Here you find the pictures of the presentation that I, and the ones who used my camera, took. I didn’t set the shutter speed right it seemed, so some movements are blurred. Apologies for that! There will be more pictures available on the KISDphoto page soon from someone else. (under ‘Services’ at the top)
The Friday AG just informed all presenting groups that the time is limited to 20 minutes per group. This is extremely short! So maybe we open our doors for interested students after the presentation for another 30mins in the afternoon before you rebuild everything in room 240? We will have a feedback meeting on TUE […]
To do for Tuesday / Wednesday Today: Update and fix your user stories. Remember – the user story has the purpose to communicate a dedicated “use” (and user experience) of your concept, the system and products you designed. No single step in the user story should be a commonplace, always tell what is special and […]
We will meet around 10am in R240. I kindly ask all of you to get your (needed) part(s) of the exhibition system in the basement (R58) and bring it to 240 so that we can see how exactly the individual elements will look like and how they can be put together to get a coherent […]
Find the folders here. So I’ve been putting your content into the new poster template and the A5 factsheet. Now, I gave myself quite a challenge to try and put it in for you, aiming to maintain a unified form/feeling. 😉  Along the way, I have played around with your text, got out typo’s and […]

Food is increasingly getting on the agenda of design and designers. And there is need for new approaches!

In this international project, we will research and analyse structures and processes related to food production, distribution and consumption in (future) cities (Cologne/Taipei).

We will develop possibilities of future approaches, especially in the context of increasing digitization (AI, IoT, blockchain, traceability, bait to plate, farm to fork) – and question them critically.

  • How can we design a different relation to food, its ingredients and values, its production and culture, its habits and processes?
  • How can we create new relations and values to ingredients of food?
  • How can we connect (us to) different stakeholders, especially to build relations between farmer/producer and consumer.

A part of the project team – max. 6 students – will be able to work in Taipei for a week in November, supported by students from SCID Taipei and the project group in Cologne. Details will be clarified in the first project meeting.

In Cologne, we work together with local experts and stakeholders.

At the end of the semester, both the analysis and drafts / prototypes will be presented.

In the project we refer to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, in particular to SDG 11 and 12. Due to the topic, it might be possible to submit the results to the Cumulus Green Award (and I will encourage and support you to do so).

We will approach the project by questions we want to explore. In the beginning, we will have the opportunity to find a huge variety of questions and then discuss them – amongst us and with others . in order to find out the most relevant ones. Relevant in terms of the need to approach them and relevant to approach them from the perspective of design.

Pre-meeting: if you have questions or want to make sure that you are really in the project – or want to influence the character of the project even before it started please try to join our pre-meeting on Thursday September 26 at 12.30

First official meeting: This is mandatory for all that want to join – it will be on Tuesday October 22 at 10.00. In this meeting I want to see what your specific interest in this project is – so please subscribe to this space, contribute with some relevant questions and maybe cases as well…

Regular meetings: The regular meetings are always on Tuesday at 10.00. As I mentioned due to some travel activities we won’t meet every Tuesday, but there will be weeks where we meet twice or longer during the Tuesday meeting. There is a GoogleDoc with all our meetings (always updated). If you are not available we can arrange to connect via zoom – but always let me know before. 

Taiwan trip: the workshop in Taiwan is scheduled for November 18-23. The core group not traveling to Taipei will proceed meeting here and we will remotely collaborate via our KISDspace and zoom (see above).

We can learn a lot from existing cases and studies. Here we are collecting relevant cases how digitalisation  influences and affects food farming, production, distribution and consumption. How farmers/producers are connected to consumers, the rural to the urban.

Cases are structured around 3 core questions: What it is, Where it is and Why it is relevant. In addition, cases have tags / keywords to made them more accessible and findable. It would be great to use the comment function about the use of cases to create additional information

Here we will collect interesting experts: individuals, organisations or initiatives who are doing something we consider valuable in the context of the project. They can be (preferrably) from the area Cologne or Taipei with the purpose to meet them for an interview, invite them for a talk or a workshop, or to go for a visit or a field trip.

This is the page where we share our digital communication – in this case video messages between Cologne and Taipei to figure out what’s the best way to keep in touch. And for live connections please use https://zoom.us/j/5505005500

Q1: How can we design / change the situation of “common meals” at restaurants or in food stalls in order to connect people more to the food (its origin, its culture, its value…) they are eating?

Q2: How can we design settings where people in cities connect to local and seasonal food and their production context? How could we use data and digital media to increase the possible impact of people engaged in CSA for them and their friends / community (both in relation to the ingredients used and the more efficient / less waste use)?

Q3: How can we design and use data about food / ingredients to support people in selecting specific regional and seasonal food? This question should deal with different retail situations of food and work with specific examples of organic food allowing to connect to the origin of the food and dealing with different layers of information depending of the interest of the customer.
It adresses different situations with different contextual information needs.

Q4: Looking at regional and seasonal food, what are the opportunities to reduce or avoid packaging in retail situations in cities but in the same way provide necessary information about the products (goes together with Q3)? Are there services that enable change of the existing patterns of shopping regional and seasonal food in supermarkets (e.g. through engaging with the regional farmers through digital channels / platforms or through building communities)? Which new experiences and retail channels might emerge supporting local farmers?

Q5: Which possibilities emerge through emerging data technologies (like block chain) to establish a stronger relationship between people living in large cities and the food they buy and consume? Both types, regional and distant food will be explored for ways to connect both to the food and their production, cultivation, their value and the engaged people. What could this mean for interested people in the city?

Q6: How can social media and digital platforms be used to create local communities of people living in big cities sharing an interest in local and regional food? Can specific characteristics of food culture support this process and which type of services or processes might emerge?

Q7: How can we learn from the two phases of production and consumption in the food cycle in a way to better connect producers and consumers of food through a digital platform and build urban communities more aware of the value and origin of food, appreciating and enjoying food?

Q8: How can CSA around Cologne and Taipei be more efficient and appealing to a broader community / audience, supported through activities and new services based on available data and digital platforms? How would this change the work at CSA (or new types of farming) in a sustainable way? Which new roles for both urban citizen and farmer emerge?

Q9: How can we create value in limited availability of (local, seasonal) products, making them special and appreciate its very quality? What type of food might be a good example for that?

Q10: How could the street stall culture in Taipei can become a unique pioneer (and new best-practice) in connecting to peri-urban food production / farms? Can the farm-to-plate principle, currently applied to more pricy restaurant, be applied to this very common type of “eating out”? Street stalls might be satellites or pop-ups of a farm.

Q12: Which non-food products made of upcycled food waste relate to the city / urban context are able to tell a story about its origin through digital information layers? How could the experience be? (How) can it be a strong story supporting a brand?

Q13:Which types of narratives using food / ingredients / cultivation / production data are able to create a relation to the product (and a strong user experience)? It might be the process of growing, or taking care, of the use of fertilizers etc. that can be “shared”.

Q14: How could urban citizen connect through local / peri-urban farming products and which new types of supply chain / distribution could emerge?