A year of community projects, events and exhibitions in North East England involved local people, businesses and public service providers in a variety of design projects as active participants. The results show that the local community can, and wants to, redesign its everyday life to be easier, cheaper, friendlier and more sustainable.
Dott 07 identified aspects of daily life where things could be improved.
Dott 07 was inspired by the question ‘Who Designs Your Life?’. It helped residents, businesses and public services in the North East use the tools and techniques of design so that they could answer, 'We do'.
Putting people back in charge of their environment raised questions which Dott 07 hoped to answer with practical community projects. How to ask the right questions. How to identify what needs fixing, or changing. How to obtain appropriate design proposals. How to put together, and work in, multi-disciplinary teams. How to get projects paid for. How to judge their success.
The community projects were:
- Urban Farming, which has helped schools, communities and businesses grow their own fresh food in a variety of spaces in Middlesbrough, and seen them making it into meals for the whole town to enjoy.
- Low Carb Lane, where one street in Northumberland looked at a range of ways to make their homes more energy efficient, cut their carbon emissions and reduce their demand on the National Grid by up to 60%.
- The DaSH (Design and Sexual Health) project looked at improving screening and treatment provision for sexual health in Gateshead in consultation with service users. The aim was to develop a system where anyone contacting the service will be seen within 48 hours.
- The Move Me project in Scremerston, Northumberland aimed to improve transport systems within this small rural community. It looked at how best to use public and private transport and make it easier and more energy efficient for people to get around.
- OurNewSchool brought together a whole variety of people to learn, share thoughts, discover opportunities and come up with new ideas to improve people's experiences of being at school. OurNewSchool at Walker Technology College had the support of designers and other experts. Students, staff and people from the wider school community explored how to change the ways things work and collaborated to design and try out solutions.
- Alzheimer 100 looked at how design can improve the daily life of people with dementia and of their carers. The project focused on practical issues and sought to design new products and services that tackled them.
- The Eco Design Challenge saw year eight pupils across the region working with professional designers to redesign an aspect of school life to reduce their environmental and ecological impact.
The Dott work culminated in a Festival in Newcastle at the end of October. There was a series of debates, talks by some of the partner organisations that helped make Dott 07, and exhibitions to explain what design did for projects in Dott's five core areas.Dott 07 Programme Director John Thackara sums up the 20 most memorable things that happened during the Dott 07 Festival, which ran from 16-28 October 2007 in Newcastle. "The Dott 07 Festival brought together the results of projects and events that explore what sustainable life in one region could be like – and how design can help us get there" he says.
- 1. The 100-page Dott 07 Manual.
You can still get hold of a copy from Amazon
- 2. Debates. During the Dott 07 Festival the team debated about what they'd learnt during the projects, and what to do next?
Read transcripts of the debates to find out how.
- 3. Site and location (The festival was held in Newcastle with its world-class array of bridges)
- 4. Town criers (how to be heard)
- 5. Landscape/Portrait (demonising design data)
- 6. Move Me (no car? no problem!)
- 7. Welcomes (and unwelcomes)
- 8. Urban camping (the real thing)
- 9. Landlines (landscape as spectacle)
- 10. Mapping The Necklace (from food to fondling)
- 11. New Work (time, space and lonliness)
- 12. Low Carb Lane (one house at a time)
- 13. Eco Design Challenge (the follower-generation takes charge)
- 14. Our New School (it's not just the building)
- 15. Better Lives with Dementia (an eBay for time?)
- 16. Design and sexual health (mourning after the night before)
- 17. Our cyborg future? (brain-scan heaven)
- 18. Urban farming (hoodies cook burgers)
- 19. DE07 (twenty more events)
- 20. North East England (it's gorgeous)