Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The coming of
post-industrial
design
NI GEL CROSS
Milton
Keyn~s.
UK
T HE GENERATION GAME
Accord ing to Archer', 'design methodology is al ive and
well'. This may have come as a surprise to many who had
assumed that the subject was now (like so many of the
delicate offspring of the 1960s) well and truly dead.
Such an assumption was clearly prematuro, if he is
right. However, Archer might be presumed to have a vested
interest in trying to keep the subject alive on his hospital
gence o f a major new, systematic and scientific design process, the actual achievements have been very modest. This
0142- 694X/8 1/01 0003-06 S02.00 1981 IPC Business Press Ltd
DESIGN STUDIES
Crisis in technology
Why should design be in such a crisis period now? My own
view is that it is closely connected with the crisis in technology. Design, the conception and creation of new artefacts,
is the central function in a technology which has been facing
the crim of energy and resources, and the criticisms of the
antitechnocrats and alternativo technologists.
lf, from these unprecedented crises and criticisms,
a new technology emerges, it will need new, postindustrial
design methods. Justas the pioneers of the Modern Move
ment recognized the need for new design concepts to match
the new technology of the 20th centurv. so the pioneers of
the postModern movement recognize the need for new
design concepts to match the emergent technology of the
21st century.
T here has been sorne confusion over the concept
of the past but much simpler, cheaper and freer than the
present technology of the affluent world.
The idea of a resourceconserving socety based on parsi
mony, and the idea of a toolusing society seeking auto
nomv for the human being, come together in yet a third
key ooncept: quality 20 This notion of quality comes
from within, and the quality of society can be made
right only if ind ividual values are first of all right.
These notions, again, connect with another: the idea of
social and economic life reorganized in small-scale units . .
A resource~conserving society, since it must minimize
To
economic growth
human growth
increasing specialization
increasing urbanization
intreasing centralization
des4gn
lndus1fial design
Ponindunr&al desif'l
Proctucts are:
speciahz.e d
si ngle1)t.lrpose
shorHived
rec:laceable
Ptoducn ert:
generallted
mulu.purpote
longh...ed
repeiroble
mass.oroduced
shon-run
standardlzed
optimum
CUSI Omized
satisfactorv
Procen is:
Proeess ls:
autocrotlc
lnternellzed
dcmoctotlc:
e xternol l7ttd
exclusive
Inclusive
intunsive
e xttns!vtt
rlgld
reltxed
Ooslgncrs ar(l :
Designet1 are:
creative
colloborollve
ndividuel
enonvmous
prOfessional
peniciPlltory
Participatory design
PerhapS t he most obvious example of a shilt towards a new
desogn paradigm is offered by the experiments in design
panicipation. Originally seen by R ittel as just thc initiation
of a second generation of design methods, the participatory
design techniques are growing into a generally-accepted ncw
approach to design - particularly in arehitecture and environ
ment.1l design.
Many examples of panicipatorv design have been
reponed in the past few years. The concept now feels fami
liar. but we should remember tha1 less than ten years ago it
was a novelty, and only 15 vears ago i t was practicallv
unheard of.
The examples now range from rather token nvolve
ment of future tenants in public housing schemes. such as
the Bvker housing in Newcastle, to the stilllimited but detalled
involvement o ffe red by the PSSHAK system in London, to tho
more f undamental user involvement that wns attempted at
the University of Louvain, Belgium.
One of the most successful experiments appears to
have been that of the small housing development buill in
1974 at Klostermuren in Sweden. The neighbourhood of o
dozen houses was designed in general layout and in the
dctails of its houses by the group of future owner-occup1ers,
with the architect, Johannes Ol ivegren, playing the 'midwife'
role of skilled assistDnt at the 'bor th'.
This role is a radical change from that which archi
tec:ts are traditionally educated and e xpected to play, and
s indicative of the shift in attitudes that is underway.
The motive of panicipatory design underlies much
of the recent v1ork of AJexander. for e xample as in the Oregon
Experiment of university planning and design.11 AJexander's
'pattern language is an auempt to re-thmk and recast envuon
mental design so that it is understandable by and accessble
to everyone. like other languages. n
Argumentative planning
Although planning was supposed to become more open an<J
pal'ticipatory in the last decade, there are few signs of
genume structural change in the plannmg procedures. The
most important changes of att itude have occurred no t wlth
the planners but with thc planned : peoplt: have simply
refused to accept that the planner$ know best and are
working for the general welfare o f the community .
The result has been a growing number of popular
resistance movements against the plans for roads, airports,
reservors, pawer stations and such like schemes for the
disruption of communi ties and environments.
Protesters have takcn a new. argumemativc stoncc
which has meant that planning procedures have become
lengthier as the planners ha ve been forced to jus t ify thci
plans in the tace of organized opposition .
DESIGN STUO I ES
London airport.
Socially-responsible design
CONCLUSIONS
'Don't blame me, 1 only work here' is a saying that only has
meaning in industrial societv. People's lives are fragmented,
and responsibi lities are divided and sub-divided until noone
can really be held responsible for anything.
People find themselves designing and making things
that thoy would rather not, and which they would refuse
to design and make if they really felt responsible for their
actions; but it is easy to abdica te responsibility to 'the
system'. The result, at bes t. is badly designed and poorly
made goods; at worst it is the production of goods that
are positively harmful and dangerous.
Onc significant painter toa move away from this
REFERENCES
1
Eco.<fesign
One positive aspect of the crises faced by industrial societies
has be~n the way these have torced a reappraisal of design
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10
11
12
13
14
15
(19721
119751
Bell, O 'Notet on the pon.indunrial soci1y' The Public
Interese (Winter 196n
Bell, O Thtl coming of postindustrilll sociery Heinetnann,
L.ondon ( 19741