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SPACE ARCHITECTURE EDUCATION IN MILAN

Arch. Annalisa Dominoni, Ph.D.Professor of Industrial Design

Head of Research Programs of SpaceLab

Facolt del Design — III Facolt di Architettura — Politecnico di Milano

Via Durando 38/A Milano 20158Italy

Tel. + 39.02.2399.5968 Fax. + 39.02.2399.5986annalisa.dominoni@polimi.it

ABSTRACT

This paper suggest a method to develop projecteducation activity teaching architecture andindustrial design practices.

The thesis is based on the application of amethodology called project research ,developed by the author inside the DesignFaculty of the Polytechnic of Milan, to formativecontext of the fourth year of the Laboratory ofIndustrial Design Space Design . Themethodology related to the project researchconsists of the elaboration of new knowledgethrough the project experience in which theoryand practice overlapped and in which theexternal environment, the real purchaser, theindustrial reality, are the principal interlocutors ofthe designer.

The application of the project research methodsto the formative context is recommended if theobjective of the Laboratory of Industrial DesignSpace Design is oriented to a professional

formation which put the students in theconditions to operate in a real context withexternal stimuli to the academic environment.

Copyright ' 2002 The American Institute of Aeronautics andAstronautics Inc. All rights reserved.

The focal point of the thesis expressed in thispaper is the proposal of a education program inwhich the theoretical lectures of the academicinstructors interweave with external resources,as experiences of professionals from thescientific and industrial world, with the aim tostimulate students curiosity and get themaccustomed to the complexity. It could be usefulto place the theoretical teaching next to the realpractice of the workshop through: the research,that is the capability to found information; theanalysis, that is the capability to manage andorganize them; finally, the elaboration of conceptdesign, which represent the visualization of thefirst hypothesis in which the project requirementsand the designer intuition join together.

The results attended with this method couldconsent to the students to acquire a doublemanagement capability: the informationmanagement, from which it could derive thestudent attitude to the industrial design research,and the project management, from which couldarise the attitude to the practice of industrialdesign.

The paper describes the proposed methodthrough the case study of the fourth year of theLaboratory of Industrial Design Space Design ,in which the author is scientific coordinator,

AIAA Space Architecture Symposium10-11 October 2002, Houston, Texas

AIAA 2002-6123

Copyright © 2002 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved.

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started from this year at the Design Faculty of thePolytechnic of Milan.

INTRODUCTION

The Industrial Design Degree Course at thePolytechnic of Milan offers a graduate educationto industrial and service, visual communicationsand multimedial designers. The degree course isoriented to teaching design, technologicalprocess, product, and communicationsinnovation and these skills will help to developgoods and services within a complex productivesystem characterized by interwoven localactivities, the need of the globalization of themarkets and awareness of rapidity varying anddiversified demands.

Unlike others industrialized countries, industrialdesign in Italy has been always considered instrict connection with the architect activity,therefore to introduce the new Degree Courseinside the Architecture Faculty constitute aacknowledgement of the specificity of italianindustrial design spread in all the world.Moreover the Architecture Faculty, being part ofa center of excellence as the Polytechnic ofMilan, has the opportunity to avail itself ofcultural, technological and managerialcompetence particularly qualified in the field ofthe technologies concerning the industrial design.The Industrial Design Degree Course is able toengage important synergies the differentAteneo s components.

For Polytechnic of Milan the field of spaceresearch is extremely important. And because ofits highly technological content in such atraditionally industrial area, it has become moreand more important over time. The Italiancontribution to this great project is fundamental,thanks to Alenia Spazio s technological andindustrial know-how. This firm is specialized inbuilding the habitation modules where not onlytrained astronauts, but also researchers andscientists will be spending quite long periodssometime in the near future.

The growing awareness of the problems of livingin space casts the spotlight on architecture andindustrial design: it is essential to improve

comfort and living conditions in these extremesituations. There has to be innovation if spaceresearch is to have a future and completely newprojects must be implemented, to createstructures, equipment, and also objects foreveryday use, which are specially designed foruse in restricted spaces and in microgravity.

My experiences gleaned from the projects thathave been carried forward in these years ofresearch have demonstrated the importance of astrategic approach on the part of the industrialdesigner who represents a central figure in theproject and who must choose partners with theknowledge and the technological competencerequired to participate in the design anddevelopment of products specifically intended forlife in space. The strategic role of industrialdesigner in producing equipment to be used inextreme environments, which became clearduring the experience I had working on theseprojects for my Ph.D. course, has also openedup another field of study and discussion on theappropriateness of preparing industrial designersspecialized in the aerospace sector. Because ofthe SpaceLab activities, various projects havebeen started up as partnerships with aerospaceindustries and agencies, and they are currentlybeing developed. On the other hand, however, toavoid limiting this research work to an isolatedepisode, several recent research doctorates inindustrial design have attempted to developthese topics, so the field can instead representthe beginning of a specialized field offering a newand innovative contribution to such project.

Therefore, the conviction of the real need tocreate the right conditions to permit the SpaceDesign planning sector to rapidly assume anindependent character and become the subjectof systematic activity within the Design Faculty ofthe Polytechnic of Milan has been transformedinto a teaching reality.

OBJECTIVES

This year, the fourth year of the Degree Coursein Industrial Design includes two six-monthlaboratory classes dealing with designing forspace: the first in Industrial Design, and the

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second in the Technology and Experimentationof Prototypes.

The objective of the laboratory classes is tostimulate the students creative and projectabilities through the analysis to the successiveplanning of structures, apparatuses andequipment for living and working in space. Thechoice of aerospace sector is finalized toexperiment the potentialities of industrial designin a very particular context which require a global,strategic and innovative approach compared tothe traditional environment in which the designercarry out his projects.

Figure A — Students project: flexible surface tools holder

The study of extreme situations, confinedenvironments and microgravity conditions, butabove all, the complete rethinking of productsand their use in relationship with thephysiological, dimensional, postural andperceptive alterations to which man is subjectedin space, is a very useful exercise for thestudents. This also helps them acquire greatermental flexibility and develop the projectproposals in close relation to the users needs.The importance of industrial design in theaerospace assumes a methodological approachby which the human factor must be the key tosuccessful planning of the environments andobjects in close relationship with the astronaut-user. The increase in the length of theuninterrupted periods of time spent by astronauts

during the missions in space and the change ofthe crew, composed of professional astronauts,but also of researchers, scientists and tourists,have contributed to make aware the aerospaceagencies and industries scientific communitytowards the comfort and the well-being of thesingle man, which began extremely importantbecause is connected directly with the operativeefficiency and the good result of the mission. Theeducation activity of the first six-month laboratoryin Industrial Design is shared in theoretical andpractical program: lectures in the morning andworkshop in the afternoon of the same day oncea week. The lessons are oriented to explain the

Figure B — Students project: hygiene cabin inside the rack

state of the art in the space sector with particularattention to habitability problems and to analyzethe human mission in confined space and inmicrogravity conditions. The experience in spacecontext is explained to the students throughregular lectures of seven part-time instructorsfrom different disciplines: industrial design,interior design, materials and components forindustrial design, bio-medical technologies,semiotics, aerospace mechanical engineering,social sciences, etc. Besides, the programforesee visiting specialist and lectures fromdifferent sectors and visit organized to spaceagencies and aerospace industries with the aimto increase the space culture of the students.The workshop foresee the develop of conceptdesign with the aim to increase the crew quality

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of life with project act to began a realcountermeasure to discomfort of living in space

conditions.

The education activity of the second six-monthlaboratory in Technology and Experimentation ofPrototypes is shared in theoretical and practicalprogram as the first one: lectures in the morningand workshop in the afternoon of the same dayonce a week. The lessons are aimed to presentresearch project analyzing in dept the habitabilityaspects related to different daily activities, publicand individual, during a mission in spaceenvironment: to work, to rest, to sleep, personalhygiene, the food and packaging system, theequipment to support the crew movements, thelight system, the physical exercises, etc. Theworkshop is dedicated to develop and project ofthe concept design carried out during the first six-month laboratory. Students are invited to presenttheir concept design through high level renderingand 3D models. The project activity is supportedfrom theoretical and practical lectures with theaim to give to the students the necessariesinformation to present real and feasible results. Itis unthinkable, in fact, for a designer to imaginedeveloping a research project without having toface the actual concomitance placing theproblem and the conditions together with thesurroundings and context, assuming amethodology with the characteristics of dialogueinvolving the industrial designer.

In the forthcoming academic year, the FinalSynthesis Laboratory of Industrial Design SpaceDesign , which the fifth-year students of theDegree Course must take, will complete this firsteducational experience of ours, and the follow-upcould be involve extending planning and designto all extreme environments, from Lunar, Mars orAntarctic bases to monasteries, prisons,submarines and more. The project researchassumes real interlocutors, in other words, fromthe very first phases of the conception anddevelopment of the project, it envisages theparticipation of users and industrial partners: theformer in order to identify needs and definerequirements, whereas the latter areindispensable to enable the industrial designer topropose feasible and acceptable solutions. In thissense, the Final Synthesis Laboratory of

Industrial Design Space Design will rely on thedirect participation of the user, the astronauts,sector operators, and both aerospace andconventional firms for discussions with studentson the problems of designing for extremeenvironments.

From my point of view, as head of researchprograms of SpaceLab , the research laboratoryfor space design, coordinating the educational,research and service activities is a winningstrategy in order to respond effectively to theneeds of the aerospace agencies and industries,as well as to traditional industries, presentingthem with a research unit that is both sound andarticulated on various fronts, both academic andindustrial.

METHODOLOGY

The enormous changes and the exponentialspeed of transformation driving the evolution ofcontemporary society force the architecture andindustrial design researcher to tackle the problemof how to manage complexity and find solutionsto the problems arising from it. Likewise, industryis forced to undertake research for the onlyfundamental resource that will allow it to create acompetitive advantage to weather marketturbulence: knowledge. If research, as such,must produce knowledge — meaning usefulknowledge that can be shared with the relativescientific community and can also be extended tothe world beyond — it would be natural to thinkthat project research should produceknowledge by proposing solutions that can take

SpaceLab was founded in 1998, within the present DesignFaculty at the Polytechnic of Milan. Its purpose is to satisfythe primary needs of astronauts in space, designingstructures, interiors, apparatuses and equipment that areparticular suited for confined environments and forconditions of microgravity and that are aimed at improvingthe level of well-being on board. SpaceLab has realized forthe ASI, the Italian Space Agency, in the last year 2001,VEST, an integrated clothing system of clothing for the IVAactivities on board, FORTE, a system of lightweight exerciseequipment, and in the year 2002, ISS HABITABILITY, aresearch programs with 27 projects about living and workingin space.

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form through devices, objects, instruments andequipment that should be able to improve thelevel of comfort and pleasure of the user. But if itwere so simple, what then would distinguishproject research from planning? Apparently the

distinction can seem very hazy, perhaps becausein a certain sense all project activities can beconsidered researchers. The character ofinnovation and complex technology is not whatturns a project activity into research activity,inasmuch as the results of the project are notspecifically knowledge, instead, it is the theoreticreflection that is carried out during the projectplanning that enriches the project and givesscientific value to the results.

Project research is therefore the articulation ofthe skills, intuitions, capacities, sensitivities andinstruments used by the researchers. It is whatenables them to deal with the complexities andthe speed of transformation of the problems, andthen arrive at translating the project experiencesinto new knowledge that can be transferred toand recognized by the scientific community(Dominoni, Trabucco, 2000).

This methodology allows to the students todevelop a research attitude permitting theprogressive acquisition of credibility and ofscientific interest, in this specific case fromaerospace agencies and industries. The focus ofindustrial design in the aerospace field impliesindeed a methodological approach that considersthe human factors as a key to face the design ofhabitats and objects in relationship with theastronaut-user. Industrial design and humanfactors and the design of usage and gestureinteraction are the focal points that best expressthe potential of the industrial design in theaerospace sector and on which the studentsbased their practical experiences acquired duringthe course research activities and the theoreticalreflections on the problems which arise fromdealing with and projecting for an environment sounfamiliar to man: space.

RESULTS

The experiences described in this paper showhow a research strategy can be set up and howsuch a usually academically oriented activity, like

that of Space Architecture Education in Milan ,can be useful, or even indispensable, bridgingthe world of design to the aerospace sector shighly specialized engineering industries. Thespace industry has to open its doors toarchitecture and industrial design, in order tocreate the completely new kinds of productsnecessaries for living and working in space, andthe students can find the points of contact, bothwith creativity work beyond the normal limits ofthe Earth environment, and within the totallydifferent limits imposed by the spaceenvironment. Several students projects carriedout in this first experiment of the fourth year ofLaboratory in Industrial Design Space Designhave obtained extraordinary results, as in termsof research and analysis of all the informationcollected during the lectures and doing specificindividual research inside the aerospaceagencies and industries, as in terms ofmanagement of project complexity together toothers disciplines involved in the process ofdevelopment of the new space concept design.The relationship with firms has been necessaryto permit to the students to spend a period oftheir academic time doing a stage insideResearch & Development Centers of the sameaerospace agencies and industries, but also ofthe industries with terrestrial technologicalknow-how involved in the definition of the newspace products and the possible scientific andtechnological spin-off.

At the same time, students have been stimulatedhaving a self-education in space architecture anddesign through science fiction films and literaturebooks with the aim to try suggestions and ideasfor the real project mediating reality and fantasywith information on architecture and designtechnologies which involve in research of newmaterials, inflatable and collapsed structures,textures surfaces, etc. The success of thiscourse on Space Design is the equilibrateorganization of all lectures and seminariesinvolved during the year and the capacity to letstudents deepen into the subject and, at thesame time, to be able to shift to other field ofarchitecture and design, as high technology,innovative materials, environmental architecture,interior design, etc. with aerospace mechanicalengineering, social sciences, health sciences,

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Figure C — Students project: extensible textile table

Figura D — Students project: pliable restraint chair

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medicine, physiology, psychology, biomedicaltechnologies, ergonomics, etc. with the aim togive a very complex and conscious view of livingand working in space

CONCLUSIONS

The results of the paper demonstrate thatstudents have had the chance to learn all basicinformation and requirements about spaceenvironment and, in the mean time, theyimmediately have started to develop their ownresearch and design concept. They have had theopportunity to talk with astronauts and withaerospace engineers from Alenia Spazio andcheck theirs concept design with concrete usersand real problems to solve.

From the students point of view, the majordifficulty observed during the course is perhapsthe impact with such a complex thematic as thespace environment and its implications with theothers disciplines. At the beginning, because ofthe very different backgrounds of teachers andspecialist lectures invited, students have workedvery hard to try to assimilate all the newinformation and translate the space requirementsinto a design concept. This is the reason why thiskind of course should come at the end ofstudent s academic curriculum, because it needadvanced skills and managerial capacities toorganizer and select the project complexity.

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