S.H.E.D: Design for Emergency

Design for Emergency is a global research enquiry, looking at Covid19, as a design challenge, and is building solutions that address the problems, needs and emotions of people living in confinement in different countries. It is an open design platform launched in 2020 at the Center for Design (Northeastern University, Boston) to collaborate on design solutions and confront the COVID-19 emergency. Design for Emergency is led by Dr Sara Colombo and Prof Paolo Ciuccarelli and gathers a global team of researchers across 11 countries.

For this global research project, Jones was invited, to test out S.H.E.D, as reconfigurable and mobile space, as a methodological design solution; to demonstrate how its, (S.H.E.D’s), design has supported delivery of cultural activity and provided researchers with a mobile consultation space for research projects through a pandemic. S.H.E.D has successfully adapted its design potential and specifications to be able to operate in a covid secure manner. Led by Jones, and working with the S.H.E.D team, Simon Burrows, Sarah Webb, Byron Manning, Ollie Smith and Victoria Barker they developed a design and tour-able project.

This was shared by Jones, and disseminated with the research leads by Dr Sara Colombo and Prof Paolo Ciuccarelli, to provide the global research partners with a case study of how to engage in discourse with the public and each other as a research-generation space and design object. As a result of this initial research, Dr Jones’ was invited to be the UK research lead partner for the Design for Emergency Project. S.H.E.D will continue to contribute to the capturing of data about the impact globally of covid19 from a design perspective, and on daily life for the UK public.


Working with DESIS Design for Emergency, the first research project was undertaken in 2020, entitled S.H.E.D: Design for Emergency, Jones designed a project where S.H.E.D worked in partnership with The Gramophones Theatre Company and designer Cory Shipp, to create a unique S.H.E.D experience, for parents and child through the creation of a digital soundscape performance at Lakeside Arts, Nottingham, UK. Supported by Arts Council England, S.H.E.D and The Gramophones created a site and sound specific experience, to put playfulness and fun back into parenting / home-schooling balance as a result of the impact of lockdown. To capture this, members of the public, (parent and child) who were to attend the show / site specific experience hosted at S.H.E.D, would be asked to complete the UK, version of the Design for Emergency research survey, led by Dr Jones and Dr Victoria Barker, as part of the global knowledge exchange and consultation process for the wider DESIS Design for Emergency project.

To this end, Jones’ has been able to provide S.H.E.D as a design solution example, within this international context. Through its continued touring activity and engagement with the public, through tier3 and 4 in Lockdown, due to its innovative outdoor design solutions that have been re-designed and can adapt to Covid19 safety measures.

An additional impact and outcome of this project, can be already noted is that it offers insights into how this research project reconfigures design needs and purpose, S.H.E.D provides a refreshing take on a global understanding of the role that design challenges perform in order to build solutions that address the problems and challenges of the pandemic. To this end, Dr Rhiannon Jones and Dr Victoria Barker have now been invited to provide a paper at CHEAD Annual conference 2021, to share plans for the UK research for this project, building further survey insights and creating a S.H.E.D open design challenge for UK-based designers and artists to test out some of the internationally proposed designs generated as a result of this research initiative.

Contributors
Hannah Stone
Ria Ashcroft
Patricia Davenport
Cory Shipp
Rebecca Peyton
Anna Clock
Simon Burrows
Sarah Webb
Mark Hawkhead
Ollie Smith
Byron Manning
Victoria Barker

Partner Venue
The Gramophones
Lakeside Arts

Delayed due to Covid.

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