Prof. Neri Oxman neri@mit.edu
Labs Wednesday 7:00 – 9:00 PM 7-429
Inspired by Charles and Ray Eames’ canonical Powers of Ten, the course explores the relationship between science and engineering through the lens of Design. It examines how transformations in science and technology have influenced design thinking and vice versa. It offers interdisciplinary tools and methods to represent, model, design and fabricate objects, machines, and systems. Structured as core lectures and lab sessions, the course is organized by “systems”: Design of Data, Design of Matter, Design of Life and Design of Perception. World-renowned designers, scientists and engineers will contribute with guest lectures. We will design things – material and immaterial; we will learn new computational and fabrication tools along the way; we will develop methodologies for design research of interdisciplinary problems; we will practice what it means to think, live, and breathe Design.
The course creates a new pedagogical paradigm for education, which cuts across various disciplines and scales to demonstrate that design is not a discipline but a way of looking at the world that promotes the synthesis of interdisciplinary knowledge across scales in order to create objects and systems for the greater good. This is partly due to the fact that such challenges – such as the race to cure cancer, the mars landing mission and the challenge to design sustainable cities and buildings – require, perhaps more than ever, an interdisciplinary skill set and an ability to operate across multiple scales with creativity.
The history of design innovation provides endless examples of cross-disciplinary individuals and innovations. Buckminster Fuller, for instance, was a designer, a futurist, an inventor, an author and a systems theorist. His designs based on the geodesic dome has inspired not only generations of designers, architects, engineers and urban planners but also chemists, material scientists and physicists who were inspired by his representation of the physical world. Charles and Ray Eames were mid-century American designers working at a range of scales and in a variety of media, from furniture and military aircraft parts to films and exhibitions. Their experiments in design fabrication, and cultural media are a useful reference for design education today. An example of the value of learning across disciplines today is found in Siddhartha Mukherjee’s book, Emperor of All Maladies: a Biography of Cancer, which tells the story of how the process of inventing cell dyes to trace the growth of cancerous tissues was actually inspired by textile design.
Design has expanded to include a broad range of scales and disciplines, shifting from the production of objects to the design of experiences, data, networks, territories, and social frameworks. Designers are no longer exclusively committed to design autonomous objects (buildings, cars, furniture and household products), but rather are conceiving and testing whole ecologies of design experiences (robotic construction systems, transportation systems, health care experiences, water distribution, and clean energy). This has prompted Tim Brown, CEO of the design consultancy firm IDEO to state, “Design is too important to be left to designers.” The scope of design ecologies is so broad and so integrated with other disciplines that traditionally trained designers are ill equipped to tackle the new breadth of design tasks at hand. Interdisciplinary teams must work together to design the systems, experiences, environments and futures for our increasingly complex world.
Design Across Scales, Disciplines and Problem Contexts responds to this challenge by creating a course that is not a traditional design course for designers, but a design course about culture, science and technology to serve as a foundation for all students regardless of major.
Assignments
For Undergraduates, the final grade is distributed as follows: Assignment 1: 25%, Assignment 2: 25%, and Class participation: 50%. For Graduate students, the final grade is distributed as follows: Assignment 1: 25%, Assignment 2: 25%, Assignment 3: 25%, and Class participation: 25%.
Schedule*
February 3 Tues LECTURE 1- DESIGN ACROSS SCALES
Prof. Meejin Yoon and Prof. Neri Oxman
Recommended Readings:
Colomina, Beatriz. "Enclosed by Images: The Eameses' Multimedia
Architecture. Grey Room. (2001): 7-29.
Paola Antonelli, et. al., Design and the Elastic Mind. New York: Museum of
Modern Art; London: Thames & Hudson, 2008.Top of Form
Morrison, Philip, and Phylis Morrison. Powers of Ten: A Book About the
Relative Size of Things in the Universe and the Effect of Adding Another Zero.
Redding, Conn: Scientific American Library, 1982.Top of Form
February 4 Wed NO LAB. TAs to discuss course admission.
February 10 Tues LECTURE 2: DESIGN ACROSS SCALES IN PRACTICE
Prof. Meejin Yoon and Prof. Neri Oxman
* Cancelled due to snowstorm, the lecture will be given in conjuction with
"Design of Innovation".
Issue Assignment 1: Design a Representational System
February 11 Wed LAB 1: Documentation, Video and Image Capture, Video Editing
Image Processing and Illustration
Lab Gurus: Steve, Markus, John
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
Tools: Final Cut X - Video editing; Adobe Photoshop - Image Processing
Adobe Illustrator - Vector drawing.
February 17 Tues NO CLASS (MIT Monday schedule of classes)
February 18 Wed LAB 2: CAD TOOLS
Lab Gurus: John, Chikara, Will
Location: Long Lounge (7-429) and E15-341
Tools: 2D and 3D CAD: Autocad, Rhino, 3DSMax, Solidworks
February 24 Tues LECTURE 3: DESIGN OF REPRESENTATION
Notation, Information and Communication
Prof. Meejin Yoon and Prof. Neri Oxman
Prof. Cesar Hidalgo, Macro Connections Group at Media Lab
Recommended Readings:
Daston, Lorraine, and Peter Galison. Objectivity. New York:Zone Books, 2007.
Maeda, John. The Laws of Simplicity. The MIT Press.
2006.Books24x7.Web.Feb. 1, 2013.
McLuhan, Marshall. "The Medium is the Message". Understanding Media:
The Extensions of Man. New York: Signet, 1964.
Tufte, Edward. Envisioning Information. Cheshire, CN: Graphics Press, 1990.
February 25 Wed LAB 3: Data Processing and Visualization
Lab Gurus: Jorge, Laia, Alex
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
Tools: Processing (Data streams, sound inputs, and visualization)
March 3 Tues LECTURE 4: DESIGN OF DATA
Computation, Visualization, and Big Data
Guest lecturers:
Jer Thorp
Ben Fry, Fathom (co-developer of Processing)
Recommended Readings:
Maeda, John. Creative Code. London: Thames & Hudson, 2004.
Reas, Casey, and Ben Fry. Processing: A Programming Handbook for Visual
Designers and Artists. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2007.
Fry, Ben. Visualizing Data. Beijing: O'Reilly Media, Inc, 2008.
March 4 Wed LAB 4: Design Development Crit for Assignment #1
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
DESIGNING INNOVATION
March 10 Tues CLASS PRESENTATIONS: ASSIGNMENT 1 DUE
March 11 Wed LAB 5: Fabrication Workshop 1
Lab Gurus: John, Chicara, Will
Subtractive Fabrication Tools: Laser Cutting, 3D Printing, File Set-Up &
Exchange Demo
March 17 Tues LECTURE 5: DESIGN OF INNOVATION
Design as Practice
Lecturer: Prof. Meejin Yoon
Guest lecturer: Lee Moreau, Principal of Continuum
Recommended Readings:
Brown, Tim and Barry Katz. Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms
Organizations and Inspires Innovation. New York: Harper Business, 2009.
Mau, Bruce, and Jennifer Leonard. Massive Change. London: Phaidon, 2004.
McDonough, William, and Michael Braungart. Cradle to Cradle:Remaking the Way
We Make Things. New York: North Point Press, 2002.
Issue Assignment 2: "Re-Design the Wheel"
March 18 Wed LAB 6: Fabrication Workshop 2
Lab Gurus: Will, Steve
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
Additive Fabrication Tools: Additive Manufacturing, Molding, Casting
March 24 Tues SPRING BREAK- NO CLASS
March 25 Wed SPRING BREAK- NO LAB
The workshops for this module will take place in room 68-074
March 31 Tues LECTURE 6: Designing with DNA
Lecturer: Prof. Neri Oxman
Additional speakers: Steven Keating and Will Patrick
Introduction to Synbiota
With David Sun Kong, Ph.D., Technical Staff, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
April 1 Wed LAB 7 - SYNBIOTA SESSION 1: Programmable Bacteria
Lab Gurus: David Kong, Sunanda
Location: 68-074
DNA Design: Concepts, Methods, Tools and Example Applications
*This lab session will be 7 - 10pm
April 7 Tues LECTURE 7: Designing with DNA
Guest Lecture:
David Sun Kong, Ph.D., Technical Staff, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
Tal Danino, Postdoctoral Fellow, Bhatia Lab, MIT
April 8 Wed LAB 8 - SYNBIOTA SESSION 2: Programmable Bacteria
Lab Gurus: David Kong, Sunanda
Location: 68-074
DNA Design: Concepts, Methods, Tools and Example Applications
*This lab session will be 7 - 10pm
April 14 Tues LECTURE 8: MEMBERS WEEK
Guest lecturer:
John Snavely
April 15 Wed Brainstorming Session for Assignment 2 - work in groups
(Non-obligatory for ML students during sponsor week)
Lab Gurus: Architecture TAs
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
April 21 Tues PATRIOTS DAY HOLIDAY - NO CLASS
April 22 Wed LAB 9: ARDUINO KITS
Lab Gurus: Will, Steve
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
DESIGNING ACROSS DISCIPLINES
April 28 Tues LECTURE 9: DESIGNING ACROSS DISCIPLINES
Guest lecturers:
David Edwards, Director, Le Laboratoire
Skylar Tibbits
GRADUATE ASSIGNMENT DUE (Designing Life with David Kong)
April 29 Wed LAB 10: Design Development Crit for Assignment #2
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
May 5 Tues LECTURE 10: DESIGN AS RESEARCH
Prof. Meejin Yoon and Prof. Neri Oxman
Recommended Readings: TBD
May 6 Wed LAB 11 - Design Development Crit for Assignment #2
Location: Long Lounge (7-429)
May 12 Tues ASSIGNMENT 2 DUE - Class Presentations
Redesign the Wheel
* Changes to the schedule, if necessary, will be announced via email.
* Supplemental Graduate Student Assignment due date will be determined in advance of the due date.