Performing hybrid play-lecture-exhibition, with Åsa Ståhl and Sara Hyltén-Cavallius, at Linneaus University.
Photo Miguel Salinas, 2019.
The project Boost Metadesign explored two converging housing crises. 1. The lack of affordable and suitable housing for students, migrants and older persons – groups unprioritized by the market. 2. The threat to our home Earth, as human activities are driving detrimental changes to vital Earth systems, threatening all life on this planet.
The project took place in the region of Småland, Southern Sweden, spanning rural and urban areas as well as what is in between. We worked in co-creation with students, migrants, older persons, local and regional governance, and the building sector. We developed new scenarios for housing – The matching agency – matching surplus with needs, House-human-choreography – flexible, agile and emergent housing responding to needs, Trans-port – housing as interdependent with mobility and mobility as learning, and Oikology – home ecologics a new learning field for life within Earth’s limits. The project also generated a series of methods for co-creation – scenario salad anyone? and a series of cruxes (itchy dilemmas) that can be bounced into housing planning processes – whether by citizens, industry or a municipality or region. We shared the project in a hybrid format of a touring performance-lecture-exhibition.
Scenario salad – method for exploring ideas with people from different disciplines, at Växjö Food Festival, 2018.
Photo Mathilda Tham, 2018.
A concrete outcome of the project is the book Oikology – Home Ecologics: a book about building and home making for permaculture and for making our home together on Earth. In line with the project’s ethos of co-creation, the book includes ‘recipe’s for home making from many of the project participants.
Mathilda Tham led the three-year-long (2017–2019) project Boost metadesign, working with Åsa Ståhl and Sara Hyltén-Cavallius, the Department of Design, Linnaeus University. It was part of a larger project, BOOST, which also included development of hands on technical prototypes of wood and glass and business model innovation, and was funded by the European Regional Development Fund.