Funded PhD Opportunity - textile design, UK

‘Thinking Through Textiles’

Applications are invited for a PhD studentship offered by the School of the Arts, English and Drama Loughborough University within the area of textile design.

Recent design research has discussed how textiles practice and knowledge, or ‘textile thinking’, has the capacity to originate new materials, forms, and material systems, as well as to enhance the sensory pleasure of materials (Igoe 2012 and Spuybroek 2005). This PhD project draws on the pervasive nature of textiles to consider the possibilities of ‘new’ materials or ways of approaching materials from:

• process perspectives
• aesthetic perspectives
• functional/performance perspectives

Exploring the creative application of contemporary and traditional textiles processes as well as new technologies, the candidate will investigate the potential of ‘textile thinking’ to develop innovative textile outcomes in terms of either (or any combination of) process, aesthetics, functional/performance, possibly linking into sustainable design agendas.  In addition, the PhD study could contribute to current debate regarding the use of tacit knowledge and its importance in research, its integration and utilization in the process of research, and methods for the communication of tacit knowledge within research-by-practice. The studentship is deliberately focused on attracting researchers who wish to engage with inter-disciplinary and cross-disciplinary approaches to enable the possibility to explore the application of knowledge gained from textile practice within other disciplinary areas. The candidate’s expertise in textile practice and the experiential knowledge that such a high level of skill brings could form the basis for the project approach, acknowledging that technical expertise is based on experience, tacit understanding and an intuitive grasp and judgment of processes and situations (Dreyfus & Dreyfus 1986).

The project will be supervised by academics from the Textile Research Group at The School of the Arts. (http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/sota/research/groups/Textiles/index.html) In addition to being guided by supervisors for the research project, the successful candidate will have to attend the PhD training and seminar programme run by the School of the Arts and the Graduate School’s training courses.

The candidate must have an applied knowledge of textile design practice and have a committed interest in innovation within the field. In addition an awareness and understanding of practice based research methods is required. We anticipate that the successful candidate will be qualified to Masters level.  The studentship provides a stipend of £13,590 per annum plus tuition fees at the UK/EU rate for up to three years.

We envisage a start date for the student researcher of April 2013

Enquiries should be made to Emma Nadin (School of Arts Research Postgraduate Research Administrator) E.L.Nadin@lboro.ac.uk

Details about the application process can be found here:

http://www.lboro.ac.uk/study/apply/research/

Deadline December 14th 2012

Please quote the following reference when applying: TRG/2012/2

Craft Research, Volume 4.2 - Call for submissions

After three successful issues, Craft Research is preparing to expand to two issues per year. From 2013 there will be two issues, one in January/February and one in September/October each year.

The final date for submission of contributions for Vol 4.2 is Monday 3 December 2012.

For guidance notes or further information, or to submit an article or review, please contact the editors or visit the journal's website for details:

Kristina Niedderer k.niedderer@wlv.ac.uk
Katherine Townsend katherine.townsend@ntu.ac.uk

Aims & Scope
Craft Research (CRRE) is the first peer-reviewed academic journal dedicated to the development and advance of contemporary craft practice and theory through research. The aim of Craft Research is to elicit craft as a vital and viable modern discipline that offers a vision for the future and for the sustainable development of human social, economical and ecological issues. This role ofcraft is rooted in its flexible nature as a conduit from design at one end to art at the other. It gains its strength from its at times experimental, at times developmental nature, which enables craft to explore and challenge technology, to question and develop cultural and social practices, and to interrogate philosophical and human values.

Call for Papers
Craft Research aims to actively promote and strengthen this future-oriented role of the crafts. In order to do so, it recognises inter and cross disciplinary practices, and encourages diverse approaches to research arising from practice, theory andphilosophy. It welcomes contributions from new and established researchers,scholars, and professionals around the world who wish to make a contribution to advancing the crafts. Contributions may include research into materials, technology, processes, methods, concepts, aesthetics and philosophy, etc. in any discipline area of the applied arts and crafts, including craft education. Craft Research welcomes a number of different types of contributions as set out below.

Contributions

Full Research Papers (4000-6000 words)
They will describe completed research projects, including research problem,
questions, methods, outcomes, and findings. They should include original work of a research and/or developmental nature and/or propose new methods or ideas that are clearly and thoroughly presented and argued.

Short Research Papers / Position Papers (2000-3000 words)
• Short Research Papers may describe smaller research projects or research in progress including research problem, questions, methods, (expected) outcomes and findings. They are an opportunity to new researchers/practitioners to get into publishing.
• Position papers may put forward and debate a position on a particular (current) issue (e.g. new technology, material, theoretical, social or educational issue).
Both kinds of contributions should include original work of a research or developmental nature and/or propose new methods or ideas that are clearly and thoroughly presented and argued.

Craft & Industry Reports (1500-3000 words)
Reports of Investigative Practice from Craft & Industry should present an advance in and for the field, including collaborations and new developments of work, processes, methods, ideas etc. by practitioners and industry in the crafts.

Review Section. We invite reviews of the following:
• The Portrait Section (1000-2000 words)
Will feature the work of an individual (crafts person, artist, designer, maker, researcher) within the field whose creative work stands out for its developmental / research qualities and contribution to the crafts.
• The Exhibition Section (1000-2000 words)
Will feature scholarly reviews of exhibitions that are of particular
developmental / research significance for the field for the technical,
conceptual, aesthetic, social etc. quality of the work or for the curation.
• The Publication Review (1000-2000 words)
Will feature reviews of publications in print and new media.
• The Conference Section (1000-2000 words)
Will feature reviews of any relevant conferences/symposia/etc. in the field.

Calendar of exhibitions and conferences
• We invite notifications of important and relevant forthcoming craft
exhibitions and craft conferences/research events.

Remarkable image section
• We invite the submission of images of outstanding quality for their beauty, complexity, simplicity, challenging nature, novelty, humour, humanity, etc. that are representative of contemporary craft developments and research.

'Use Your Hands for Happiness': PhD Opportunities

  AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award opportunity to potential candidates:
 
  'Use Your Hands for Happiness': crafts practice as a means of building
  community assets, health and well-being.
 
  University College Falmouth(Cornwall),
  in partnership with Arts for Health Cornwall.
  Mode of Study:              Full time, for three years
  Application Deadline:   13th July 2012
  Interview date:               25th July 2012
  Start date:                      1 October 2012
  Funding:                        Fees and a stipend of ￡14,140 per year
                                        (plus ￡1500 p/a research expenses)
  Supervisors:                   Dr Fiona Hackney (University CollegeFalmouth)
                                         Dr Nicola Thomas (Geography, University of Exeter)
                                         Ms Jayne Howard (Arts for Health Cornwall)
 
  http://air.falmouth.ac.uk/ahrc-cdaphdstudentship
  http://www.artsforhealthcornwall.org.uk/
 
  Summary
  This AHRC doctoral studentship focuses on the diverse ways in which
  craft practice - particularly creative hobby crafts - can enhance the
  well-being and health of communities in primary care health practice
  initiatives or as part of creative arts health programmes. It takes an
  'asset-based' approach to crafts and aims to examine how an art for
  health agency can build on the inherent skills, competencies and
  creativity in communities, while paying attention to the relationship
  between social and cultural capital when agencies work with community
  groups. The project develops from the AHRC network Connecting Craft and
  Communities http://connectingcraftcommunities.wordpress.com/ and it is
  envisaged that questions of craft within social networks, creative and
  embodied practices will be central themes.
  The award is available as a three-year full-time AHRC studentship. It
  pays fees and an annual maintenance grant (currently ￡14,140 per year)
  (UK/EU residency requirements, expectation of a Masters degree in a
  cognate humanities/social science discipline), with Arts for Health
  Cornwall contributing a further ￡1,500 per annum for the student¹s
  research expenses.
 
  Informal enquiries before the submission date can be sent to Dr Fiona
  Hackney on Fiona.Hackney@falmouth.ac.uk or for application queries
  please contact Jemma.Julian@falmouth.ac.uk,  tel. 01326 255831

 
  http://air.falmouth.ac.uk/ahrc-cdaphdstudentship
 

Design and Innovation

Design and Innovation is one of the tracks at the forthcoming 10th European Academy of Design Conference - Crafting the Future, April 2013 in Gothenburg, Sweden.
   
Interest in how design can spur innovation has gained momentum in recent years, despite a general lack of interest in design within main-stream innovation research. New concepts about the relationship and intersection between design and innovation have instead been developed either in design practice, such as the concept of Design Thinking (Brown, 2008), or in fringes of innovation research with inspiration from other discourses, such as the concept of C-K theory (Le Masson et al, 2010).

This is all very promising. However cutting across these developments is also a problematic tendency to either rationalize design into a general innovation approach, such as C-K theory, or to reproduce design as a series of methods, as with the Design Thinking concept. In both cases design is described as a problem solving approach. A risk is then that the value of design in innovation contexts, as a lived and experienced practice of meaning creation (Krippendorff, 1989), is either "lost in translation", or is taken for granted but not explored in new contexts. A further risk is the general lack of empirical studies that focus on understanding the role of design and designers in innovation work.

In this track on Design and Innovation, we want to invite scholars to present their work on the role of design and design practitioners in innovation work as well as on the epistemological relationship between design and innovation. For example, what is the value that design can create in innovation processes? How is such value expressed, and what are typical assumptions that underpin the rhetoric around design and innovation initiatives and policies? What are the benefits as well as the obstacles when combining the two fields? How can companies become more innovative through repositioning design in their operations, and how can such processes be evaluated? How can design capabilities be developed in practice and what are the challenges that design practitioners face when entering new roles in innovation work? The aim of this track is to contribute to a better understanding of what role design can play in the future of innovation. Both conceptual and empirical papers are welcome.

Short Abstracts due for submission 15 May 2012

Track Chairs:
- Maria Elmquist, Center for Business Innovation / Chalmers University of Technology.
- Marcus Jahnke, HDK, the School of Design and Crafts at the University of Gothenburg.
- Roberto Verganti, Politecnico di Milano.
- Julian Malins, Gray's School of Art at the Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, Scotland.

Crafting the Future

MAKING TOGETHER 
Open, Connected, Collaborative





10th International Conference of the European Academy of Design

17-19 April, 2013
Gothenburg, Sweden

The theme of the conference is designer’s practice knowledge. How can the specific knowledge of designers be brought forward, articulated, made visible and be understood and used in contexts like innovation, business developmente and social change?

The track will reflect on changes in creativity and production, traditionally seen as the province of professional design but now driving new ways to work, socialise, be creative and live across society. This is informing the emergence of novel design scenarios to create products and services (e.g. personal manufacturing, peer production, fablabs, crowd sourcing, collaborative business models) on many levels: people, companies, organisations, institutions, communities.

Design is challenged with new business models, long tail markets, new networked organisations, diffused distribution, non-technological innovation, that are underpinned by new ways to manufacture and design products and services. Creative practitioners are increasingly working both through direct creative input and through facilitating new processes. Design and creativity can in fact rethink and give meaning to tools and technologies that help people connect, understand, share and create. Design is also taking the position of facilitator and enabler where in the past it was a technological gatekeeper.

Although pervasive, this topic is still emerging and being explored, both from an academic perspective (underlining the theoretical bodies that can help such approach emerge), and from the perspective of practitioners (detailing the development of systemic and collaborative projects). Examples can be found in Service Design, Transformation Design, Open Design. Moreover these phenomena are underlining a revolution in work and human relationships, mirroring a move to more distributed, collaborative processes.

Can collaborative practices trigger new business models and new innovation in products and services? How can collaborative making enabled by social technologies be explored/practiced/developed from a design perspective? What are the implications/benefits/impact of collaborative making for design? How may the boundaries and role of design be re-defined? Can designers design collaborative networks?

For any further information please refer to the official website of the conference http://www.craftingthefuture.se

Important dates:
Submission of intention to submit: Until May 15, 2012
Submission of full paper: September 15, 2012
*Notification of acceptance or revision: November 1, 2012
Notification of acceptance: December 15, 2012
Conference date: April 17-19, 2013

We are coordinating a track within the above mentioned EAD conference and are inviting submissions on the topic:

Ideas of the Handmade: Histories and Theories of Making

FREE EVENT :: Friday, 20 April 2012

Contact Dr Catharine Rossi to book your place* - c.rossi@ed.ac.uk

Edinburgh College of Art/University of Edinburgh
Hunter Lecture Theatre (O17), Hunter Place,
Lauriston Building, Laurison Place, Edinburgh, EH3 9DF

Conveners: Dr Catharine Rossi and Dr Juliette MacDonald,
Edinburgh College of Art/University of Edinburgh

Ideas of the Handmade: Histories and Theories of Making is a one-day seminar devoted to craft. It will bring together a variety of craft-related research and researchers in order to investigate and champion the importance of craft, an area largely marginalised in design history and yet vital to contemporary and historical design culture in terms of practice, production and consumption.

The symposium builds on the recent surge of interest in craft amongst academics, practitioners and the public alike. There is an appetite not just for consuming and producing craft, but also for critical ways of thinking about the handmade. The variety of subjects and arguments at the seminar showcases research by established and emerging voices in thinking about the handmade, whose research moves encompasses both the identification of craft as a set of material-based disciplines as an expanded view of craft as a multiple, shifting concept that exists in relation to art, design and architecture. The papers range from revisitations of historical figures and institutions such as Ernest Gimson and the Dovecot Studios to reflections on the role of craft today in the prototyping and innovation process. Together, the seminar combines historical and contemporary perspectives by both academics and practitioners from a variety of multidisciplinary approaches that will lead to further developments in craft-related design history.

Bringing together independent practitioners and academics based at a variety of institutions including Edinburgh College of Art, the University of St Andrews and the University of Dundee, Ideas of the Handmade will showcase and connect the rich variety of craft-related research being conducted in Scotland and will serve as a contribution to ECA's active research culture.

Programme of the day:

9:30 - 10:00 Registration

10:10 - 10:15 Welcome

10:15 - 10:45 Annette Carruthers (Senior Lecturer, School of Art History, University of St Andrews)
''I See More than Difference - I see Opposition': Gimson, Lethaby and the D.I.A'

10:45 - 11:15 Francesca Baseby (PhD Candidate, University of Edinburgh & Dovecot Studios)
'Fact or Fiction? The Creation of Dovecot Studios' identity after World War Two'

11:15 - 11:45 Andrea Peach (Lecturer in Contextual and Critical Studies, Gray's School of Art, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen.)

11:45 - 12:00 Coffee Break

12:00 - 12:30 Katy West (Ceramic Designer)
'Authorship and the Modern Maker'

12:30 - 13:00 Ellie Herring (PhD Candidate, University of Edinburgh)
'Furnishing Windows: The Craft of Window Display'

13:00 - 14:00 Lunch (provided)

14:00 - 14:30 Dr Nuno Sacramento (Director of the Scottish Sculpture Workshop)
'The Lost Hand'

14:30 - 15:00 Dr Jessica Hemmings (Head of Context/Deputy Director of Research, Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh)
'Smart Writing about Smart Textiles'

15:00 - 15:15 Coffee Break

15:15 - 15:45 Dr. Louise Valentine (Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design)
'Craft and the Innovation Agenda'

15:45 - 16:15 Arno Verhoeven (Lecturer, Product Design, Stage 1 Coordinator, School of Design, Edinburgh College of Art/University of Edinburgh)
'From Concept to Creation. Low-fidelity Prototyping and its Role in Designers' Sense-Making: a protocol analysis.'

16:30 Drinks Reception

Thanks to the generous support of the Design History Society and Edinburgh College of Art/University of Edinburgh, the the Day Seminar is open to all and is free to attend. 

*RSVP however is essential as places are limited. Please confirm your place by email to Dr Catharine Rossi (c.rossi@ed.ac.uk)

Textiles as agent for wellbeing

Duck Journal for Research in Textiles and Textile Design
Call for Contributions: Volume 3

The first call of the Journal for Research in Textiles and Textile Design explored what research in this wide field may encompass and began to establish a platform for textile research. (Volume 1) The second call examined an issue in the immediate context, namely the impact of austerity on craft making and fashion design. (Volume 2) This call aims to show how textile research might be a positive factor enabling and facilitating social and personal contexts - an agent for wellbeing. Accepted contributions will be published in Volume 3.

Textiles and wellbeing are intimately connected from physical, psychological and emotional perspectives. The relationship between the two can be perceived and expressed within the contexts of textile making, consumption, use and viewing. They may be activated in both private and communal settings.

The intention of this call is to draw out the links between textiles and wellbeing within a broad range of contexts and from multiple standpoints. We welcome contributions relating to textile research in the following areas:
•    Textiles and physical well-being - innovations in medical, technical, smart and interactive textiles applied within creative or social contexts

•    Textiles and emotional well-being - fashion, wearable textiles engendering sensory responses and changing mood 

•    Textiles and well-being in the built environment - interiors, architecture, colour and tactility 

•    Textiles as agent for sustainable behaviour leading to well-being

•    Textiles as agent of community and communication - therapeutic, communities of practice, alternative learning styles, occupational health, community projects e.g. millennium embroideries, Mardi Gras costumes, communication through communal making 

•    Textiles and memory – textiles and emotional attachment, textiles documenting personal or community events or ceremonies, collecting textiles, textile heirlooms 


Duck: Journal for Research in Textiles and Textile Design also welcome submissions to previous calls. For details, please see the individual calls for papers in Volume 1 and Volume 2 respectively.

Deadline for submissions: 30 May 2012
Authors will be informed of the outcome of their submission by the end of September 2012.

Submission Instructions:
Contributions may take the form of written texts (maximum 5,000 words), visual essays, a series of images relating to methods (sketchbook style), visual diaries or other methods deemed appropriate. All submissions however, must respond to the call articulating the research question, the research methodology and methods used, conclusions and discussion.

Contributors must present their ideas in an accessible format for Duck's diverse readership of researchers, educators, artists and designers. The Harvard System of referencing should be used.
Images should be 300dpi where possible, embedded in the submission, captioned and referenced. Submissions should be provided in word format.

Please provide your name, affiliation, email address, a title for your submission, an abstract (200 words max) of your contribution and five keywords.

Please send submissions by email to: F.E.Kane2@lboro.ac.uk 
(Maximum file size: 5mb)

Alternatively, please send on disk (CD or DVD) to: 
Dr FE Kane,
DUCK Journal - Textiles Research Group,
Loughborough, University School of Art and Design, Loughborough, Leicestershire,
LE11 3TU 
UK

Copyright: In submitting material to Duck, contributors thereby grant permission for it to be published on the Duck website. Contributors retain copyright of their material and may use it elsewhere after publication in Duck, though we would appreciate it if Duck could be acknowledged as the original source of publication.  Please note that it is the responsibility of contributors to obtain the necessary permissions for reproducing work other than their own.