Gautam Vishwanath, Joel Wolff and I presented our final proposal ‘Eventful Forest’ for 2018
Design for Government. © Heidi Konttinen
Design for Government (DfG) is an advanced studio course in Creative Sustainability Master Programme. It took two periods from February till May 2018. “DfG develops design addressing the complex challenges of the government and public sector. In the course, we apply empathic approaches to identify stakeholder needs, systems approaches to analyse the wider context of policies, and behavioural insight to identify and design relevant solutions.” (Design for Government course description)
Our clients this year were The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and Metsähallitus, a state-owned company managing forests and hiking areas. Our mission is to find a clear profile and increase numbers of visitors for national hiking areas.
The course structure was divided into three parts and taught as how to apply different perspectives (human, systems and intervention) into the design process. My team initiated our approach with user’s journey and shifted our direction to create a eventful forest for the future scenario through an event facilitation model. We propose for the commissioners to take the facilitator’s role to build joint forces between public and private sectors in order to utilize events for raising public awareness and generating a sustainable growth in visitor numbers as well as local economy.
The final presentation took place in Säätytalo, House of Real Estates. We presented our proposal in a formal setting to our clients, supervisors and audience from public and private sectors. Design for Government provided a precious chance to work with the public sector to create solutions for real-life situations. There were three student teams with diverse background and expertise. As a result, three proposals were differentiated from each other, the other two focused on natural education and streamlined management inside Metsähallitus. Through Design for Government, we learned how to utilize design to help the government achieve goals.
More about my team’s proposal ‘Eventful Forest’
The final show of DfG 2018 – slides, videos and pictures
http://dfg-course.aalto.fi
Greetings,
Hsiao-Pei Liao
Creative Sustainability in Design