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September 24, 2004

Design Festival Open Day

Thanks to all those who came along today to our Touching the State open day. As part of the London Design Festival we showed off the selected entries from the design challenge. Great to meet you nice people.

Chris Vanstone | LINK | TOUCHING THE STATE PROJECT | COMMENTS (0)

August 31, 2004

An invitation to view our work and meet our team

Can design make the leap from sofas to social issues?

During London Design Festival our unit will be showcasing its current project on Citizenship at the Design Council's offices in Bow Street, London.

The project asks: how does the design of encounters such as voting, jury service and the new citizenship ceremony shape our sense of citizenship?

The RED unit invite you to drop in for light refreshments, view the work and have a chat with the team on Friday 24th September between 11am and 4pm at the Design Council, 34 Bow Street, London WC2E 7DL, nearest tube Covent Garden. Map

Click here for more information on the project. For any further information contact Claire Hartten on 020 7420 5254.

Chris Vanstone | LINK | TOUCHING THE STATE PROJECT | COMMENTS (0)

July 23, 2004

Design Challenge Closed and Judged

Many thanks to all of you who took us up on our design challenge and entred your redesigned and newly created state-citizen touchpoints. We were very happy with the response to this - our first prototype challenge.

The entries have been judged by our expert panel and the selection will be announced by August 2nd - watch your inboxes.

Chris Vanstone | LINK | CITIZENSHIP + TOUCHING THE STATE PROJECT

July 13, 2004

Touching the State evening event write-up

On the evening of 22 July the design community came together to debate to potential of design to shape our sense of citizenship, as part of our Touching the State Design Challenge. Those charged with delivering some of the experiences by which we encounter the state, such as voting, jury service and the new citizenship ceremony, also joined the debate. Eight tables responded to eight of the Design Challenge briefs with a variety of bright ideas, thoughtful reflections and provocative discussion. A summary of the feedback from each table can be downloaded here: Touching the State evening event write-up

Jennie Winhall | LINK | TOUCHING THE STATE PROJECT | COMMENTS (0)

June 23, 2004

Touching the State: User Research and Briefs

Last night we unveiled our research to date at the Touching the State:Work in Progress event. Presentations included an overview of citizenship from Ben Rogers of ippr and excerpts of research from Acacia Avenue into citizens' experiences of jury service, voting and the new citizenship ceremony. An audience of designers planning to enter the challenge and those involved in delivering current state-citizen encounters responded to a number of design briefs to have come out of the research so far with lively debate and some great ideas.

A write-up of the proceedings will be available here shortly for those of you who missed it.

In the meantime, on the Touching the State Design Challenge page, we've uploaded:

  • The full user research presentation, showing the experiences of 9 citizens

  • More focused briefs for the Design Challenge that have emerged from the research to date (you can still respond to the original one if you prefer)

  • Video clips of interviews with the citizens who participated in the research
  • Take a look - there's lots of rich material there to inform your contributions.

    We will be uploading useful links for background projects and information as we find them, and transcripts of the interviews with the citizens are available on request.

    If you haven't registered for the challenge yet, there's still plenty of time - deadline for contributions is July 19 and you can download the form here.

    Good luck!

    Jennie Winhall | LINK | BRIEFS + DESIGN CHALLENGE + TOUCHING THE STATE PROJECT | COMMENTS (0)

    June 15, 2004

    Touching the State: Work in Progress

    We've uploaded a one-pager to the challenge page that introduces the concept of citizenship and it's significance today. We'll be being posting more background information this week and our user expereince research on the 23 June.

    If you're a designer and haven't RSVP'd yet there is still time to register to attend our Touching the State: Work in Progress event at 6:30pm in the Design Council on 22 June. We'll be introducing RED, the Project, the challenge and our research to date. Email touchingthestate@designcouncil.org.uk to reserve a place.

    Chris Vanstone | LINK | TOUCHING THE STATE PROJECT | COMMENTS (0)