This is a preprint of an article submitted for consideration in CoDesign, Taylor & Francis, March 2008. CoDesign is
available online at http://journalsonline.tandf.co.uk
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Co-creation and the new landscapes of design
Elizabeth B.-N. Sanders (*) & Pieter Jan Stappers (**)

(*) MakeTools, LLC, 183 Oakland Park Ave., Columbus, Ohio 43214 USA
(Liz@MakeTools.com)

(**) ID-StudioLab, Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, Delft University of Technology,
Landbergstraat 15, 2628CE, Delft, The Netherlands (p.j.stappers@TUDelft.nl)




Abstract
Designers have been moving increasingly closer to the future users of what they design and the
next new thing in the changing landscape of design research has become co-designing with your
users. But co-designing is actually not new at all, having taken distinctly different paths in the US
and in Europe.
The evolution in design research from a user-centered approach to co-designing is changing the
roles of the designer, the researcher and the person formerly known as the “user”. The
implications of this shift for the education of designers and researchers are enormous. The
evolution in design research from a user-centered approach to co-designing is changing the
landscape of design practice as well, creating new domains of collective creativity. It is hoped
that this evolution will support a transformation toward more sustainable ways of living in the
future.

Keywords: participatory design, design research, co-design, co-creation, collective creativity,
user-centered design


1. Introduction

Over the past six decades, designers have been moving increasingly closer to the future users of
what they design. Especially in areas where technologies mature, and the next new feature is no
longer of value, manufacturing companies have been increasingly open to approaches that define
the product based on what people need. The first advances, well consolidated now in industrial
practice and education, practiced user-centered design from an ‘expert perspective’, in which
trained researchers observe and/or interview largely passive users, whose contribution is to
perform instructed tasks and/or to give their opinions about product concepts that were generated
by others. The user-centered design approach (i.e., “user as subject”) has been primarily a US-
driven phenomenon. Increasingly, since the 70s, people have been given more influence and
room for initiative in roles where they provide expertise, and participate in the informing,
ideating, and conceptualizing activities in the early design phases. The participatory approach
(i.e.,“user as partner”) has been led by Northern Europeans. The two approaches are now
beginning to influence one another. Figure 1 gives an overview of the current state of the human-
centered design (research) landscape (discussed in more depth in Sanders, 2006a).

This is a preprint of an article submitted for consideration in CoDesign, Taylor & Francis, March 2008. CoDesign is
available online at http://journalsonline.tandf.co.uk
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Figure 1. The current landscape of human-centered design research as practiced in the design and
development of products and services.

Within this landscape, in the area of participatory design, the notions of co-creation and co-design
have been growing. The terms co-design and co-creation are today often confused and/or treated
synonymously with one another. Opinions about who should be involved in these collective acts
of creativity, when, and in what role vary widely. Online dictionaries do not yet have entries for
co-creation, cocreation, codesign or co-design. Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, has only
preliminary entries on co-creation and co-design.

The authors take co-creation to refer to any act of collective creativity, i.e., creativity that is
shared by two or more people. Co-creation is a very broad term with applications ranging from
the physical to the metaphysical and from the material to the spiritual, as can be seen by the
output of search engines. By co-design we indicate collective creativity as it is applied across the
whole span of a design process, as was intended by the name of this journal. Thus, co-design is a
specific instance of co-creation. Co-design refers, for some people, to the collective creativity of
collaborating designers. We use co-design in a broader sense to refer to the creativity of designers
and people not trained in design working together in the design development process.

Figure 2 shows a simple representation of the design process today. Of note is the large and
growing emphasis on the front end. Formerly called “pre-design”, the front end describes the
many activities that take place in order to inform and inspire the exploration of open-ended
questions such as “how can we improve the quality of life for people living with a chronic
illness?” or “what is the next big thing in family leisure time?” The front end is often referred to
as “fuzzy” because of the ambiguity and chaotic nature that characterize it. In the fuzzy front end,