Design Research Forum

28/12/2019

The aim of the Design Research Forum’s inaugural symposium entitled LATITUDE was to explore the definitions, methods, and applications of design research. The goal of this event, however, was not to arrive at a single definition, but to appreciate the depth and endless potential of this field. The day-long event brought together twelve distinguished guests from across institutions, disciplines, and continents for frank methods-focused conversations about the nature of design research. Nearly one hundred attendees settled into a warmly-lit, living-room-like Piper Auditorium for a series of topical panels. Discussions were wide-ranging and often surprising as they represented a meeting of the minds between scientists, sociologists, educators, design practitioners, and students. This event was the inaugural conference hosted by the student group Design Research Forum (DRF), a highly diverse research collective run by MDes students.

04/10/2019

WE'RE AT IT AGAIN!
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We'll have with us Fiona Kenney (MDes HPDM '20) and Gio Shin (M. Arch. I '22) presenting their project which they worked on with Brian Bo Ying Lee (M. Arch. I '21; whom we shall miss); titled 'Empathy (on your own time)'. Starting as a final project for DES3358 An Unsentimental Look at Architecture and Social Craft and continuing as an independent study, this project sought to explore discourse circulating at the GSD about the agency of the design professions to affect social change. Part one involved surveying the GSD student body to identify students' perceptions of the GSD's position, the importance of the topic, and the relevance of their curricula. Part two then brought these results, aggregated and visualized by degree program, to key faculty members in interviews. The final review provided a space for students and faculty to collaborate on proposing solutions and finding common ground.
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Fiona Kenney is a second year MDes student in History and Philosophy of Design at the GSD. She is interested in mortality and ethics in relation to the built environment. Her current research focuses on medical and end-of-life architectures as sites of production of new ethical frameworks for the practice of architecture.
Gio Shin is an M. Arch I 22’. His main area of interest is in the relationship betwen design and its political, social, and economic contexts—specifically in the role of design in creating a more just and equitable society.
Come for a very thought-provoking conversation; stay for wine and chips! See you!

29/09/2019

This week we had Inés Btz and Edgar Rodriguez talk to us about their project; "To Whom It May Concern". (A quien corresponda:)
Aware of the scarcity of exhibition opportunities and spaces for design appreciation in Mexico, they extended an invitation to whom it may concern, for interested designers and architects to showcase their work in an area of 0.0588 m2. They offered participants a physical space abroad at Kirkland Gallery, to question exclusivity as a tool for legitimizing creative disciplines.
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Inés Benítez (1989) is a Research fellow for the Irving Innovation Fellowship at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, recently completed a Master in Design Studies: Art, Design, and The Public Domain. Her work oscillates between architecture, craft and artistic methods, materiality and nature, cultural translations and gastronomy.
Edgar Rodriguez (1992) Master in Architecture candidate at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. In 2014 he co-founded the architecture office operadora in Mexico City. He is interested in the confluence of internet culture, art, curation, and architecture.

20/09/2019

IT'S FRIDAY!
For our second meet of the year, Je Sung Lee (MDes ADPD '19) will talk to us about his thesis project! Je Sung is an artist/designer born in Seoul, Korea who declares himself as an "inbetweener." By traveling through art, design, and otherprojects within the public domain, he wants to create clues/opportunities to overcome barriers in our society. With this goal in mind, he has been engaged in several social Art/Design projects and founded the design studio '0.0'. He received his BFA from Kookmin University in Seouland recently completed an MDes degree in Art, Design, and the Public Domain at Harvard Graduate School of Design with the Fulbright scholarship. He's currently a research assistant at MIT Media Lab, Poetic Justice Group.
"Missing Women Surviving Men" aims to re-describe multiple national aspects of the phenomenon of sex-selective abortions in the 1980s and 1990s in Korea. In the 80s and 90s, state-sanctioned and culturally-coded abortions intended to socially engineer the gender make-up of a family by screening for and aborting girls and prioritizing male sons.
This project examines the impact of gender discrimination on Korean society that has been enforced by the governmental body, its policy, technological development, and other economic/cultural factor. More importantly, MWSM provides the opportunity to discuss trauma by collecting individuals’ experiences.
As usual, we shall be having a bout of DRFinitions ™️; your weekly life-sized, interactive encyclopedia. Come by, guys!

13/09/2019

Come join us at our first meeting for the year, this evening! (details in the poster)
We'll talk more about DRF and ideas for the group moving forward, followed by DRFinitions™️, an easily accessible breakdown of apparently complex design/ philosophical concepts and terms brought to you by Ryan Beitz and team; followed by our FIRST guest speaker!
Stella Rossikopoulou Pappa (MDes Tech. 2019), is a licensed architect and a toy designer. She recently completed her Master in Design Studies at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Her thesis, Dēmiourgós: A Construction Toy for Children, was part of her ongoing research on the correlation between construction toys and technology. Stella mentors regularly at MIT and was an instructor at GSD. In 2018, she graduated from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece, where she also held multiple exhibitions. She is interested in exploring the subject of play through historical research and contemporary technologies.
What constitutes the nature of children’s toys today? This thesis begins with a historical analysis on board games in the 18th century, and studies their development into today’s board games. As a response, Demiourgós - from Plato’s origin story of world-creation from a few paradigmatic forms - is a construction-based toy for children that furthers this trajectory through algorithmic and interactive projection.
Come say hi, stay to meet Stella and others, and share in some ideas, wine, and chips! See you there!

13/09/2019

Hello from the new academic year, and from behind our new logo. This is your new DRF Leadership Team, and we're looking forward to get to know you!

Thank you to all of you who stopped by at the mixer and at our student group fair table last week. The upcoming year looks exciting and promising, we have so much to get done!

ICYMI, the Design Research Forum aka DRF is a student run organization formed to highlight design research going in and around the Harvard Graduate School of Design. We are a highly diverse collective, run by MDes students, but with the common purpose of exploring the multiplicity of design research methods, and the opportunities they yield for inquiry and generative practice across design fields.

Stay tuned to know about what we have planned for the year, and we shall see you very soon!

12/04/2019

Humanities and the Social Sciences Panel

12/04/2019

Design Research in/as Practice Panel

11/04/2019

Methodologies of Science and Technology Panel

07/04/2019

Join us this Saturday, April 13th from 10:00AM-5:30PM for our DRF Symposium: Latitude!

If you want to register, please go to https://www.eventbrite.com/e/latitude-a-symposium-by-design-research-forum-tickets-58879028760?aff=utm_source%3Deb_email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=new_event_email&utm_term=eventurl_text

17/11/2017

... We've got Cheddar!!!

11/10/2017