Anatomy of Local Government/Design Education Collaboration

The Public Collaboration Lab (PCL) is an action research partnership between the London Borough of Camden (LBC) and the University of the Arts London, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. The research explored the potential for, and value of, strategic collaboration between design education (DHE) and local government (LG), and how design research and practice can contribute to service, policy and social innovation in the LG context. The project prototyped and piloted a new way of working that identified and leveraged synergies in the operational objectives of LG and the learning objectives (research and teaching) of DHE.

The poster shares findings from the research in the form of an ‘anatomy’ of LG/DHE collaboration, which articulates and visualizes the internal workings of LG/DHE. The ‘anatomy’ serves as a resource for researchers and practitioners seeking to reflect on collaborative projects by inputting data to the models to visualize their activities; and as a generative tool, providing a set of templates that focus discussion around the planning of collaborative projects.