Design Products (MA)
Design For Manufacture
About
Tutors: Alex Williams, Jo Barnard & Tim Rundle
As manufacturing & distribution technologies rapidly evolve through increasingly open systems, the opportunities for large or small-scale interventions in global & hyper-local markets abound for both corporate organisations & small entrepreneurs.
Whether prototyping for batch production, developing service touchpoints, or developing/adapting manufacturing processes for scale, the DfM platform provokes designers to explore conceptions of manufacturing & apply these to their work. The projects are diverse, with typical themes embracing:
• new product technologies
• the development of more circular economies
• reducing carbon miles & responding to local capabilities
• the evolution of long tail markets in ever smaller or more distributed regions
• the changing role of RP in supply chains
• lower energy & less capital intensive means of production
• frugal innovation needs in developing economies
• servicised capabilities.
In each instance, students aim to develop pre-production prototypes providing proof-of-concept, many taking these ideas forward as start-ups.