Route · Public Design Atlas
Design with other people
So the people who live the problem take part in the solution.
Choose the approach
How much decision-making power the team shares.
Co-design
The collective creativity of designers and people not trained in design, applied throughout the whole process. It is a specific case of co-creation.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- The design team prepares materials so anyone can create.
- People create from their own experience.
- Together, everyone interprets what was made and decides what to design.
- Avoid
- Inviting people to co-design when the solution has already been decided.
Participatory design
An approach in which the people who will live with the result take part as partners throughout the design process and decide together with the team.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- Form a group with the people who will live with the result.
- The team and the people learn from each other.
- Decisions are made together at every stage, from start to finish.
- Avoid
- Calling a survey, or a workshop where nothing is decided, participation.
Prepare the tools
Materials that let anyone express themselves.
Generative tools
Kits of materials (images, words, pieces) that people use to create collages, maps or models to express experiences, feelings and ideas that are hard to put into words.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- Prepare the kit. Images, words and a clear prompt.
- Create. Each person builds their collage, map or model.
- Tell it. The person explains what they made and why; it is recorded.
- Output
- Collages, maps or models made by the participants themselves
- Avoid
- Analyzing the collage without the explanation of the person who made it.
Run the session
Work together in the same space.
Charrette
An intensive, collaborative workshop, often lasting several days, in which design teams and affected people propose, present and revise solutions in rapid cycles.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- Prepare the problem and decide whom to invite.
- Work in groups and present to everyone.
- Revise based on what you hear, until you reach a plan.
- Output
- Proposals developed and revised as a group over a few days
- Avoid
- Calling a two-hour meeting a charrette.
Role playing
The team, and sometimes users, act out a situation with simple or cardboard objects to imagine how a product or service would work.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- Prepare the scene and the roles.
- Act out the situation with the imagined object.
- Discuss what worked and what didn't.
- Output
- Acted-out situations that show how an idea would work
- Avoid
- Turning it into theater without a design question.
Bodystorming
Ideating in the real place, or a similar one, and acting out the situations and ideas there with your body, instead of imagining them from a meeting room.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- Go to the place or recreate a similar one.
- Act out the situation and the ideas.
- Note what works and what doesn’t.
- Output
- Ideas tried out physically in the real place
- Avoid
- Doing it without research data: you would be acting out your assumptions.
Close the loop
Organize what came out and share it back.
Affinity diagram
Writing each research observation on a note and grouping the notes by affinity, bottom-up, until the themes that connect them emerge.
How it’s used
How it’s done
- Write one observation on each note.
- Group the notes that are alike, without prior categories.
- Give a title to each group and arrange the groups.
- Output
- Observations grouped into themes
- Avoid
- Starting with categories already decided: that way you only confirm what you believed.
Design synthesis
The process of organizing, grouping, and interpreting what has been researched until patterns, insights, and design opportunities emerge.
How it’s used
Why it happens
- Get all the information out while it is fresh.
- Group and regroup it, looking for patterns and differences.
- Interpret it until insights and opportunities are formulated.
- Avoid
- Jumping from data to solutions without going through interpretation.