The Design Lab Project
The designLab project is about increasing the practice of design by designers in specific territories.
A lot of coworking places were borned in recent years. The APCI Board has decided to work on a specific acculturation about design in this kind of place. Because APCI believes in proximity, designers don’t need specific places to practice design but they need to be involved in the economical issue of a territory.
The APCI Board is producing a specific charter to make a good starting point for the designers. The Designlab is a label for coworking and creativity places based on designers’ needs about the practice of design, from the design thinking to the design doing. In France, designers need to act as a network to make some proof of the positive design impact on a business project. For yet, the design practice is still considered as a hobby and not like a powerfull tool for companies. Each Designlab will be a very efficient demonstrator powered by designers for designers. The choice to collaborate with places already built allow to transform each place into a design centric place. In this type of place, designers can start a various range of business partnerships
The first APCI DesignLab was born in Rennes Metropôle on the 19th September 2019 to address an audience of designers located in Brittany (West of France). In parallel, we have started talking with 7 different cities and places. The first aim for APCI is to create 13 designLabs, one in each French Region. The DesignLab project is a two years old project, it is one of the first project of the new APCI, new strategy, new partners, new team.
To become a Designlab, a coworking place must follow the basic methodology of design management: from the design diagnosis and observation phase, the ideation and visualisation, to the design studio and the prototype to make users test in real condition, the whole range of design services will be dispensed in by a local designers’ community.
Each territory with a DesignLab APCI can work about the big issues of society. A Designlab is a strong tool to act on transformation’s project with public and private sectors, at the same time. The design impact will be positive about energy efficiency, sustainable development, citizens participation and a lot of humans needs.
For more information visit:https://apci-design.fr/