Speculative Design

When one mentions speculative design, my mind can't help but wander off on its own stream of thoughts. These thoughts usually revolve around what things could be like in the future. What if the we woke up one morning in the future and our bedroom was completely solar powered? What if we put on a pair of goggles and all of a sudden we could see space? What if someday we were visiting a hotel which was run by robots? "What if" is a question many of you finish your own imaginative sentence to.

I think speculative design is one that's exiting, refreshing and new. We live in a world that can often be too sceptical. Sometimes we let our imaginations become overshadowed by more logical thoughts.

I think its important to recognise that speculative design could be our fuel for future innovation. People are always talking about how important innovation is especially in design. Are we really pushing this? I mean, innovation isn't always just pushing new ideas but its also questioning future ideals and

Designers are always observing current environments, identifying problems and looking for ways to solve these problems. Speculative design is trying to imagine what is in the future for us. If we can imagine future scenarios and experiences we can try look at ways to improve these. We can also try imagine future designs for the future. I think its almost adopts a "the sky is the limit" approach to design. This is amazing as to me, limits can often be a designers "frenemy". A friend to help them have direction to their designs however restricting the imagination. It's there to confine designers to focus on the key problems and what needs to be done but this can also provoke a designers block. Speculative design is bringing in an approach that makes us welcome to change. Change is inevitable, so why don't we imagine what these changes may be. It's an exiting challenge for design to speculate what may be.

In contrast to what I have discussed above, it's important to have a healthy balance with imagining the future and also appreciating the now. Mindfulness seems to be the term deemed for being present in the now. There are appropriate times to think ahead and there appropriate times to think in the now and what we're dealing with. Designers who are able to master a good balance of both, to me have a great advantage.