What is the Institute for Design Informatics?

The Institute for Design Informatics is a joint institute between Edinburgh College of Art and the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. Our mission is to bring design and data together to create a world that is socially just, where people live well, have agency and autonomy, and are able to adapt and transition how they live to ensure the planet flourishes. We seek to have a transformational impact on society by creating alternatives to dominant models of technology design and development, and to shape ethical and responsible data futures through applied research and practice.

Our motto – design for, with and by data – reflects how we look at design and data from different perspectives:

  • We design research products, prototypes and experiences that are underpinned by data and enable new data interactions
  • We create new methods and techniques that use data in design processes in innovative ways
  • We look at the agency, autonomy and power of data in how we design systems and experience the world.

In other words, some of us engage in research through design practices. Some of us study the use of things designed by others. Some of us critically reflect on and critique designed things. Some of us approach design by looking at processes, materiality, and complex systems.

We work across a wide range of technologies and technical approaches – artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, distributed ledgers, open data, robotics, internet of things, biosensing, language models, amongst others. We explore these technologies in many different domains – such as health and care, creative industries, cultural heritage, financial services, environmental sustainability, and more. See our Research pages for project examples.

What unifies our work is a deep engagement with the data that underpins these technologies, and the use of design and creative approaches to materialise the ideas, implications and complexity of these systems.

Our Values

Our six values are at the heart of what we stand for in the Institute for Design Informatics. They guide our actions, decision-making, interactions with each other, and reflections on our work. We embody our values throughout our activities, always seeking fair, ethical, and inclusive ways to explore the role of design in our relationships with data, technology, and its use in society.

We embrace openness in mindset, disciplines, technology, and collaboration, using design to convene and translate ideas into the world. Through openness, we create things, tools, infrastructures, and resources that help people learn about data and technology, create with data, as well as resist its encroachment when necessary.

We develop practices for designing with, for, and through data to enable people, organisations and ultimately the world to flourish and drive positive change. This includes helping diverse individuals and groups speculate and imagine new ways of living, working, and growing, and shaping new technological agendas. We value our surroundings and communities, enabling them to engage with data and design, and to adopt and adapt our work.

We critically study how data is often extracted from people and the environmental impacts of data-intensive technologies. We seek to avoid extracting value from individuals and strive to reciprocate and give back to our collaborators, participants, and society. We use design and data to repair, reuse, and act regeneratively and responsibly, avoiding resource waste.

We engage with, learn from, and respond to the questions and concerns raised by people and societies about design and data. We respect diverse viewpoints, challenge practices that marginalize individuals, and proactively restore people’s control and rights over data and technology. We hold each other accountable to the highest ethical standards of responsible research and innovation.

We use design and creative practices to materialize concepts and ideas related to data, posing questions and initiating conversations with society. We approach data critically, recognizing it as formed, shaped, constructed, dynamic, multifaceted, and political, requiring contextualization. By questioning and critiquing dominant ideas around data use in people’s lives, we work to create practical alternatives.

We view data and technology as an ecology of interdependencies and relationships that traditional design methods cannot fully address. Therefore, we develop new relational and participatory practices that convene communities of interest and action around data challenges. We also create novel systemic design approaches to reveal the complexities of data-intensive technologies and shape better futures.

FIND US

Institute for Design Informatics
Bayes Centre
47 Potterrow
Edinburgh
EH8 9BT

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