Design research & reflective practice: the facility of design-oriented research to translate practitioner insights into new understandings of design

This PhD research explores the potential of design-oriented research for investigating design practice. This project is interested in drawing attention to the value of a designer’s perspective, and showing how this perspective can play a more significant role in shaping how academic discourse frames and understands design. This goal is explored through the critical undertaking of a design-oriented research case study. In reflecting upon the methods adopted the project evaluates, from a practitioner’s perspective, the limitations and the opportunities of designing as a research methodology. Exploring the methodological practice of a designer-researcher, this project is driven to adopt and adapt studio-based methods and reflection-based research interventions that will promote the synergetic relationship between speculation and reflection. In noticing and accounting for the designer’s reflective conversation with the research situation, the project proposes strategies for how the back talk of a reflective design practice might be productively amplified to establish resonance and facilitate the external consultation of practitioner-led research.