VISTA VERSA – Critical Considerations on the Evolvement of Designerly Attitudes, Instruments and Networks in Design Driven Studies

Keynote Paper - We are all involved in design.Besides being the (sub)conscious recipients of all sorts of design driven activities, we are professionally concerned with products of design and acts of designing, either as practitioners or as academics, in some cases as both… As someone who was trained as a designer, drifted into design teaching and presently attempts to combine composition research with design practice, I feel there is a need to bridge the cultural gap between design and design research. I intend to put forward the case for more designerly approaches in the study of design. In this context I would like to discuss perspectives for design driven studies by considering the following ensemble of aspects:- the matter of shifting attitudes to design in a scientific context; - the necessity of expanding the scope of instruments of design in relation to methods and insights. - the furthering of opportunities for networks aimed at bringing out and communicating findings concerning different aspects of design.It is on the topic of interaction, between the targeted creativity of designing on the one hand and the open minded search for relevant knowledge, insights and applications on the other, that I would like to dwell. Furthermore, I hope to provoke some thoughts – and hopefully responses – concerning the roles of computer based applications in such studies. What kinds of impulses have computer technologies offered, should they perhaps have offered and indeed might they still be able to offer in this field? I would like to by take a critical look back and try to turn things around, towards a possible view forward…