An hour and a half from Miami I look out from the airplane window at clusters of blue tents scattered about the dense city of Port-au-Prince, the outskirts lined with transitional shelters, and the rugged mountains towering just behind. We have arrived to Haiti.
Rafael and I landed in Port-au-Prince yesterday morning with excitement after nearly a three month wait. After clearing through customs we proceded outside where a local driver was waiting for us, and he drove us to the nearby Grassroots United compound where we are stationed as a base for our activites. There are many organizations and individuals working on all types of projects ranging from health and education, to construction and microfinance. We were welcomed in good spirits and spent the day getting oriented and meeting some of the fifty plus people staying here.
After breakfast this morning we tagged along with a volunteer to his work-site where he is helping to set up a school in one of the camps, and we piled into one tap-tap after another (modified pick-up trucks used as shared taxis) as we navigated our way through the maze of the bustling capital. After about 40 minutes we arrived at one of the shelter camps on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince called Canaan and were greeted by playful children who wanted to hold our hands as we walked around. The volunteer estimated there are 5,000 people living in small shelters scattered along the treeless hillside. This is one of the smaller camps, he said. The living conditions there are very difficult. With no electricity or running water, let alone a sewage system, there is almost no livelihood on site aside from some small garden plots where people grow what they can to eat or sell--and water is scarce. The people are not living here by choice so much as necessity. This camp is located about 25 minutes by tap-tap from any kind of market or workplace. ACF International has been distributing drinking water and removing human waste. When I asked someone what would happen if ACF International were to stop distributing drinking water, he simply replied, there wouldn't be any water. We met a man along the path who is living there with his wife and daughter. He invited us into his plywood house where he now lives. Almost in tears he told us about how he used to own a pharmacy, but since he lost his home and store in the quake he has not been able to find a job. Thankfully his wife still works at the hospital so they can buy food for themselves. Many families like this have no safety nets to fall back on. We showed him pictures of our shelter design, and he was very excited and supportive of our idea. With proper financing tools, he said, we would certainly find homes for middle class families still looking for the land titles to rebuild their homes on.
Tomorrow we are going with the founders of Builders Without Borders to visit a housing exhibition available housing unit designs for Haiti (Building Back Better Communities).
Thứ Hai, 31 tháng 1, 2011
Liquidlogic Boat Designs for the Future
So we threw the question out to you all on the Liquidlogic Facebook page. What are the boats you would like to see Liquidlogic work on in the near future? The response was pretty amazing. After wading through 100 plus responses on one FB thread, 50 on another thread, 40 on a blog post, many emails, texts, and chats I came up with this list of designs that you all mentioned. Now lets hone down the details and see where we end up. This post will appear on the Liquidlogic Facebook Page add your comments there for any or all of these design ideas. If you have more to add go for it.Flat Hulled Creeker
How flat is a flat hulled creeker? How long? How many gallons? What are some important features (in boat design, not accessories and outfitting) you would like to see in this boat?
Bigger Remix
Brad I think this was you. A bigger Remix really?! :), Woody paddles the 79 pretty happily at 6'4" and 250lbs. But I would like to hear the reasoning.
Here was a good one from the facebook page.
Josh Brown
To many great ideas here. Just put one somewhere in the middle for me that mows grass, baby sits the kids, and shaves body hair. Then I might have enough time to go kayaking and I'll buy 2 of your plain kayaks.
Narrower Remix SeriesWe can't change an existing boat like this. It would mean building all new molds for the series. So I would like to hear about a boat you would like without comparing it to the Remix Series. A narrower river runner with speed I am assuming. Now fill in the blanks.
Brad again I am assuming. How many gallons? How long?
85 Gallon Creeker or in between Jefe and Jefe Grande
That is a very specific request. Have you paddled both boats and really find that neither works for you? Or are you just worried that the "volumes" aren't good for you. Why should it be 85 gallons? What will that do that the 80 or 90 gallon versions won't be able to do?
I think that volume is the most over rated criteria for boats especially creek boats. It works as a place to start searching but testing and demoing boats is the only way to tell how the boat paddles for your size, weight, height, etc... The Jefe Grande is being paddled very hard and happily by paddlers weighing 160lbs and up to 260. Most seem to love it.
C-1 Specific Boat
Explain please. How is it different? What type of boat? Size?
C-1, K-1, SOT, Combo Platter,etc.
Craig explain yourself and how you are going to pay for this.
Surf Boat
I would like to make a surf boat but what I would really like to do is make another generation of a surf boat design I did a couple years ago.
Kids Boat
We did the Remix 47 a few years ago. I am really psyched with this boat. They are able to paddle it downstream with confidence, roll it well, and have a great time. What other kids specific boats would you like to see out there?
Modern Gus
Interesting request. What are the performance characteristics that you see in the Gus that you would like to see carried on in a new design?
River Running Playboat
There are many river running playboats. What type of RRPlay boat are you thinking of? Length, Volumes, and types of play. Would you lean more towards play, more towards river running, or stick it right between.
Playboat
What would you like to see in a new Liquidlogic playboat design.
Remix Creeker
What does a Remix Creeker mean? What are the characteristics of the Remix Creeker?
Longer XP boats
The request was for 12 and 14 foot versions of the XP. What will the 12 and 14 do that the 9 and 10 won't? Is it speed? Carrying capacity? Is it a touring boat?
Longer Remix
My guess is this is an old school boat or maybe a Stinger type boat. How long? What do you want to do with it?
Longer Creeker
How long are we talking? What is too long? What do you gain? What do you lose?
Super Squish Remix
I am thinking of this as a long river running playboat focused towards surfing and stern squirting like the old Sleek and Cruise Controls. Is that the idea?
Expedition Boat (hatch)
This boat sounded like a full on creek boat with a hatch and more durable outfitting but is there anything in the boat design itself that separates it?
Long Playboat
How long? What is the performance desired? What types of tricks or moves are you looking to do in it?
Stinger
What would you change to the Stinger at this point? We would love to bring it into a production mold. It is really expensive though, but people sure do seem to love it.
Sea Kayak
Something that has "LL style" was the quote. That would be a fun project to tackle. How long? What features are important? And also What is LL style?
Shorter Versa Board
The Versa Board was really popular for us last year. A shorter Versa Board would be really fun. What could you do with a shorter Versa Board? How short?
Composite playboat
That would be fun but will anyone pay for it? How much would you pay for a composite playboat?
and a Pink boat
I like the idea of a Pink kayak but we tried that once and didn't sell very many. I even had a pink boat (yes I really did). What other colors?
Thanks for checking this out and add your comments to the facebook posts about Boat Design.
Cheers
Shane
Thứ Năm, 27 tháng 1, 2011
January 2011– London Revit User Group
So last night we held our London Revit User Group meeting. The group is almost 12 months old and we are going from strength to strength. Also, the London group has started the ball rolling with the user group message spreading and similar groups forming in Bristol, Leeds and Glasgow. Yesterday’s meeting was extra special as we had visiting guests from the good old US of A. Laura Handler Q5/Tocci and John Tocci Jnr Gilbane where in town promoting / demonstrating their VDC (virtual design construction) experiences and skills. It was a very interesting insight into how they approach things.
They discussed lonely BIM, social BIM and briefly touched on intimate BIM (a slightly dodgy term in my opinion), they briefed us on how they developed a BIM execution plan and how they used and managed the BIM model for construction purposes. An interesting aspect of this whole talk was their approach to the BIM in general, they just do it! No if’s and but’s, just plan ahead and go for it. “It’s entrenched in our DNA” explained Laura.
Image process map courtesy of Q5 the company
Another thought-provoking point was where Laura and John saw the UK in terms of BIM adoption. I have to say, their view was not totally inline with what I see and hopefully as they travel through the UK they may get a better picture. Whilst I think the UK was ahead in the early days of BIM adoption, certainly through keen advocates of the methodologies, for one reason or another it lost its way and it has not filtered through to the mainstream. They suggested that the UK industry is 5 years behind the US, I would argue that case, maybe 18 months, but certainly not 5 years. Many firms in the UK still use a 2d deliver process, its engrained in the mentality, but it’s no different worldwide and I would probably suggest that it’s the same case in the US, but I am happy to be proven wrong.
There are many challenges in the UK industry and for that reason BIM adoption is slow; lack of client understanding, the perceived cost of implementation, lack of BIM trained individuals, the way consultants are appointed, limited support from the professional bodies, the role of the contactor, lack of government support, the blame game culture have all accumulated into the situation we have now. Saying that, I would agree that the US have over taken us Brits because for too long we talked about it, rather the recognising this was an opportunity for change. Much has been written about BIM and the integrated approach to construction, you only needed to read at the Egan report and that was 1988! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egan_Report
Nevertheless I certainly believe 2011 will be a big year for BIM in the UK. Paul Morrell is the UK government's Chief Construction Advisor he is actively pushing for BIM delivery. He has indicated that publically procured building projects will be required to adopt BIM. He was quoted at last years Autodesk BIM event saying “We have commissioned a team drawn from BIM users across the industry, both clients and suppliers, and software developers, to prepare a route map that shows how we can make a progressive move to the routine use of BIM. I am convinced that this is the way to unlock new ways of working that will reduce cost and add long-term value to the development and management of built assets in the public sector”.
So times are a changing for the BIM in the UK. This is great news in my opinion. If the government do adopt BIM in this fashion on all publically procured projects, the flood gates will open and it will drive adoption across the private sector as well. But I suspect we may well end up with a two tiered industry, those that BIM and those that don’t!
Thứ Ba, 25 tháng 1, 2011
What design ideas do you want Liquidlogic to produce in the near future?
It’s that time of year again. The design cycle here at Liquidlogic has us working on future concepts, designs and improvements. Each year, we start the process with many different projects and whittle them down to the few that we think most deserve to make the cut. This year we have so many designs in mind that we thought those of you interested in our boats might want to weigh in on what you’d most like to see Liquidlogic pursue in the coming year or two.
We want your input on anything you think we should and could do better. If you have an idea, or would like to see us develop a specific boat design, fire away! If you envision a way to improve Bad Ass Outfitting, let us know. Even the smallest parts of a kayak make a big difference, and we want to perfect every detail. On the Liquidlogic Facebook Discussion Page you can take part in the discussion. We want your input.
Shane
Vasari - Design Patterns
I have followed Zach Kronz blog articles on Parametric Design Patterns with interest. If you haven’t seen what he was been doing, shame on you. Get yourself over to his blog asap and be prepared to be wowed; there is much for you to learn my young padawan! Anyway, a few years ago I started experimenting with curtain walls in Revit and was particularly interested in seeing if I could create some of the design patterns and tessellated forms that Erin Hauer had developed. Then few weeks back I was passing Arups London office, they are located just over the road from HOK’s London office and I noticed that they had a decorative screen using one of Hauers design to sub-divided part of the office. Sadly I got the bug again and started experimenting to see if I could re-created this screen. I think I got reasonably close by using one of Zach Kronz true hexagon panels from the Parametric Design pattern articles and some nested adaptive components.
Its not as pure as the original design as I was unable to create a curved surface with three major anchor points which would remain adaptive.
Anyway, I will run in to the technicalities of how to create this in a future blog article. I may well use this as a platform to model examples of buildings and designs I see of complex forms on my daily trip into the office. In the meantime, I hope you find these interesting.
Thứ Sáu, 21 tháng 1, 2011
Inclusive Design: Invitation to Davos
Inclusive Design for Development in India
Prof M P Ranjan
Design Thinker & Independent Academic, Ahmedabad
I have been invited to speak at Davos on the 28th January 2011 as part of the India - Future of Change initiative's event on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum. The event is a panel discussion moderated by Tim Brown and the focus is on Design, Innovation and Entrepreneurship for development in India. The India - Future of Change has a huge task ahead of them and the various events planned by the team is covered at their website here. I have prepared a background note that explores the contours of the Inclusive Design agenda and makes a call for drastic change in the design establishment in India so that these changes can start playing a constructive role here in India and some of these could be influenced by the happenings at Davos next week. The full text of my submission is quoted below and it is also carried at the India - Future of Change website as well.
Quote:
"If we do not work on more prototypes which mainfest in action all our collective understanding regarding our relation to living, work and celebration, then design will indeed not do its bit for India. We talk too much, and do less. Or do in areas or in ways that only talk the same language of legacy thinking. No other nation in the world has the opportunity as we do, since our diversity is the trait which helps us survive, and yet design is working to strip that down to a singular or mono-cultures."
Poonam Bir Kasturi, Bangalore
UnQuote
In 2009 the design community from India was represented by proxy at Davos since the NID team was involved in the design of five posters on sustainability that were used as a backdrop by a high power committee of CEO's from the consumer products industries. I had reported about these posters in previous blog posts here on Design for India blog. However this year the India Future of Change team has decided to distribute these posters as a booklet at their events in Davos and the work done in 2009 will now be available widely at the mainstreet in Davos. I hope that the policy makes will take heed.
Another initiative that we did at NID was the mapping and articulation of the diverse and ubiquitous hand crafts skills all across India which we believe to be the foundation for inclusive action and the seeding of the creative economy of the future for India. The outcome of this research effort was the book titled Handmade in India that maps the existing skills and resources of the crafts sector all located in the vibrant meta-clusters across all regions of India as a living resource that is available for creative reinterpretation using design strategy and action in an inclusive and non-exploitative mode. I have written about the underlying intentions and strategies at previous posts on this blog here below. This can be realized if we are able to make the investments needed in innovation and design that can use this resource to seed the changes on the ground in an inclusive manner. Digital version of the book Handmade in India can be downloaded from this link here as a pdf file 337 mb size.
Design for Inclusive Development
Prof M P Ranjan
Design Thinker & Independent Academic
Ahmedabad
Our economists and planners have got used to the idea of measuring progress by the growth and their metrics include industrial production, agricultural production and the growth of money itself in the system along with the notional value of a host of financial instruments and derivatives that reside in the digital space. Politicians have not been told that there could be other ways to measure progress and if they have the theory of economics is very sparse in this area. Design education and innovation in India too has languished in the shade of scientific and technological investments (S&T). The deep-seated belief in the Planning Commission and the Political establishment, both in Government and in the Opposition, is that huge investments in science and technology combined with private entrepreneurship and the profit motive will somehow solve the problems of inclusive growth that is beleaguering the Indian economy. This is a consensus that has played itself out in the IT & software revolution in the Silicon Valley and more money is placed in the S&T kitty but the problems seem to grow, nevertheless. The huge gap between the haves and the have-nots grow by the day and the promises that are held out by the advocates of innovation investments in S&T behold a hot social and political time bomb waiting to explode in all our faces. The other approach is more direct, that of providing direct subsidies through political appeasement that is resorted to by Central and State Governments using pre-poll promises and politically mediated grants and aid that are dished out to the poverty ridden folks through direct action primarily to nurture a vote bank. Unfortunately, here too the delivery system is so porous and corruption so rampant through our society that it permeates the system all the way through the supply chain, leaving a very unsatisfied public that is simmering at the fringes, both urban and rural, all over the country. Our corporate bodies too are no better at addressing these needs with all the disclosures that are coming out in the media on a daily basis these days.
The result of all these plans and actions is the grave political and social unrest that is facing us in the form of a very angry citizen near the bottom of the pyramid who can for the first time see the lives of the other affluent sections and the growing middle class played out in full colour in daily broadcasts of the television channels and the open access through the internet in an age of heightened communication. Charles & Ray Eames had warned us about this impending impact of such disruptive change through extended communication, a change in kind and not in degree they said, in their 1958 India Report and we have not paid heed to this sanguine advice. He had called for the use of design to address the needs and aspirations of a people in the throes of such change but we have perhaps let slip an advantage by not channeling adequate investments to address their dreams and aspirations in close partnership with the people directly. Innovation at the grassroots has become a buzzword in management circles and here the case studies that are celebrated fall into the category of Jugaad (creative make-shift) and not of Design (intentional and sensitive configurations) as we would argue that it should be. Jugaad stands for the creative interpretation of severe limitations and shortages to produce a workable contraption or scheme held together by available opportunity, hope and hard work, always at a fraction of the cost that would otherwise have been available, with most of the action lying in the unregulated space of zero taxation and technical specifications, in many cases illegal. So the celebration is in the extreme cost cutting that has been achieved by the poverty ridden creator and service provider and the rest of us stand in mute respect for the heroic achievement, the response of the poor or a clever service provider to an impossible situation, a sheer act of survival. Unfortunately, Jugaad also fosters a Chalta-hai (make-do) attitude that permeates all our offerings from Government services to low cost infrastructure, products and service solutions that are not sustainable for inclusive development, all lacking in refinement and costly in the long run, creating the platform for a low quality sub-culture far from the rich tapestry of traditional wisdom that are at the very foundation of the Indian society that has somehow survived till date. However is this the only way? Is there another way?
The communication boom and an era of transparency have ensured that the Indian consumers are no longer willing to accept the mediocre when better value is available. For example, in many parts of India the poor have shunned incompetent public education systems to place their child in expensive private schools and in going the extra mile to avail quality where it is on offer, a new phenomenon for both urban and rural India that is communication enabled. However, the design establishment in the country has languished in the face of great apathy from both Government and industry during an extended period of a highly regulated and centrally managed economy and the absence of any real competition. Design schools like the National Institute of Design have suffered from an absence of both funding and vision in recent years and the National Design Policy of 2007 too has a very limited mandate which does not include the huge opportunities that exist for local investments in innovation and design for inclusive development. It stops short of harping on slogans and on the export and luxury product industries as their area of focus. Further, on the education front while several new NID’s are proposed to be funded by Government there is an absence of any new vision statement as to their focus and purpose as if the model exemplified by NID Ahmedabad could be used as a clone for the creation of these new centres in four geographical regions of India, a missed opportunity to address the change that is taking place in our country. The India Design Council, another outcome of the National Design Policy is harping on “Good Design” as a quality benchmark which is product of Western Industry and their consumer marketing focus that is least suited to evaluate design solutions for inclusive development that is now needed in India.
No international design solutions are available that are ready and off the shelf to address the pressing problems of the Indian people such as affordable healthcare, rural and urban sanitation, dispersed quality education at the primary and secondary levels, agricultural and rural tools, rural housing and mobility and a host of other design opportunities across 230 sectors of our economy that are in crying need of design attention. These will have to be addressed locally and innovation and design will be the way forward but the infrastructure for action is not in place since the existing institutes are barking up the wrong tree it seems. The Eames Report and the National Institute of Design in the early years innovated an unique education programme in design that was addressing these very issues but over the last ten years these advances in design education and research were systematically demolished by literally throwing the baby out with the bathwater in their misguided effort to get university status and in the search for qualification rather than content and relevance. The DIPP, the department in Government that handles the NID budgets and the National Design Policy has proved to be patently incompetent to support the design movement in the country and to move it in directions that it needs to be taken if it to be relevant to the creation of a platform for inclusive development. Perhaps their limited mandate to address the needs of Indian industry has made them myopic to the larger roles that design has to play if it to be relevant to our national agenda. Design is not a mere hand-maiden for industrial development but a much broader strategy that can help transform society and feed into the culture forming processes of a country and a region. The evidence of this incompetence is visible in the poor quality of vision and funding that is provided to the NID when compared to the IITs and IIMs, both of which were set up around the same time in the early 60’s. The National Institutes of Fashion Technology (NIFT) was set up in the late 80’s through the Textile Ministry and they used a special export cess that was accumulated with Government to rapidly fund the establishment and growth of a huge national infrastructure that is now recognised as a university of national importance. Further, NID’s faculty are a poorly remunerated lot when compared to their counterparts in any comparable institute or university in India and this I am sure will ensure that the best will veer away from committing themselves to pressing design education roles that are facing the nation today. Perhaps the correct way out of this messy situation is to move the NID’s to a new ministry that is capable of addressing the multi-facetted roles of design action that are needed in India across all verticals and all ministries. My students once proposed a structure and they called for the creation of the Ministry of Design, perhaps as part of the Prime Ministers Office till it can move to the area of Culture where it could find a niche that is appropriate to address the emerging challenges of quality and relevance to society
When I reflect on the various projects done at the NID in the early years from the Electronic Voting Machine to the Jawaja project, through the Chennapatna toy project to numerous textile design projects such as the Dhamadka Block Print project a number of design strategies come to mind. We need to ponder deeply on many of these real world design experiences to cull out lessons that can take us forward to a socially and culturally appropriate application of design action that could bring great value to our population. More recently, our initiatives in Tripura State through the “Katlamara Chalo” project integrates bamboo cultivation with product manufacturing as a means to alleviate rural poverty using local skills, resources and local enthusiasm as the primary resource. We were able to discuss design and develop strategies for the bottom of the pyramid with colleagues at the Indian Institute of Crafts and Design, Jaipur, an initiative of the Government of Rajasthan that is now being managed under a public-private partnership and here we built a more generalized sketch model called “Raindrops and Footprints” that explained the process leading to the selection of the village through local intensive research and the building of an understanding of the local context from which a number of design opportunities are identified and modeled before they are taken through a participatory development process which used the local strengths and resources in a sustainable manner. Here design is not just looking at “Good Form” but at the strategies and approaches along the entire supply chain and at each stage value is unfolded. The attempt was to find local solutions suitable for local application using our macro-micro strategy for design action that are informed by serious research and sustained contact with the beneficiaries through hand-holding and educational contact in the field. This integrated strategy has paid off but the investment of time and effort is considerable to prototype and test such a strategy to be rolled out to various locations using available local resources as the platform for sustainable change. For the first time in India we have a rural community using farm based bamboo to drive a local industry towards self reliance and managed growth. Starting with bamboo products and furniture we see the sustained action providing an uninterrupted supply of raw materials and skill sets that can foster the growth of a decentralized, local and self governed economy that could survive and thrive in the emerging era that I call the “Post industrial and Post-mining era”.
This is a new form of design action not to be confused with the form giving activity of traditional industrial design, although it would include elements from the old form of design thought and action. Here we are proposing that the design action take into account the structure of society along with their macro aspirations, their histories and cultural preferences as a starting point and from here build imaginative approaches for products, services and systems that would include the meta-system, the infrastructure, the hardware, the software and the processware to ensure a perfect fit to the circumstances and requirements of the particular situation. This kind of offering is complex and would need a multitude of knowledge and skill sets to be brought to bear with sensitive social and cultural orientation and with a fine tuned economic and technical feasibility. Design for inclusive development is therefore a multi-disciplinary activity that needs to draw a variety of knowledge and skills in an innovative and future oriented setting that is well informed about the legal and the ethical parameters. In this form it becomes a powerful political activity since it is propositional in the manner in which it visualizes and realizable alternatives for the stakeholders from which the process of selection and decision can begin. It is a democratic activity at the very heart and gives power to the people who are at the location and to those who would be most impacted by its implementation. This shift in design thinking can be better understood through the model that I have proposed that explains the three orders of design – Form, Structure and System – material & functional, aesthetic & socio-economic, environmental and political – all of which need to be addressed in all cases if we are to be assured of its sustainability and relevance to the local context. Under these terms of reference industry and business must take responsibility for end to end offer of service and not just for the delivery of brands and boxes that contain a “Good Design” product but ensure that they serve the purpose that was promised in the first place.
I do believe that design can help here and we may need to make some fundamental changes in our design education approaches and widen the base for action, a shift from a focus on business and industry to the design for public good that is operational at the local community level. These should include the grassroots workers in the design education loop and the content of such education needs to be informed by design insights that are local and rooted in the local reality for which our current crop of textbooks would be found wanting. This will need fresh approaches and enlightened support from the political establishment if these changes are to be forged. I do feel that we need to raise this debate and explore the various roles of design and its potential application that is today ignored by design education and practice alike, including my own school if I may admit here, so that a new sense of commitment is brought into the use of design in areas far outside industry and business. This is one of my mission objectives for setting up the 'Design for India" blog to help create a platform from which I can share my thoughts on the possibilities that I see in my minds eye. I also find the peer review system of the research publications as not so perfect for the dissemination of design insights although it does work wonders for science analysis and knowledge creation but it may be extremely defective for design demonstration since the idea of “design opportunity”, a very specific term – a combination of perception and imagination – excludes the viewer or reader from "seeing" the imagination part of the designers statement and therefore it compels the designer to take the idea far down the visualisation and realization path before it can even dawn on others that the idea is truly credible. This means that we may need to create a platform or even a multitude of platforms for design incubation and development that can be accessible to many across numerous areas of application and these kinds of platforms just do not exist in India today, or if it does, it is dominated by centralized administrative controls that stifle innovation and exploration which is critically needed to make the demonstration. Our policies for faculty research and action need to be liberal and this needs substantial change and autonomy for the ‘Maverick innovator” with good intentions and value systems in place to do their innovative work. Some of us have had to battle hard to achieve even a small degree of autonomy of action and this is not a good climate for addressing these complex problems which surround us here in India in an effective manner. We need new institutions and whole new mind set to address these complex issues at hand.
How do we create such autonomous and decentralized action strategies and how do we roll this out across our Universities and Institutes of design action? This will be one of the central questions that can change the current impasse in development approaches dealing with poverty in many parts of India. There are no simple answers but we will need to look deeply at our experiences in the field and build new institutes and strategies that can use the promise of design to find approaches to address these complex needs. The current conviction that we hold is the use of a macro-micro design strategy which has been developed after years of application and we need to do more before we can spread this deep conviction that we hold to others who hold the purse string in our countries where real action is needed today.
Prof M P Ranjan
Design Thinker & Independent Academic, Ahmedabad
Prof M P Ranjan
Design Thinker & Independent Academic, Ahmedabad
I have been invited to speak at Davos on the 28th January 2011 as part of the India - Future of Change initiative's event on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum. The event is a panel discussion moderated by Tim Brown and the focus is on Design, Innovation and Entrepreneurship for development in India. The India - Future of Change has a huge task ahead of them and the various events planned by the team is covered at their website here. I have prepared a background note that explores the contours of the Inclusive Design agenda and makes a call for drastic change in the design establishment in India so that these changes can start playing a constructive role here in India and some of these could be influenced by the happenings at Davos next week. The full text of my submission is quoted below and it is also carried at the India - Future of Change website as well.
Image: Thumbnail images of bamboo plantations, product development workshops as well as crafts entrepreneur and farmer cooperations, all part of the macro-micro design strategy that we had called the "Seedlings of Wealth" – has now seeded a new era of development in Katlamara, Tripura using inclusive design as a way forward. (Download pdf 47 mb) Such prototypes and business models are at the heart of inclusive design agenda for India and we need to adopt it and apply it across the length and breadth of India today.
Quote:
"If we do not work on more prototypes which mainfest in action all our collective understanding regarding our relation to living, work and celebration, then design will indeed not do its bit for India. We talk too much, and do less. Or do in areas or in ways that only talk the same language of legacy thinking. No other nation in the world has the opportunity as we do, since our diversity is the trait which helps us survive, and yet design is working to strip that down to a singular or mono-cultures."
Poonam Bir Kasturi, Bangalore
UnQuote
In 2009 the design community from India was represented by proxy at Davos since the NID team was involved in the design of five posters on sustainability that were used as a backdrop by a high power committee of CEO's from the consumer products industries. I had reported about these posters in previous blog posts here on Design for India blog. However this year the India Future of Change team has decided to distribute these posters as a booklet at their events in Davos and the work done in 2009 will now be available widely at the mainstreet in Davos. I hope that the policy makes will take heed.
Another initiative that we did at NID was the mapping and articulation of the diverse and ubiquitous hand crafts skills all across India which we believe to be the foundation for inclusive action and the seeding of the creative economy of the future for India. The outcome of this research effort was the book titled Handmade in India that maps the existing skills and resources of the crafts sector all located in the vibrant meta-clusters across all regions of India as a living resource that is available for creative reinterpretation using design strategy and action in an inclusive and non-exploitative mode. I have written about the underlying intentions and strategies at previous posts on this blog here below. This can be realized if we are able to make the investments needed in innovation and design that can use this resource to seed the changes on the ground in an inclusive manner. Digital version of the book Handmade in India can be downloaded from this link here as a pdf file 337 mb size.
Design for Inclusive Development
Prof M P Ranjan
Design Thinker & Independent Academic
Ahmedabad
Our economists and planners have got used to the idea of measuring progress by the growth and their metrics include industrial production, agricultural production and the growth of money itself in the system along with the notional value of a host of financial instruments and derivatives that reside in the digital space. Politicians have not been told that there could be other ways to measure progress and if they have the theory of economics is very sparse in this area. Design education and innovation in India too has languished in the shade of scientific and technological investments (S&T). The deep-seated belief in the Planning Commission and the Political establishment, both in Government and in the Opposition, is that huge investments in science and technology combined with private entrepreneurship and the profit motive will somehow solve the problems of inclusive growth that is beleaguering the Indian economy. This is a consensus that has played itself out in the IT & software revolution in the Silicon Valley and more money is placed in the S&T kitty but the problems seem to grow, nevertheless. The huge gap between the haves and the have-nots grow by the day and the promises that are held out by the advocates of innovation investments in S&T behold a hot social and political time bomb waiting to explode in all our faces. The other approach is more direct, that of providing direct subsidies through political appeasement that is resorted to by Central and State Governments using pre-poll promises and politically mediated grants and aid that are dished out to the poverty ridden folks through direct action primarily to nurture a vote bank. Unfortunately, here too the delivery system is so porous and corruption so rampant through our society that it permeates the system all the way through the supply chain, leaving a very unsatisfied public that is simmering at the fringes, both urban and rural, all over the country. Our corporate bodies too are no better at addressing these needs with all the disclosures that are coming out in the media on a daily basis these days.
The result of all these plans and actions is the grave political and social unrest that is facing us in the form of a very angry citizen near the bottom of the pyramid who can for the first time see the lives of the other affluent sections and the growing middle class played out in full colour in daily broadcasts of the television channels and the open access through the internet in an age of heightened communication. Charles & Ray Eames had warned us about this impending impact of such disruptive change through extended communication, a change in kind and not in degree they said, in their 1958 India Report and we have not paid heed to this sanguine advice. He had called for the use of design to address the needs and aspirations of a people in the throes of such change but we have perhaps let slip an advantage by not channeling adequate investments to address their dreams and aspirations in close partnership with the people directly. Innovation at the grassroots has become a buzzword in management circles and here the case studies that are celebrated fall into the category of Jugaad (creative make-shift) and not of Design (intentional and sensitive configurations) as we would argue that it should be. Jugaad stands for the creative interpretation of severe limitations and shortages to produce a workable contraption or scheme held together by available opportunity, hope and hard work, always at a fraction of the cost that would otherwise have been available, with most of the action lying in the unregulated space of zero taxation and technical specifications, in many cases illegal. So the celebration is in the extreme cost cutting that has been achieved by the poverty ridden creator and service provider and the rest of us stand in mute respect for the heroic achievement, the response of the poor or a clever service provider to an impossible situation, a sheer act of survival. Unfortunately, Jugaad also fosters a Chalta-hai (make-do) attitude that permeates all our offerings from Government services to low cost infrastructure, products and service solutions that are not sustainable for inclusive development, all lacking in refinement and costly in the long run, creating the platform for a low quality sub-culture far from the rich tapestry of traditional wisdom that are at the very foundation of the Indian society that has somehow survived till date. However is this the only way? Is there another way?
The communication boom and an era of transparency have ensured that the Indian consumers are no longer willing to accept the mediocre when better value is available. For example, in many parts of India the poor have shunned incompetent public education systems to place their child in expensive private schools and in going the extra mile to avail quality where it is on offer, a new phenomenon for both urban and rural India that is communication enabled. However, the design establishment in the country has languished in the face of great apathy from both Government and industry during an extended period of a highly regulated and centrally managed economy and the absence of any real competition. Design schools like the National Institute of Design have suffered from an absence of both funding and vision in recent years and the National Design Policy of 2007 too has a very limited mandate which does not include the huge opportunities that exist for local investments in innovation and design for inclusive development. It stops short of harping on slogans and on the export and luxury product industries as their area of focus. Further, on the education front while several new NID’s are proposed to be funded by Government there is an absence of any new vision statement as to their focus and purpose as if the model exemplified by NID Ahmedabad could be used as a clone for the creation of these new centres in four geographical regions of India, a missed opportunity to address the change that is taking place in our country. The India Design Council, another outcome of the National Design Policy is harping on “Good Design” as a quality benchmark which is product of Western Industry and their consumer marketing focus that is least suited to evaluate design solutions for inclusive development that is now needed in India.
No international design solutions are available that are ready and off the shelf to address the pressing problems of the Indian people such as affordable healthcare, rural and urban sanitation, dispersed quality education at the primary and secondary levels, agricultural and rural tools, rural housing and mobility and a host of other design opportunities across 230 sectors of our economy that are in crying need of design attention. These will have to be addressed locally and innovation and design will be the way forward but the infrastructure for action is not in place since the existing institutes are barking up the wrong tree it seems. The Eames Report and the National Institute of Design in the early years innovated an unique education programme in design that was addressing these very issues but over the last ten years these advances in design education and research were systematically demolished by literally throwing the baby out with the bathwater in their misguided effort to get university status and in the search for qualification rather than content and relevance. The DIPP, the department in Government that handles the NID budgets and the National Design Policy has proved to be patently incompetent to support the design movement in the country and to move it in directions that it needs to be taken if it to be relevant to the creation of a platform for inclusive development. Perhaps their limited mandate to address the needs of Indian industry has made them myopic to the larger roles that design has to play if it to be relevant to our national agenda. Design is not a mere hand-maiden for industrial development but a much broader strategy that can help transform society and feed into the culture forming processes of a country and a region. The evidence of this incompetence is visible in the poor quality of vision and funding that is provided to the NID when compared to the IITs and IIMs, both of which were set up around the same time in the early 60’s. The National Institutes of Fashion Technology (NIFT) was set up in the late 80’s through the Textile Ministry and they used a special export cess that was accumulated with Government to rapidly fund the establishment and growth of a huge national infrastructure that is now recognised as a university of national importance. Further, NID’s faculty are a poorly remunerated lot when compared to their counterparts in any comparable institute or university in India and this I am sure will ensure that the best will veer away from committing themselves to pressing design education roles that are facing the nation today. Perhaps the correct way out of this messy situation is to move the NID’s to a new ministry that is capable of addressing the multi-facetted roles of design action that are needed in India across all verticals and all ministries. My students once proposed a structure and they called for the creation of the Ministry of Design, perhaps as part of the Prime Ministers Office till it can move to the area of Culture where it could find a niche that is appropriate to address the emerging challenges of quality and relevance to society
When I reflect on the various projects done at the NID in the early years from the Electronic Voting Machine to the Jawaja project, through the Chennapatna toy project to numerous textile design projects such as the Dhamadka Block Print project a number of design strategies come to mind. We need to ponder deeply on many of these real world design experiences to cull out lessons that can take us forward to a socially and culturally appropriate application of design action that could bring great value to our population. More recently, our initiatives in Tripura State through the “Katlamara Chalo” project integrates bamboo cultivation with product manufacturing as a means to alleviate rural poverty using local skills, resources and local enthusiasm as the primary resource. We were able to discuss design and develop strategies for the bottom of the pyramid with colleagues at the Indian Institute of Crafts and Design, Jaipur, an initiative of the Government of Rajasthan that is now being managed under a public-private partnership and here we built a more generalized sketch model called “Raindrops and Footprints” that explained the process leading to the selection of the village through local intensive research and the building of an understanding of the local context from which a number of design opportunities are identified and modeled before they are taken through a participatory development process which used the local strengths and resources in a sustainable manner. Here design is not just looking at “Good Form” but at the strategies and approaches along the entire supply chain and at each stage value is unfolded. The attempt was to find local solutions suitable for local application using our macro-micro strategy for design action that are informed by serious research and sustained contact with the beneficiaries through hand-holding and educational contact in the field. This integrated strategy has paid off but the investment of time and effort is considerable to prototype and test such a strategy to be rolled out to various locations using available local resources as the platform for sustainable change. For the first time in India we have a rural community using farm based bamboo to drive a local industry towards self reliance and managed growth. Starting with bamboo products and furniture we see the sustained action providing an uninterrupted supply of raw materials and skill sets that can foster the growth of a decentralized, local and self governed economy that could survive and thrive in the emerging era that I call the “Post industrial and Post-mining era”.
This is a new form of design action not to be confused with the form giving activity of traditional industrial design, although it would include elements from the old form of design thought and action. Here we are proposing that the design action take into account the structure of society along with their macro aspirations, their histories and cultural preferences as a starting point and from here build imaginative approaches for products, services and systems that would include the meta-system, the infrastructure, the hardware, the software and the processware to ensure a perfect fit to the circumstances and requirements of the particular situation. This kind of offering is complex and would need a multitude of knowledge and skill sets to be brought to bear with sensitive social and cultural orientation and with a fine tuned economic and technical feasibility. Design for inclusive development is therefore a multi-disciplinary activity that needs to draw a variety of knowledge and skills in an innovative and future oriented setting that is well informed about the legal and the ethical parameters. In this form it becomes a powerful political activity since it is propositional in the manner in which it visualizes and realizable alternatives for the stakeholders from which the process of selection and decision can begin. It is a democratic activity at the very heart and gives power to the people who are at the location and to those who would be most impacted by its implementation. This shift in design thinking can be better understood through the model that I have proposed that explains the three orders of design – Form, Structure and System – material & functional, aesthetic & socio-economic, environmental and political – all of which need to be addressed in all cases if we are to be assured of its sustainability and relevance to the local context. Under these terms of reference industry and business must take responsibility for end to end offer of service and not just for the delivery of brands and boxes that contain a “Good Design” product but ensure that they serve the purpose that was promised in the first place.
I do believe that design can help here and we may need to make some fundamental changes in our design education approaches and widen the base for action, a shift from a focus on business and industry to the design for public good that is operational at the local community level. These should include the grassroots workers in the design education loop and the content of such education needs to be informed by design insights that are local and rooted in the local reality for which our current crop of textbooks would be found wanting. This will need fresh approaches and enlightened support from the political establishment if these changes are to be forged. I do feel that we need to raise this debate and explore the various roles of design and its potential application that is today ignored by design education and practice alike, including my own school if I may admit here, so that a new sense of commitment is brought into the use of design in areas far outside industry and business. This is one of my mission objectives for setting up the 'Design for India" blog to help create a platform from which I can share my thoughts on the possibilities that I see in my minds eye. I also find the peer review system of the research publications as not so perfect for the dissemination of design insights although it does work wonders for science analysis and knowledge creation but it may be extremely defective for design demonstration since the idea of “design opportunity”, a very specific term – a combination of perception and imagination – excludes the viewer or reader from "seeing" the imagination part of the designers statement and therefore it compels the designer to take the idea far down the visualisation and realization path before it can even dawn on others that the idea is truly credible. This means that we may need to create a platform or even a multitude of platforms for design incubation and development that can be accessible to many across numerous areas of application and these kinds of platforms just do not exist in India today, or if it does, it is dominated by centralized administrative controls that stifle innovation and exploration which is critically needed to make the demonstration. Our policies for faculty research and action need to be liberal and this needs substantial change and autonomy for the ‘Maverick innovator” with good intentions and value systems in place to do their innovative work. Some of us have had to battle hard to achieve even a small degree of autonomy of action and this is not a good climate for addressing these complex problems which surround us here in India in an effective manner. We need new institutions and whole new mind set to address these complex issues at hand.
How do we create such autonomous and decentralized action strategies and how do we roll this out across our Universities and Institutes of design action? This will be one of the central questions that can change the current impasse in development approaches dealing with poverty in many parts of India. There are no simple answers but we will need to look deeply at our experiences in the field and build new institutes and strategies that can use the promise of design to find approaches to address these complex needs. The current conviction that we hold is the use of a macro-micro design strategy which has been developed after years of application and we need to do more before we can spread this deep conviction that we hold to others who hold the purse string in our countries where real action is needed today.
Prof M P Ranjan
Design Thinker & Independent Academic, Ahmedabad
Thứ Tư, 19 tháng 1, 2011
Remix XPs self support trip in the Grand Canyon
Well the fellas are back from their self support trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon and John Grace is going to put together a video of the experience Here is the write up and a trailer that he has put together just a few days after they got off the river.
“12 Days” is a feature film focusing on Self Support Kayaking The Grand Canyon of The Colorado River. Coursing through 200+ miles of the most rugged terrain on the planet The Grand Canyon is truly a wonder of the world. While many experience the canyon by hiking or with raft support, some of us have a wanderlust for a more personal experience. Self support kayaking is the answer for those who want the most out of the canyon. The experience of packing everything needed for survival in your own boat then paddling it hundreds of miles through a remote, rapid choked canyon is nothing short of incredible. “12 days” covers everything a paddler needs to know from permits to groovers all the while showcasing the spectacle that is The Grand Canyon!
They hope to have the video out in April. It should be a fun one because the trip was full of action, drama, and suspense.
Enjoy
Shane
Thứ Hai, 17 tháng 1, 2011
designbymany – I won!
Much to my surprise I got an email from Dave Fano over at Case last week to say that I had won the first designbymany competition with my Vasari submission of the first sponsored challenge. The task was to design a parametric version of Buckminster Fuller’s Dymaxion House. I didn’t really want to copy the original design, but to apply a modern twist on the concept which would allow todays fabrication processes to produce something would could be easily assembled and constructed. Dave Fano posted the following Youtube movie of my model being flexed.
My model can be downloaded from the designbymany website if you are interested.
The latest competition has just been posted and this is to design an external shade system. Go for it, you may end up winning a HP plotter!http://www.designbymany.com/content/design-external-solar-shade
HOK uses BIM to design Dali Museum
Following the opening of the the new Dalí Museum on January 11th 2011, this article was published on AEC Cafe last week.
http://www10.aeccafe.com/nbc/articles/view_article.php?articleid=911310
Chủ Nhật, 9 tháng 1, 2011
Paddy makes his maiden ride
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| Paddy climbs into the velomobile. (The packing tape over the nose holes reduce the ventilation. With open holes it gets to draughty when its cold) |
Thứ Bảy, 8 tháng 1, 2011
Wind and speed
Today I went for a short (10 km) test trip again. I improved the chain guidance with a long polyethylene (plastic shopping bag) tunnel under the floor of the body. Works great. No friction, no noise. At least until the packing tape fails... Than the chain springs of the rear chain wheel easily.
But what fun it is in a T-shirt only on a cold windy day driving on a dike. Catching the wind, sailing.The feeling that you are pushed aside. It was really drifting ! I have to get a speedometer.
I saw the nose flexing due to the load of the crank axle. I think this can be eliminated by closing or stiffening the little nose holes. Lots of other little nuisances: The brake cable is not mounted right, in a sharp right turn it brakes. The soft top comes of because the velcro is not strong enough. The Rohloff hub sometimes fails. The front suspension is too stiff.
But all in all I should be very happy with the results so far.
But what fun it is in a T-shirt only on a cold windy day driving on a dike. Catching the wind, sailing.The feeling that you are pushed aside. It was really drifting ! I have to get a speedometer.
I saw the nose flexing due to the load of the crank axle. I think this can be eliminated by closing or stiffening the little nose holes. Lots of other little nuisances: The brake cable is not mounted right, in a sharp right turn it brakes. The soft top comes of because the velcro is not strong enough. The Rohloff hub sometimes fails. The front suspension is too stiff.
But all in all I should be very happy with the results so far.
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