Title: 'Design Didactics'
Chair:
Dr Anastasios Tellios
Head of School of Architecture
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
Abstract/Description:
This session invites architects with overlapping identities as researchers, educators, and practitioners to interrogate the evolving terrain of architectural education and the mechanisms through which we transfer design knowledge.
Design Didactics moves beyond the mere "how-to" of architecture studio instruction, exploring the cognitive, cultural, and technical frameworks that shape how architectural thought is constructed and communicated. It will attempt to redefine the ‘architectural studio’ as a site of critical inquiry where the act of designing is inseparable from the act of thinking.
Invited contributions are expected to challenge traditional pedagogical boundaries and offer fresh perspectives on one or more of the following pillars:
The Agency of Design:
Moving beyond design as a service or a final product. We explore the role of design as a primary research method and a didactic tool that generates new knowledge rather than simply applying existing theories.
Heritage as Living Intelligence:
Departing from ‘conventional heritage preservation’, this session focuses on heritage as a dynamic repository of logic, craft, and spatial intelligence. How are students educated to engage with the past as a generative engine for future-oriented design?
The Role of Representations:
In an era of hyper-realistic rendering, we return to the fundamental role of representation as a way of seeing. We welcome discussions on how images, models, and simulations serve as active participants in the thought process—not just as ‘pictures’ of architecture, but as intellectual scaffolds.
Technology as a Cognitive Mediator:
Technology isn’t just a tool in this description. In a didactic context, it is a mediator of thought. Rather than treating it as neutral production tool, we examine how it reshapes designer’s mindsets, by introducing new parameters of logic, automation, and materiality into the conceptual phase.
Conceptualization & The Process of 'Making':
How is a concept born and sustained, bridging the gaps between abstract thought and physical reality, emphasizing the intellectual rigor required to maintain conceptual integrity throughout the design cycle.
Meanings & Semiotics:
Architecture is a language of signs and symbols. This session seeks to unpack coded meanings within the designing of architecture and the built environment and discuss how didactics can help students interpret existing contexts while intentionally ‘encoding’ their own work with layers of social, political, and cultural significance.