ID-24ST-07—Design Manual(s) for the Anthropocene

Industrial Design and Architecture students critically evaluate the phenomena of design manuals, toolkits and similar artifacts and then develop design manuals or alternatives to inform creative practices that must wrestle with a wildly uncertain future.

Offered shortly after the conclusion of phase 2 of the Horizon 2045 partnership, this studio was our first opportunity to road-test the principles and insights captured in the Polycene Design Manual. Students read text from the manual and were asked to incorporate — or to offer critical alternate takes on — ideas from the manual. A particularly rich outcome of this was the interchange between CfC fellow Jon Soske and the students. Jon is leading the development of Systems Mapping from the Margins which is a continuation and expansion of the early insights of the Polycene work.

Fall 2023 — 6 Credit Studio

Faculty
Justin Cook
Tim Maly

Partners
Dark Matter Labs
10×100
Horizon 2045
BMW Foundation