Create the future

Course description

INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE

In the course "Create the Future" the student learns to write future scenario's. Based on one or more of these scenario's a product for the future is developed. The aim of the course is to develop a long term view, for instance for over five or ten years, on a product or a product range.

LEARNING GOALS

After finishing the course "Create the Future" the students

CONTENT

The course starts with a series of lectures about future studies and how to use existing research and information to write future scenarios. The methodology is based on scenario methods developed to inform strategy making within firms and facilitate collective decision making. After this introduction one or more scenarios have to be written. Based on one of these a product is designed. This product does not have to be worked out in detail, but it must be made plausible that it can work.

RELATION TO OTHER COURSES

Create the Future is the last course in a series of four courses on "Product Design & Styling".

In the first course, Past Futures, the history of style is the main theme. Design styles are placed in the context of the society of their times. The manifestos, pamphlets and other texts that propagate a certain style always have an utopian character. Nearly always people have an idealistic vision about how society should be changed and the role the designer ought to play in that.

In the second course, Evolutionary Product Development a redesign of a product has to be done. This design should be the next logic step based on the history of the product.

The importance of emotional benefits has substantially increased over the past decades. Therefore, in the third course in this series, Design & Emotion, special attention is paid to this subject.

In the fourth and last course of this series, Create the Future, an effort has to be made to develop a product for the longer term, e.g. five to ten years.

Contact: ir. W. Eggink / Dr. A.A. Albert de la Bruhèze