Category: Design engagement

  • Design@50 – Design in a Time of Climate Emergency

    Design@50 – Design in a Time of Climate Emergency

    The latest Design@50 event focused on the topic Design in a Time of Climate Emergency, featuring reflections and discussion between Prof Stephen Peake, Dr Emma Dewberry, Dr Alessandra Campoli and Dr Derek Jones. The event also featured archive footage from the first Open University course that introduced design, connecting it to far broader issues around […]

  • What did YOU do in the War (against Covid19)? Engaging a response to the covid pandemic through visual communication.

    What did YOU do in the War (against Covid19)? Engaging a response to the covid pandemic through visual communication.

    It seems we might just, finally, be starting to win our battle against the scourge of covid. In fighting an invisible enemy that has had such a devastatingly tangible impact, it is not surprising that the rhetoric has sometimes carried metaphors of war. COBRA meetings in Whitehall and the Queen urging the country to remain […]

  • Growing cross-sector design collaboration in placemaking

    Growing cross-sector design collaboration in placemaking

    The UK Government recently announced its Levelling Up plan aiming to ‘spread opportunity more equally across the UK’, and to narrow the social and economic disparities that exist across different places. Part of this plan is to give more power to local governments to regenerate their own town and cities. Placemaking is back on the agenda, […]

  • Christian Nold: Mapping, Generative Coding, Science and Technology Studies and Systemic design

    Christian Nold: Mapping, Generative Coding, Science and Technology Studies and Systemic design

    Hi, my name is Christian Nold and I started at the OU in September 2021 as a Lecturer in Design. In this text I want to introduce myself and offer a few themes from my work that might be relevant to both design teaching and research such as mapping, generative coding, Science and Technology Studies […]

  • Creative Activism, COP26, Emerging and Forgotten Voices

    Creative Activism, COP26, Emerging and Forgotten Voices

    Today is the last day of COP26 and, being based in Glasgow, I thought it would be a good time to share some thoughts and images. I don’t want to write about COP26 itself, but rather about how creative activism has reshaped the city space and visually and emotionally engaged people in the last two […]

  • Working towards gender equality at the School of Engineering and Innovation

    Working towards gender equality at the School of Engineering and Innovation

    I am very proud to say that the School of Engineering and Innovation, which Design is part of, has received an Athena SWAN Silver Award following its recent submission to AdvanceHE. Athena SWAN is an internationally-recognised gender equality initiative, acting as a catalyst for change and cultural transformation, which enables staff and students to achieve […]

  • Incubating Civic Leadership

    Incubating Civic Leadership

    Much of the research we do at the Design Group is driven by a sense of care for people, our places and the planet, and an aspiration to use design to enthuse and empower people to create better futures. We often focus on the struggles but also creativity of everyday people, especially those that are […]

  • Some Research Conclusions… with Playmobil!

    Some Research Conclusions… with Playmobil!

    My research is investigating ways to reduce carbon emissions from heritage buildings while retaining their heritage values, I have mostly completed my data collection and am now in the process of analysing it all. Once again the OU Graduate School are running a research poster competition that includes a multimedia option and this seemed like […]

  • Homeworld ’81 revisited

    Homeworld ’81 revisited

    The Homeworld ’81 BBC Future Home 2000  Last month I attended one of the online events celebrating the 40thanniversary of the Milton Keynes Homeworld ‘81 exhibition. Yes, I am old enough to have been there (so was Robin Roy and a number of other old timers from the OU). Indeed, as I was covering the […]

  • Co-designing inclusive design education

    Co-designing inclusive design education

    How can we shape an inclusive design education that is responsive to the diversity of students’ needs, interests and professional and personal context? This was a question we started exploring yesterday in an online workshop with students from our current Design and Innovation qualification. We feel so fortunate to have had the opportunity to hear […]