stages of the Center have been featuring more diverse voices, starting to include people who have been excluded from the main narrative of design. The purpose, however, of a radical design practice is not to fix the Center, but to help to create a world with multiple centers, in which many realities can co-exist. Therefore the following questions were asked at the conference: What does a world in which many worlds fit look like? What is needed to create this reality? Who is needed to support this change?
Proceedings of Learn X Design 2019: Insider Knowledge

Naz A.G.Z. Börekçi, Dalsu Özgen Koçyıldırım, Fatma Korkut, and Derek Jones

The Fifth DRS Learn X Design International Conference for Design Education Researchers took place July 9-12, 2019 with the main theme “Insider Knowledge” at Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey. A total of 111 paper submissions, 11 workshop proposals, and 28 PhD Pit-Stop applications were received. In all, 86 papers were presented and six workshops were conducted in a variety of topics, ranging from emerging practices in design education to innovative approaches in bridging design education and society. The conference hosted 150 delegates from 81 institutions in 31 countries.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 1: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 2: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 3: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 4: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 5: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 6: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of DRS2018 International Conference, Vol. 7: Design as a catalyst for change

Cristiano Storni, Keelin Leahy, Muireann McMahon, Peter Lloyd, and Erik Bohemia

A catalyst is something that precipitates events; it is the coming together of different entities to generate something new; it is the spark for wider change. Framed by the Catalyst theme, these proceedings explore existing and emergent areas at the intersections of design research, practice, education and policy.
Proceedings of the Design Research Society Learn X Design Conference, 2017: The Allure of the Digital and Beyond

Gary Pritchard and Nick Lambert

The Conference was held in London at Ravensbourne on the Greenwich Peninsula. It brought together researchers and practitioners with an international reach and from a wide variety of education design settings with the intention of connecting emergent models and ideas around the digital, with the scholarship of teaching and learning. We also looked to issues beyond the attraction of the digital in learning: other ways of acting, knowing and becoming in design – in the full range of educational settings from kindergarten to PhD.

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