July 18, 2016
Impact Design Hub by Autodesk Foundation has recently launched a series featuring Designing In Flux, and advocating impact designs in the age of Flux.
Climate change may not mean our inevitable destruction, but it does mean the inescapable rise of catastrophic uncertainty — not ecological suicide, but Russian roulette. Borders are becoming more fluid and porous as political authority and national identity buckle and tear under the pressure of immense shearing forces. Digital technology is disrupting and disintegrating entire industries, and the very meaning of concepts like labor, wealth, nation, home and security are all being called into question. This is the end of a world of safe assumptions. We are entering an era of flux.
The refugee crisis is only the most visible manifestation of that flux, and even the word “crisis” assumes a stable order from which all this chaos, dislocation and suffering is just a temporary aberration. But what if chaos is the new norm, and temporary the new permanence? What does it mean to design solutions and make a lasting impact when the idea of something that lasts may itself be obsolete and the problems are becoming ever more wickedly complex?These are the questions we set out to grapple with in this series. From refugee camps in Jordan to high-rises in Chicago, and from the most desperate needs on the ground to the broadest systemic interventions, we’ve set out to explore the role design has in this new world. Can design address not only the clamor for new shelter solutions, but the broader conflict, economic dislocation, and ethnic strife that causes migrant flows and refugees to flee their homes to begin with? Can designers redefine how we build houses and cities to account for shifting global energy paradigms and fluctuating ecosystems? How can design thinking and methodology adapt to a world where there are no constants but change?
Impact Design Hub: Designing In Flux
The Impact Design Hub also include our Fluxus System in the database, as our mission and practice demonstrate perfectly a design solution in flux.
Fluxus System Narrative
Our mission is to enhance sustainable development in communities across the economic spectrum by providing governments, the private, public sectors and NGOs with a new way of building quality, sustainable and affordable housing for all.
We aim to advance building industry through technological innovations, while reflecting urgent social and environmental concerns. Fluxus System is a prefabricated mass building system that enables an adaptive urban strategy for need-based growth, allowing buildings to be expanded and internal space modified after initial construction. Taking advantage of economies of scale through prefabrication and mass-customization, the system serves well as a cost-effective tool to deliver affordable housing, post-disaster/post-conflict relief and reconstruction.
We believe in excellence in design and place shaping in order to facilitate sustainable communities and enhance the well-being of their inhabitants. Not only does Fluxus System have the potential to change the lives of its residents, it can regenerate distressed neighborhoods and promote economic benefits, social integration and social mobility. We engage local communities and local governments in the construction process, linking the local economy by providing sustainable employment and skill-building.
Built on the notion that profitability and social responsibility go hand in hand, we bring together this new system with embedded principles of community engagement, with an emphasis of building infrastructure and local construction, helping to reduce injustices of social exclusion and poverty.
Impact Design Hub Database
Impact Design Hub aims to bring together those working in public interest, social impact, humanitarian, and community design, and provide a platform for sharing and communication in order to collectively help grow and mature this field.
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