Design Participation in Sustainable Renovation and Living

This chapter addresses resident participation in the renovation of sustainable housing. Such renovation efforts aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by reducing energy waste from heat loss. Resident behaviour after renovation is a key factor. The residents may, for example, continue to keep windows open in winter even though there is now a ventilation system. Aligning renovation processes with the residents’ habits and preferences may therefore help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. No process framework currently exists that integrates resident participation with the renovation process. Design participation is a social design approach that seeks to support collaboration between the residents and the other stakeholders with design tools. This chapter shows how design participation reveals opportunities to innovate on the stakeholder process, as well as on technologies in the home. The examples arise from an education project in which design students collaborated with residents to address pre-, during and post-renovation needs as well as routine living. Each proposal reveals challenges and possibilities for the renovation process and for home technologies. The chapter maps the design participation examples onto the building management cycle and innovation issues in it. Overall, the examples reveal that there are still gaps to bridge between design participation thinking and the current participation and innovation processes in this field. While the latter tend to focus on agreements, being heard, and application of existing technologies, the examples presented here showcase the potential of exploration and joint discovery in promoting dialogue and innovation.