Speculative Design
Speculative Design speculates about the future or a better present
Before introducing Speculative Design, we need to think about what the purpose of Design. In the simplest terms, it is to design to change an existing situation into a desired one.
But is that all design can do? Think about it next.
"How to use design as a tool to create not only things, but ideas to speculate about possible futures."
-Dunne & Raby
That's the design we're going to talk about today.
Speculative Design
What is?
The main characteristic of Speculative Design is that it is more about raising a question than solving a problem. Most of the questions are posed as "what if" to generate dialogue and open discussion about what the future of society will be.
It relates to 2 basic concepts: speculation on possible futures and the design of an alternative present, which is a complete departure from traditional design.
Affirmative design is more like problem-solving, provides answers and enormous commercial values.
Different from it,
Speculative design is more like problem finding, asking questions and social meaning.
Dejan Kršić said that
Design is a signifying practice consisting of generating, analysing, distributing, mediating and reproducing social meaning.
Speculative design is a branch of critical design and is a design practice which focuses on future critical design solutions and social significance, thinking more about the role and impact of technology in everyday life rather than dealing with problematic applications.
Speculative design evolving from the critical design but the traditional design has evolved to the point where it is now market saturation in the aspects of problem-solving and life optimisation. But what is urgently needed in today's world is to think about the future, open up new discussions and offer alternative directions and positive change.
It is free from the constraints of commercial practice, enhancing fiction and speculation about future products and initiating dialogue with experts and users of new technologies. The emergence of this kind of design, I think, is a product of a certain level of development. Inevitably, there is a period of stagnation in traditional design and speculative design is used to break them, to break the original solidified design thinking, to stop being limited to one kind of feasibility, to stop being a solution to what others want, but to provoke deep thoughts about the future through design.
The essential component of Speculative Design is critical thinking questions practice of design(Mitrović, 2015).
What the limitations of
Speculative Design?
Rather than trying to provide answers to design questions, speculative work asks questions about the future. Its use of concepts and means of execution sometimes may be more like "art", but it put the work in "believable everyday situations so that we can explore possible consequences before they happen" (Dunne & Raby, 57).
It may seem that Speculative Design is an inevitable product of the era in development but it also has certain limitations.
You could imagine that before the introduction of this design category.
the classification and understanding of design were still in your mind, which are UI design, Graphic design, Interaction design Visual communication.
Speculative Design aims to raise social discussion about the future but still requires a certain degree of communication. Linking with reality, the projects of Speculative Design seem to only exist in the artists' exhibitions. How could a project that is only in an exhibition make people think, it only can resonate with the viewer or designer. So I think the next breakthrough point and goal for Speculative Design is to make these works more visible to the more and more general population.
an example of Speculative Design
About Courtesy Larry Sass
Courtesy Larry Sass is a speculative design for the future of affordable housing designed by MIT Associate Professor Larry Sass. Designing Affordability is the concept that he proposed this time.
Divided into categories of using land and building modularity manufacturing, these projects collectively go beyond the typical approach that is based on form to discussing affordability but offer ideas rooted in the language of space.
Rather than thinking about how to add more effective space to limited space, he inspires and provokes the construction industry to think in terms of the cost of developing and operating costs. This also reflects the current trends and some of the problems of urban life in society at the same time.
As the design is not enough to solve a problem that is expanding globally, Design Affordability opens more areas for interaction between architecture and activism( Artemel, 2015).
Reasons for choice
Speculative Design's projects are designed to reflect either a problem or the design of an alternative present; both Courtesy Larry Sass has achieved. Also, unlike other projects, I think this one is more topical because it leads to a reflection within the industry and the results of that reflection which is useful and desirable for most people.
Also, I think it was able to communicate what it was thinking through a project to a wider audience so I think the project was successful. This has to tend toward a wider group of people who prefer a design that solves problems. This is the opposite of the ‘ask question’ characteristic of speculative design but it still requires the designer to look at what contemporary people are most concerned with nowadays.
The Toaster project made me really imagine how I would survive if I travelled back in time. But for people, who are used to a world full of technology, there is an instinctive resistance to bad things so they don't think about what it would be like without technology, it's anti-utopian and makes them feel uncomfortable. So I think in this respect the Courtesy Larry Sass project is more successful.
Reference：
Anthony, D. & Raby, F. (2013). Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction, and Social Dreaming. MIT Press.
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/speculative-everything
Artemel, J. (2015). A Roof for Everyone: Speculative Designs for the Future of Affordable Housing. METROPOLIS.
https://metropolismag.com/projects/roof-for-everyone-speculative-designs-future-affordable-housing/
Jchristie. (2015). Designing Affordability: Quicker, Smarter, More Efficient Housing Now. CENTER FOR ARCHITECTURE.
Golub, M. (2014). DEJAN KRŠIĆ: Dizajn je oduvijek bio značenjska praksa. Dizajin.hr.
http://dizajn.hr/blog/dejan-krsic-dizajn-je-oduvijek-bio-znacenjska-praksa/
Mitrović I. (2019, July 14). Introduction to speculative design practice – Speculative. Speculative – Speculative – Post-Design Practice or New Utopia?. https://speculative.hr/en/introduction-to-speculative-design-practice/
Xiao, L. (2020). Embracing unforeseeable futures: A look at speculative design. Shaping Design.
https://www.editorx.com/shaping-design/article/speculative-design