Faculty of Art and Design

Postmodernism's use of historical, allegorical languages has become a perennial point of architectural discussion, praised by some for relating to the future and condemned by others as kitsch and superficial. When applied to public housing, often the emblematic, utopian faliure of Modernism, Postmodern Historicism has created some striking and controversial results that have since divided criticism. Using Ricardo Bofill's 1982 Spaces of Abraxas as a case study, this research examines the reasons behind and subsequent implications of this language's usage.

Especially in stressful urban environments, a 'transgenerational' approach to design for older people can yield general benefits to society. Portable maps to aid orientation, type that is more easily scanned, and a more inviting, as well as aurally sensitive, attitude to IT would also represent useful steps forward. In both the modification of old products and in design for compressed morbidity, there is a need for methods which encourage activity instead of just moderating the effects of infirmity. Last but not least, old people themselves need to become a design resource.

I n April 2011, Bruce Nussbaum, one of the foremost advocates of design thinking (DT), pronounced it a ''failed experiment'' (Nussbaum, 2011). After this summary verdict, Nussbaum asked, naturally enough, ''What's next?'' This article replies to that question. Nussbaum's own reply was interesting. He upheld what he called ''humanistic design,'' and described it as ''a huge advance in the field.'' However, he did not define, still less give examples of, humanistic design. Instead, he went on to outline a third concept-''creative intelligence.'' Around that concept, he plans to publish a book in late 2012. For designers and design managers, having an opinion about trends in design has always been important. In prewar America alone, industrial designers such as Henry Dreyfuss, Walter Dorwin Teague, Raymond Loewy, and Norman Bel Geddes positioned themselves as knowing a thing or two about the future. Fashion design, too, has long been oriented to color forecasting, and trend forecasting in general. Design managers have often pronounced one trend dead and upheld another one. Still, it is a bit new to do both of these things, and then say that a third designerly world view deserves a book. A cursory inspection of trends in the handling of design trends, then, reveals a certain relativism of outlook. Anything goes, pretty much: One projection may be as good as another, and much depends on this or that design manager's point of view. In other words, design managers both adopt and abandon intellectual trends rather quickly nowadays. Before we suggest what the next trend in design should be, therefore, we should first ask: Just why are trends so trendy these days? Of course, when designers such as Loewy or Bel Geddes pushed through ideas about the future to clients, there was always an element of arbitrariness about their views. In their time, style was of unrivaled importance. The subjective approach of great designers had yet to give way to more organized conceptions of design management, or of the future. However, for all the realities of today's global production, both design managers and celebrity designers still lack a sensible compass to steer them toward The Next Big Thing in Design. Perhaps, really, two trends in the handling of design trends are at issue here. On the one hand, and certainly over the past 15 years or so, the growing

to, and seek responses from, nearly 300 design managers worldwide. In the event, 73 produced usable replies-a good return, and a reasonably robust statistical sample. To arrive at the right kind of statements to put forward, Voskuijl and the PARK team first performed a literature search. They then conducted in-depth interviews with design managers at seven firms-Procter & Gamble, Johnson Controls International, StorageTek, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, Heineken, Forbo Krommenie and Auping-to test and develop their evolving ideas. Before turning to the results of the actual piece of research, therefore, we here review the initial hypotheses that came out of the interview process. These initial hypotheses formed the basis of the actual part of the research.

This, the ®rst of two papers, examines the bad consumer experiences, high stakes, high hopes and deep fears that surround the picking and delivery of e-commerce`tangibles' Ð in Britain, the EU and America alike. The paper attacks those who dwell on the merits of the electronic side of e-commerce and adopt an insouciant posture toward its physical aspects. It also suggests that while it is dif®cult to organise e-ful®lment on an economically viable basis, it is by no means impossible.

Using academic, journalistic and statistical sources, this paper situates energy innovation in historical context before describing the current sclerosis of Western energy R&D. It explores how rising energy prices denote weak innovation, and how society's emphasis on green technologies, green subsidies and green jobs has effectively supplanted a rounded programme of innovation. The paper refuses to prefer one source of energy to another, suggesting that this is to ignore the potential for technological change. It treats the rebound effect as positive, delves into the limitations of energy efficiency, and gives even shorter shrift to energy conservation. The paper shows how energy innovation has become synonymous with risk, reviews failure in energy innovation, and attacks innovations around smart meters and the behaviour of energy users. We conclude by briefly inspecting the relationship between finance and energy innovation, and, throughout, suggest elements of a new political approach to the latter. *Acknowledgement is due to members of the Energy workgroup of Big Potatoes, and in particular my longtime collaborator Joe Kaplinsky. See www.BigPotatoes.org

The paper looks at how best to build competitive advantage through design-based projects in New Product Development conducted by small and medium enterprises in the manufacturing sector. Partly under the impact of IT and globalisation, the publicly funded design of a new product for a small or medium enterprise no longer involves, if it ever did, simply client, designer, state funding agency and state-funded broker of design services. It also brings together a wider group, which typically includes subcontractors , market researchers, specialists in intellectual property and, occasionally, higher education institutions. A moot question is how best to organise these different interests to make New Product Development projects succeed. This paper is an extensive survey of the international literature and practice of state-funded design supports for small and medium manufacturers. Briefly, too, it draws lessons from 119 publicly funded projects in New Product Development and design conducted over more than 10 years by the Design Unit at De Montfort University, Leicester, a higher education institution in the UK. Both our survey and Design Unit project data suggest that, especially if they are working in the context of an active state industrial policy, higher education institutions, being specially dedicated to the embedding, communication and management of knowledge, may be particularly well suited to assisting small and medium enterprises in product design and New Product Development. In terms of their tenacity and continuity, as well as in terms of their ability to help small and medium enterprises get hold of public funds, higher education institutions may be in a good place: not just to bring individual New Product Development projects all the way to success, but also to push small and medium enterprises toward embedding design and its management within their organisations. The Design Unit's experience also suggests that small and medium enterprises may gain from what a higher education institution can provide by way of managing and integrating, in a close-up and intimate manner, the different players and interests that usually surround New Product Development today. The hope is that, by closing the gap between design research and design practice, higher education institutions, with their mission to acquire new knowledge, can begin to make state design support for SMEs more directed and more entrepreneurial.

Using academic, journalistic and statistical sources, this paper situates energy innovation in historical context before describing the current sclerosis of Western energy R&D. It explores how rising energy prices denote weak innovation, and how society's emphasis on green technologies, green subsidies and green jobs has effectively supplanted a rounded programme of innovation. The paper refuses to prefer one source of energy to another, suggesting that this is to ignore the potential for technological change. It treats the rebound effect as positive, delves into the limitations of energy efficiency, and gives even shorter shrift to energy conservation. The paper shows how energy innovation has become synonymous with risk, reviews failure in energy innovation, and attacks innovations around smart meters and the behaviour of energy users. We conclude by briefly inspecting the relationship between finance and energy innovation, and, throughout, suggest elements of a new political approach to the latter. *Acknowledgement is due to members of the Energy workgroup of Big Potatoes, and in particular my longtime collaborator Joe Kaplinsky. See www.BigPotatoes.org

Favouring orientation to and the participation of design users in the design process, Design Thinking (DT) has a long lineage. With the Cold War's end, the Internet's rise and Stanford University's turn to teaching DT (2005), this 'bottom up', demand-driven conception of design gained new adherents, going on to win mainstream status when advocated in the 'Harvard Business Review' in 2008. While some managers, especially in government, have since adopted DT rather uncritically, it has prompted a schism in design circles-one as grand, perhaps, as that between post-Modernism and Modernism back in the 1970s/1980s. Though DT has reached Latin America and Asia, critics such as Norman (US) and Verganti (Italy) are unanimous that DT has wrongly made consumer contexts, behaviours and needs seem preferable to what McCullagh (UK) describes as 'other drivers of innovation, including technical progress'. In DT, 'sustainability' tends to be taken for granted, and expensive prices are rarely considered. An alternative to DT is briefly outlined, which, it is hoped, can begin to address these defects.

Especially in stressful urban environments, a 'transgenerational' approach to design for older people can yield general benefits to society. Portable maps to aid orientation, type that is more easily scanned, and a more inviting, as well as aurally sensitive, attitude to IT would also represent useful steps forward. In both the modification of old products and in design for compressed morbidity, there is a need for methods which encourage activity instead of just moderating the effects of infirmity. Last but not least, old people themselves need to become a design resource.

INCE THE COLLAPSE OF THE Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War in 1989, and during the subsequent recession, many of the pillars of Western society have run into a crisis of public legitimacy. Advertising and branding, banks and governments, the United Nations and the welfare state: all have suffered a loss of respect. Even Information Technology (IT), it seems, may be subject to the same fate. Certainly the decline in the mainframe computer, the troubles of IBM and a tough buyers' market in hardware and software point in this direction. But, in fact, the legitimacy crisis of IT goes wider than the computer industry. Across a number of industrial sectors, there is evidence that the application of IT to products and services no longer enjoys all the popular support that it once had. IT has yet to be tailored to meet the real needs of customerswhatever demographic group they hail from.