MetaDesign

Metadesign (or meta-design) is an emerging conceptual framework aimed at defining and creating social, economic and technical infrastructures in which new forms of collaborative design can take place. It consists of a series of practical design-related tools for achieving this.

As a methodology, its aim is to nurture emergence of the previously unthinkable as possibilities or prospects through the collaboration of designers within interdisciplinarity 'metadesign' teams. Inspired by the way living systems work, this new field aims to help improve the way we feed, clothe, shelter, assemble, communicate and live together.

Metadesign has been initially put forward as an Industrial Design approach to Complexity Theory and Information Systems by Dutch designer Andries Van Onck in 1963, while at Ulm School of Design (later at Politecnico di Milano and Rome and Florence ISIA). Since then, several different design, creative and research approaches have used the name "Metadesign", ranging from Maturana and Varela's biological approach, to Fischer's and Giaccardi's techno-social approach, and Virilio's techno-policital approach.

Later on, a very active group was present at Politecnico di Milano, and several different universities and graduate programs began applying Metadesign in design teaching around the world generally based at Van Onck's approach, further developed at Politecnico di Milano. Nevertheless, there's a very active, but widely dispersed, group that base their activities at Maturana and Varela's approach.

More recently, some efforts have been made to systematize Metadesign as a structured creative process, such as (1) Fischer's and Giaccardi's and (2) Vassão's academic works, among several others, based on a much wider reference frame, ranging from Post-structuralist philosophy, Postman's Media Ecology, Alexander's Pattern Languages and Deep Ecology.

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