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Architecture and design play a crucial role in the current energy transition. On one hand, a sound and aware architecture design process can greatly reduce the embodied and operational energy of our living space while, on the other hand, users’ experience and behavior must be considered to ensure their engagement and wellbeing.
We used this approach as a starting point for our submission to the Biennale. Our artifact displays the results of two combined courses in architecture and design, which were included as part of an ongoing research project (Nordic Innovative Living) at LTU funded by the Swedish Energy Agency.
The project's vision was a smart home where people live in symbiosis with the surrounding nature and use attractive solutions for a zero-climate footprint. The goal was to co-design a future model for smart homes built in Swedish Lapland, with smart solutions and services for effective and lasting behavioral changes and, through this, to spread knowledge about how people of different ages, abilities, social strata and gender can live more sustainably.
The project/course used a trans-disciplinary and co-creative design approach to explore people's behaviors with, and barriers to, smart energy technology. The students of architecture and design cooperated in creating solutions for sustainable housing and living in and through the co-creation of a smart home.
Our artifact collects a selection of proposals developed by students involved in this project/course. It takes the form of an archival storage drawer unit, where the work of the students is stored, presented, and shared with the public. A reference for this concept is the exhibition "A is for Archive" at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, which exhibits the contents of Warhol’s so-called time capsules. Similarly, the artifact will embody this concept to offer the visitors an interpretation on how the future sustainable living could look like.
