Industrialized house builders strive towards structure and control of their processes, including design. Such structure is seldom sought for in architectural design practice, where individuality and autonomy are considered essential. This is causing a tension in the construction industry as industrialized house builders and architects strive to improve their collaboration. In this licentiate thesis, a first step towards better understanding this tension is taken by exploring different design approaches from a creativity perspective. The analytical framework builds on a theoretical conceptualization of design approach features, including design task, design process, design organization, and knowledge sharing. A creativity perspective is added using heuristic or algorithmic design tasks; divergent or convergent design processes; autonomy or imposed structure from the design organization; and sole designer or teamwork as the basis for knowledge sharing. This framework is used to analyze four empirically explored design approaches, two focusing on platform development and two focusing on project specific design. Three of these are explored using a case study approach, while the fourth is explored through interviews with multiple architects. The architectural design approach’s features seem likely to facilitate creativity: the design task is mainly heuristic; the design process enables divergence; and the architects have autonomy in how to go about the design process. However, they experience a lack of knowledge sharing, which could further facilitate creativity. The studied standardized design development approach has the opposite features: the design task is mainly algorithmic; the design process facilitates convergence; and there is a clear structure with instructions of how each subtask should be executed. Hence, this design approach is not likely to facilitate creativity (which was also not its intention). The structure has however improved the design team’s knowledge sharing, which is likely to facilitate creativity. The two platform development approaches have a mix of features. Both design tasks are more algorithmic than heuristic and creativity was not expected of the design results. The design processes are clearly convergent. While the house platform development team is multi-functional and work in close collaboration, the design automation platform developers’ knowledge sharing is based on communication with the client’s organization, thus not enabling as many perspectives on the designed product. The design automation platform developers use a support structure with process descriptions and methods to ensure quality, motivated by the variety of platforms that they develop on a regular basis. The house product platform developers on the other hand, were expected to develop only this one platform. Hence, they worked autonomously, using the teamwork setting to progress and converge in the process. In summary, the creative intention seems related to how design is approached. If creativity is sought for, the design task is heuristic, and divergence and autonomy is promoted. If creativity is not sought for, structure seem to facilitate other benefits such as reliability and quality control. Knowledge sharing could however be potentially beneficial in most design approaches. By understanding that different design approaches will influence creativity in different ways, a first step has been taken towards understanding why architects and industrialized house builders approach design differently.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:ltu-63034 |
| Date | January 2017 |
| Creators | Viklund, Emma |
| Publisher | Luleå tekniska universitet, Industriellt och hållbart byggande, Luleå |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Licentiate thesis, comprehensive summary, info:eu-repo/semantics/masterThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | Licentiate thesis / Luleå University of Technology, 1402-1757 |
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