Designed Literature
"Reality is a cliché from which we escape by metaphor.” — Wallace Stevens, Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination
Design Literature Workshop at Parsons School of Design
Design and Literature is fun, bumpy, confusing, inversal, weaved, fussy, experimental, unknown, personal, intimate, inter, bridged, conceptual, imaginary, processual. It involves reading, thinking, questioning assumptions in order to explore text based, yet off-text narratives.
Intended audience: Speculative Readers, Writers and Designers
Key Words: Narratology, Literature, Speculative Design, Design Fiction, Design-led Research, Philosophy, Linguistics, Design, Product Design
Goal of project: Explore the intersection between design and literature, to find new ways of imagining and thinking design facing the prevalence of solutionism. The measure of success was people showing up to the workshop, which were effective and highly motivated. The debriefing and messages from participants highlighted their interest and excitement.
Experience and Outcome: Research prior to the workshop involved design-led research methods, linguistic theory, semiotics and modern literature reading. The workshop led to ideas around object publishing and iterative workshops bridging designers and writers in world-building.
