Designing Sustainability Transitions
IO-MI-222
What would a sustainable future look like? How do we get there? And how can we design for it? Developing your own answers to these three questions will be the core of this minor.
Sustainability will be approached from both environmental and social perspectives. The underlying philosophy of this minor is that, in order to design for sustainability, you need to consider the whole system and go beyond resource efficient products and services.
Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering
ECs: 30
Language: English
Maximum participants: 60
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Education methods
Project work in groups, lectures, expert talks, workshops, group discussions and field tripsFor whom?
Engineering, architecture, and design students from universities worldwide on a level comparable to that of the TUDelft.
What will you learn?
You will learn about different topics and concepts that are central to designing sustainability transitions, such as societal change, transition management, complex systems, design approaches, systemic design, social design, the circular design strategies, design for behaviour change, futuring, materials, values and ethics, sustainable entrepreneurship and co-creation.
This minor provides an opportunity to experience real interdisciplinary teamwork as you will work together with fellow students from other faculties and universities. Teams will be able to think beyond their field of expertise, acquire creative design skills while sharing their disciplinary knowledge. You will critically reflect on the ethical considerations of design for sustainability and gain an unique experience working on leading topics with some frontrunner companies and larger organisations.
- You will analyse the different elements of complex sustainable systems, in the context of the challenge of addressing societal needs within our planetary boundaries.
- You will evaluate processes of change towards a sustainable future at different scales, from individual users to complete societal systems.
- You will form arguments for your own perspective on how transitions could take place.
- You will gain unique experience in carrying out project work in multidisciplinary teams for external, real-life clients.
- You will apply communication, entrepreneurship, and collaboration skills towards sustainability challenges in the real world.
Course overview
The minor Designing Sustainability Transitions comprises the following courses:
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This course combines lectures, discussions and readings, aimed at deepening your understanding of the issues of sustainability and at exploring different views of how change can be enacted in society. You will be challenged to take a stand and discuss with your peers and guest experts.
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Designers rarely have the time to consider the long-term and indirect effects of their technologies. What are effects of the product on the larger community, what happens when the product is used in different cultures, and after the product is thrown away? Value Sensitive Design provides theory and method to account for human values in a principled and systematic manner throughout the design process.
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In Demystify Green, you will investigate and numerically substantiate a sustainable claim found in current media. The course includes several lectures and workshops by experts from different faculties of TU Delft on research and fact checking, data visualisation, storytelling, and how to present like a pro.
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A series of masterclasses conducted by experts from a variety of fields will introduce you to a selection of cutting-edge marketing tools, design techniques and emerging technologies in the field of sustainable entrepreneurship, behaviour change, biological cycle materials and digital manufacturing.
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The design challenge is a team effort: you will work together in groups of 4-5 students from different faculties. You will explore a specific sustainability transition topic, provided by an external client, and put to practice the acquired knowledge and design techniques. You will be designing a system map and a concept for a new product, service, system, or other type of design that can support a transition.
Register for this minor
Minors of the faculty of Industrial Design Engineering are open only for students from academic programmes in the third year of their Bachelor studies.
Do you want some more information about this minor?
Visit the lunch meeting on 4 April from 12.45 – 13.30 in the IDE Arena!
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