Viale Monza 335- Symbiosis

Why co-design? | value of participation

After generating two possible solutions for our project for Viale Monza 335:

1 The People’s Garden- A place where people can connect through building a healthier lifestyle

2 Art Of Diversity- A place which celebrates diversity trough art

next step was organizing the co-design sessions. The main goal of a co-design session is to use it as a tool to better frame fundamental problems, re-evaluate existing ideas and get inspired by new perspectives and insights. The aim was to share knowledge and experience in order to further develop and enrich the project and generate the best possible solution to the existing problems. The result should be a single, precisely defined concept.

What, who? | defining fundamentals

In order for all of the involved parties to benefit from taking part in participation, each process must be fitted for the objective at hand. It is necessary to plan out specific activities using predetermined methods and tools in order for the participation process to be effective. After defining our aims, having in mind that our group of participants won’t benefit from the project itself, we knew we want to create something that is interactive, that allows expression of creativity, uses graphics as a main language and is easy to use. Our main goal was to create a tool which at the same time allows the participants to enjoy the process, and us to reach our objective.

After defining the “what”, we needed to define the “who”, and form our group of participants. Since we weren’t able to contact parties directly involved in the project, or strategy was to involve people from professions connected to the topic — architects, designers, urbanist, specialists on certain topics related to the project etc. Our aim was to gather a group of people with different background, nationality, age, level of professional expertise, knowledge and experience — in order to have a wide range of different insights and perspectives. We divided our participants in two main categories, based on their contribution:

1) Co-design session participants, who were directly involved in the session

2) Co-design advisors, who were there to give us valuable professions input on our ideas and the conducted sessions

Why a game? | defining the tool

We decided to organize our ‘’boundary object” for the co-design session as a Board game. The layout of the Board game is a continuous “S” shape, constructed from a sequence of interconnected smaller frames for each step of the game (“islands”). There are 10 steps, with an additional 11th step as an open over-all discussion about the topics presented. These 10 steps are divided in 4 groups based on the information we want to obtain.

Every step has simple instructions provided in bubble above its frame, explaining what the participant is expected to do. The game should be played in the presented order from step 1 to step 10, following the signage and direction of the arrows provided in the layout. Along the way, in addition to the pre-session general explanation of the space and concepts presented in the Board Game, we provided more precise explanation in circles dedicated to different topics needed to be understood in order to finish all the steps.

Main reason why we chose the layout of a Board Game as a tool for co-design session is that we wanted to create stress-free and fun context in which session is conducted, with the aim to encourage participants creativity and stimulate their engagement! Perception of the co-design session as a game breaks the mental barrier of seeing it as “work” that needs to be done, and creates a motivating environment. We made this tool in order to engage participants in a simple and inviting way. Our aim was to allow them to appreciate the experience, and at the same time allow us to gather all the needed information.

Let’s play! | co-design sessions

Considering the type of boundary object we designed, having a co-design separately with each participant was an added value. This gave us better control over the course of the session, as well as the opportunity for the participant to have our full attention and assistance if needed. In this way we were able to focus on the participant, steer and oversee every step of the session which helped us learn, improve and gather valuable information.

Before starting a co-design session, we introduced participants to the platforms we used for this session and provided all the information needed in order to play the Board game — layout of the game, where to start, in which order to play it, where to find needed instructions and explanations. For this session, we used two type of platforms: Microsoft Teams (for general communication with participants) and MIRO (for creating the co-design tool - Board game and conducting the session).

Participants had unlimited time to finish the game. They played it by themselves, decided the pace and amount of involvement in each game. After finishing the game, we had a discussion with each participant. This allowed us to have and open discussion about the project and acquire additional input that could help us generate our final concept.

What have we learned? | generating final concept

Co-design session helped us to better understand and re-evaluate premises about the space and established visions of it. Different people’s perspectives pointed out important aspects of the project that needed to be thought through again, parts of project that should have our special attention and those worth keeping in any case. With this on our mind and by looking at the bigger picture, we came to the conclusion that “solution” does not lay in single vision. Taking the best aspects of both concepts and carefully combining them will ensure complexity and richness of the future project.

The final idea is generated using urban garden theme as a way of building a strong community while using art as a way of expressing the aesthetic identity of neighborhood. One of the most important aspects of the final concept that need special attention is establishing program– something that is going to include all actors of the space, both inhabitants and users of the Pane Quotidiano Association, and is going to be recognized and interesting enough to make people coming back. The program should encourage inclusivity, celebrate diversity and create a sense of community.

We wanted to achieve this through applying the concept of symbiosis — interaction between two different organisms living in close physical association, typically to the advantage of both. Spatially structure which will lead you through the space spreading organically according to community’s needs and desires. Both Gardening and Art will be facilitated inside the structure, ensuring symbiosis on more than one level.

Team 9:

Danica Pavicevic, Daniela Pérez, Lotta Petersen, Natalia Romero, Ksenija Martic