PhD completed! Participation in Architecture

After some 9 years, I’ve just uploaded the final copy of my PhD.

Check out the new page on our website: https://www.herestudio.net/phd-participation-in-architecture

The title is Participation in Architecture : agonism in practice

My main supervisor Dr Karen Burns offered this great 50 word description:

“Ammon Beyerle’s thesis examines participatory design, or architectural design and urban design led by users and inhabitants. Using real-world projects, it challenges consensus and agreement ideals in participatory practice, arguing instead that through the action and processes of agonism – embracing tension and difference – researchers can better design public participation.”

It was especially hard to research a PhD by Creative Works in architecture, because this approach has been rare until now. Furthermore, researching through real projects in my own practice, and about topics that involve working directly other people on design and developing design processes – was a challenge. Not to mention the factor of focusing on agonism! I’m proud to say that the learning outcomes, although rooted in abstract philosophy and architectural theory, are particularly practical and everyday.

For instance, how about we focus on designing our design processes to make the most of participation of different people? How about we focus on learning and action rather than agreement and consensus? There’s so much to do in the world, so how we work together really matters!

PhD Diagram_Creative Works projects over time_AB.jpg

I feel very grateful to the 100’s of people that contributed to this work and knowledge: many colleagues, collaborators, competitors, volunteers, staff, clients, and friends were part of this journey.

My panellists were Dr Janet McGaw and Dr Alex Selenitsch; and my supervisors were Dr Karen Burns and Prof Kim Dovey – all from the University of Melbourne. My final examiners were Prof Jonathan Hill – from University College London, and Prof Laurene Vaughan – from RMIT University.

I’m now planning to do some work presenting this online, in print, and, approaching other practitioners, not for profit organisations, public institutions, and local governments in Victoria to share my learnings (and methods) from the research with say community development, town planning, city strategy and infrastructure teams. This is an excellent time for Here Studio to start focussing on public projects again.

Participation in Architecture – cover page

Participation in Architecture – cover page