CTS B | Week 11 Compulsory Question 1
Our group’s manifesto—“Design as inquiry, imagination as intention,” “Reflection transforms experience into understanding,” and “Examining artistic traditions and lineages reveals how design communicates across time and culture”—is deeply thoughtful, but I believe it can be strengthened. I would reframe it as: design is inquiry; imagination is intention; reflection is the transformation of experience into insight and action; and traditions and material lineages are actively engaged and reinterpreted so that design communicates across time, culture, and context. This change from passive “examining” to active “engaging and reframing” underlines that as designers we don’t just look at history—we intervene in it, question it, and reshape it through material, process, and cultural sensitivity.
In my Studio project for Archifest (theme: Interplay: Light and Reflection), I developed posters, a mobile website, brochures, and mockups. I approached design as inquiry—experimenting with layout variations, testing navigation flows on the mobile site, and prototyping brochure folds. Reflection was never an afterthought; each round of feedback prompted deliberate revisions in both visual structure and interaction design.
In my Materiality module, I am creating a zine rooted in my personal lineage and cross-cultural journey. I don’t just borrow tradition—I reinterpret it: the sequence, paper texture, form, and typography all bear meaning. In my Design Skills module, where I’m crafting a video, imagination-as-intention becomes concrete: each cut, shot, and beat is a considered argument—not just style.
Beyond practice, my Critical Thinking Skills B class has been crucial. It taught meta-reflection—examining how I think, why I pick certain materials or forms—and forced me to give voice to my design reasoning, rather than relying purely on instinct. It also exposed me to questioning whose perspectives are embedded in tradition: whose lineage am I engaging with? What cultural assumptions lie beneath my design? The cross-disciplinary lens of CTS B—drawing from ethics, history, philosophy, and cultural studies—directly undergirds my studio, material, and skills work.
Similarly, Li, Ho, and Yang’s design‑thinking research on Chinese handicrafts introduces a sustainable design approach grounded in five modes of thinking—with the body, mind, heart, hands, and soul—and proposes the evaluation of prototypes with indicators that reflect cultural, experiential, and interactive value. Their work shows how design thinking can revitalize material traditions rather than preserve them statically.
Finally, the book Analysing Design Thinking (Christensen, Ball & Halskov) offers a theoretical grounding: it explores how designers think and co-create across cultures, emphasizing metacognition, negotiation, and cross‑cultural understanding.
When I combine all these tools—studio practice, material exploration, video production, and critical thinking—I see a clear chain: inquiry → imagination → reflection → materialization → communication. This sequence has become the backbone of my design philosophy, and it’s precisely why I’d revise our manifesto to underline engagement, transformation, and dialogue—not passive observation.
Huang, Ko‑Hsun, and Yi‑Shin Deng. “Social Interaction Design in Cultural Context: A Case Study of a Traditional Social Activity.” International Journal of Design, vol. 2, no. 2, 2008.
Li, Wen‑Tao, Ming‑Chyuan Ho, and Chun Yang. “A Design Thinking‑Based Study of the Prospect of the Sustainable Development of Traditional Handicrafts.” Sustainability, vol. 11, no. 18, 2019, article 4823. doi:10.3390/su11184823.
Dam, Rikke Friis, and Teo Yu Siang. “What Is Design Thinking and Why Is It So Popular?” Interaction Design Foundation, 2018, interaction‑design.org/literature/article/what-is-design-thinking-and-why-is-it-so-popular.
Christensen, Bo, Linden J. Ball, and Kim Halskov, editors. Analysing Design Thinking: Studies of Cross‑Cultural Co‑Creation. Routledge, 2017.
