Collaboration

Design D-Day! Shanghai Jiao Tong School of Design successfully held the FourC Challenge 24-hour Global Design Charrette Contest!

During June 6-7, 2020, the FourC Challenge 24-hour Global Design Charrette Contest with the theme of "Reconnect" was held successfully online. This contest is sponsored by Shanghai Jiao Tong School of Design and implemented by the IIDE Program Center. The topic of this contest is "flowers", and interdisciplinary cooperative design is carried out around this topic. There are over 200 students from 52 universities registered for this contest, including Harvard University, Northwestern University, Rochester Institute of Technology, IE University, National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University, University of Sydney, University of Melbourne, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Tsinghua University, and Zhejiang University etc.

Highlights of the event

Opening Ceremony

On the morning of 6th, the FourC Challenge 24-hour Global Design Charrette Contest was held at Minhang Campus, Shanghai Jiao Tong University. The opening ceremony was chaired by Professor RUAN Xing, Dean of School of Design. The opening ceremony and the entire process were broadcast live online through Bilibili & Tiktok.

Professor XU Xuemin, Vice President of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, delivered a speech at the opening ceremony. After more than 120 years of unremitting efforts, Shanghai Jiao Tong University has become a comprehensive, research-oriented, international first-class university renowned domestically and internationally.  The School of Design at Shanghai Jiao Tong University has three disciplines: Design (Industrial Design, Environmental Design and Visual communication Design), Architecture and Landscape Architecture. President Xu expressed the hope that this contest will further strengthen the linkage between academicians and design students from all over the world through online collaboration, and provide new understanding and solutions for facing global crisis together.

Dean RUAN Xing introduced the relevant background and theme of this design contest: as a designer, how to "reconnect" the whole society and all mankind through design in the "post-epidemic era" is a topic that designers deserve to think about continuously. Although online teaching has become the new normal, online contest is still full of challenges. This contest mixes students and judges from different countries, regions, universities and institutions, and hopes to be able to "reconnect" each other through the power of design in these 24 hours beyond physical space.

Dean RUAN Xing said that using "flowers" as the topic of the competition, laid reasons that flower was a symbol of hope, vitality and beauty. Borrowing from the German philosopher Kant's theory, the beauty of flowers transcends personal taste and cultural boundaries. We hope that all participants will bring good memories back after this contest. The flower connects students who had never met each other. Whenever they see this flower in the future, they will remember this contest and the work they create together with their companions in this special time. This connection could be profound, which also reflects the core idea of this contest: "Crossing the distance, connecting from the heart".

Professor Martin Bechthold from Harvard University, Ms. YANG Yan, the director of the nursing department, Renji Hospital affiliated to Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, Mr. GUO Yu, the well-known user experience expert, and John Hartman, assistant professor of Northwestern University delivered keynote speeches at the opening ceremony.

Professor Martin Bechthold shared related design concepts, system engineering design, evaluation process, taking Apollo and ColdSNAP as examples, systematically introduced how to connect design with engineering effectively.

Ms. YANG Yan specifically introduced some of the "design work" that the medical workers at Renji Hospital participated in during the epidemic, such as mask design and protective clothing design. YANG said that they were actively bringing the voice of medical workers to the design of medical health nowadays. Medical and health workers hope to solve the current practical problems through design, and hope to be able to further reflect the humanistic value and significance of medical health design in actual medical work.

Mr. GUO Yu started the speech from four aspects: daily life, trends, lifestyles, and cultural influences during the epidemic, and shared his thinking about the evolution of the design paradigm in the "post-epidemic era". Mr. GUO concluded that social-oriented communication design, health design, protective equipment design and other fields would continue to penetrate the design field and have a profound impact in the future. He pointed that keeping it fast, maintaining flexibility, and accepting changes were key rules for design in future.

Professor John Hartman focused on the theme and the huge impact of design thinking to the future. He believes that design will invisibly lead to profound changes in healthcare, workplace, life, family and education. Maybe we cannot predict the future for now, but we know that design faces the future ahead, and design needs to stand at the forefront of the world. He also pointed out that collaborative design was to establish the process and create a design space, so that designers from different perspectives could participate in the design together. Therefore, in a sense, collaborative design creates a crystallization of wisdom that integrates different design concepts, and has a far-reaching reference value for solving practical problems.

Online Design Process

Dr. ZHANG Zhan, Director of Industrial Design and IIDE Program, Shanghai Jiao Tong School of Design, the head of the FourC organizing committee, announced the contest procedures. The contest will be held in the form of Make-a-thon, and each team will conduct online design around the topic within 24 hours. 40 teams carried out online live creative design, completed six innovation process including team building, team definition, problem solving, ideation, prototype production, video and exhibition board production with English communication throughout the whole process. Jury panel and mentors were professional teachers from more than ten colleges and universities at home and abroad including University of Sydney, National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Zhejiang University, Fudan University, Tianjin University, Harbin Institute of Technology, Hunan University, Southwest Jiaotong University, Jiangnan University, Beijing University of Science and Technology, Guangdong University of Technology, Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts.

After a fully hard-working day, all teams presented their works by a 3-minute demonstration video display. The jury panel judge comprehensively based on factors such as the innovation and creativity, completeness, technical possibilities, and the feasibility. After two rounds of intensive evaluation, FUTUREBUS, the collaborative design work of participants from Harvard University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Northwestern University, and Hong Kong Polytechnic University, won the grand prize; and SEEDS, the collaborative design work of participants from the University of Sydney, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Jiangnan University, and Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts , FOUR-MAN - another piece of work presented by students from Southwest Jiao Tong University, Hunan University, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Dalian University of Nationalities won the first prize of the competition respectively; and Team 5  FLOWEVER, Team 27 Dandelion, Team 33 Concomitance won the second prize; while Team 2 Reconnections of Post-coviol-9 Life within the Community, Team 8 So Far Yet So Close, Team 1 Plasunt-layout Substitute, Team 13 Blooming, Team 14 Dao Hua, Team 17 Lavender Metaball won the winning award. The works involve public transportation, dining facilities, stall economy, applications and other aspects of our everyday life, providing humanized, warm, valuable design ideas for the post-epidemic era. (The winning entries of the contest will be presented on the official Wechat account of Shanghai Jiao Tong School of Design).

Award & Closing Ceremony

On the evening of the 7th, the FourC Challenge 24-hour Global Design Charrette Contest announced its closing online.

HE Renke，Professor & Dean of School of Design, Hunan University, also the president of Jury Panel, gave an ending note addressing this day as Design D-Day, as June 6th is also the Normandy Landing anniversary. By connecting online, our participants conquered the obstacle of time and space, went through a sweaty day and welcome its bright successful dawn. They will remember this contest day as a seed of friendship planted and anticipate its blooming in the future.

Dean RUAN expressed his sincere gratitude to the guests, jury panel and students who participated in this contest. It is hoped that the contact within 24 hours will allow participating students to further gain design knowledge and enhance friendship through "create, connect, communicate and collaborate". He believes this contest has fully realized the interdisciplinary, cross-cultural and multi-field design interaction. Through innovative design thinking, all the participates have a profound understanding of the meaning and connotation of the community of shared future for mankind, and fully expressed their solidarity and faith in fighting against epidemic, as well as actively demonstrate the responsibility of contemporary design young talents.

Participate Institutions

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