Book release "Contemporary design in the social sector. New ideas for school spaces"

Within the framework of the international project for socially integrated design - “Design Platform” the Creative Association of Curators TOK explores the possibilities of creative practices for social change.  We have developed a number of architectural and design projects that will help turn a typical school into a contemporary informational and educational center. Modernization of schools is valuable for the learning process; it can make it less regulated and more interactive and can also shift the center from the teacher to the learner. For the pilot stage of the project we have chosen an ordinary school no.53 in St Petersburg, which was built according to a archetypical project during the year of its creation in 1965 and therefore it is in desperate need of a makeover. Based on sociological research conducted in the school, an international team of architects, designers, sociologists and curators prepared several projects aimed at improving the school environment.

The results of this work can be found in the current book, the first publication of the “Design Platform” project was about school spaces and the possibilities of their transformation in reaction to current global educational trends.    The book includes theoretical articles on socially integrated design, architecture and the role of arts in schools as well as a collection of design projects that were created in response to the results of the aforementioned research. Our hope is that the ideas of these specialists will not simply remain as proposals on paper but rather be implemented –first in School #53 and then later on in other schools around the city. 

The book presentation will be held on October 22nd in St Petersburg at the conference 'Socially integrated design: new ideas for traditional spaces' organized by TOK.