Phase 1 Clusters

In March 2004 the AHRC & EPSRC announced a call for proposals for Phase 1 research cluster projects that would operate during the 2005 calendar year. In doing this, the aim was to build new relationships within the design research community, particularly between design disciplines and groups sharing common ground but with limited previous opportunity for collaboration.

129 proposals for research clusters were received in June 2004. These originated from a whole variety of different academic departments including, Architecture & the Built Environment, Art & Design, Engineering, Computing and other disciplines such as Business, Education and Performing Arts. In October 2004, following a process of peer review 21 of these proposals were selected for funding by a specially convened commissioning panel. Each one of the selected proposals had a core theme, for example, ‘Understanding and supporting group creativity in design’. During 2005 each cluster ran a series of workshops, discussion groups and other activities. These aimed to build bridges between interested disciplines, explore research issues and identify research questions that could inform the subsequent development of the Designing for the 21st Century Initiative as a whole.