italiaDesign Prospective
Student Information
What is italiaDesign Field School
The field school is a chance for undergraduates to do high-level primary research and participate in a large-scale research project where you will upon the research of those who have come before and contribute to this legacy of knowledge and research yourself. It is an opportunity to work under the leadership and direction of a leading academic expert on Italian Studies and Design.
It is an opportunity to study abroad and to learn by first-hand experience. To learn while immersed directly within the topics, history, neighborhoods and firms you are studying. This is not just studying design and history from books. The ideas will come alive in front of you and you will gain a deep knowledge of these places and ideas.
It is a rich, six week, cultural and historical experience that gets beneath the surface level of the cities, and goes far beyond the limited tourist perspective. In many instances you will leave the tourists far behind and have an experience of the country that few people achieve even from multiple visits.
It is an opportunity to travel with a purpose, and to do so amongst your peers. To experience the work and the sites with some of the best students in the school, working, sharing ideas and experiences together.
italiaDesign is a unique learning opportunity for senior level undergraduate students. It allows exceptional senior level students to take their design studio on the road with them, working on laptop computers to produce complex design research and presentations while abroad. Each year, students on the field school interview the top designers in the country about the status of design and innovation within Italy and throughout Europe and North America.
The research, projects and interviews are then prepared for publication by the students who produced these resources in-field in an analysis, production and publication course in the semester following the field-study. Each year leaves its findings and its recommendations for future study with the next group, thereby enriching the field school year after year.
It is also a unique field school model compared to the other field schools offered by SFU.
Firstly, italiaDesign situates students in a series of bases in the country for extended periods and uses these bases as jumping off points from which to explore the surrounding cities, and regions under the guidance of an experienced and driven, native-speaking director.
Secondly, it is a unique style of field school because it uses the design studioes, factories, and streets of the cities as its classroom, taking advantage of some of the greatest in designed urban spaces for lectures, and making use of local host institutions when necessary for presentations.
Additionally, it prepares the students who participate and builds context during the semester prior to the in-field study’s summer session through a concentrated full-credit preparatory course in Vancouver as well as a preparatory course in basic Italian, allowing students to build a social and working relationship with each other as they prepare for what they will see and experience in-field.
As mentioned before though, the field-school does not end with the summer study in Italy. In the semester following the study, students return to the classroom in order to decompress and make sense of what they have learned and experienced over the summer, and to then publish those results as part of the ongoing long-term collaborative research project that is the field school’s backbone.
This social and working relationship that is built before traveling is then reinforced in-field as students room together and work on projects in teams, giving them a sense of shared purpose and providing fodder for lively discussions on rich topics that span design, economics, management theory, urbanism, pattern languages, interaction design, architecture, urbanism, ethnography, and wide range of history. All while surrounded by the world’s richest collection of antiquities, art, knowledge, and some of the most stunning urban and rural environments in the world.
italiaDesign is an exceptional opportunity for the exceptional student and it will provide a personal awareness and a depth of knowledge that marks its grads. Bringing them to an entirely higher level of discourse and awareness of design and their own capabilities, all while preparing them for the increasingly complex environment of the future of design.
italiaDesign Travel Tips
These are recommendations made by students from years past who participated in the field school
If you own or have access to a laptop computer it will be of great value to you in-field and will make nearly every facet of your study easier and more convenient. Of the 2007 group, 11 of the 12 brought laptops. (And of that 11, 10 were macs.) It is not mandatory that you have one, but the more there are, the easier everyone’s days become.
This field school is HARD. This cannot be stressed strongly enough. Before applying one should take some time to reflect on what your future goals and aspirations are if this field-study complements them. It is essential that you go into the field study with a passion for the topic and the research because if you do not you will be in for a shock and will likely be sadly disappointed. This is not a vacation, it is a study that focuses on a very specific variety of topics and there is a lot of hard work involved in preparation, during and proceeding the time in Italy. With that said, if you have a passion for the subject, it meshes with your goals for your future, and you aren’t afraid of a deranged amount of work then you will likely enjoy this study a great deal, and you will likely use what you learn during this summer for years afterwards in a variety of situations.
TRAVEL AND IN-FIELD TIPS
Come Prepared!
Plan your packing, plan what to bring with you and even more importantly, figure out what you think you will need that you can in fact leave behind. Above all else, DO NOT leave your packing to the last minute.
And when you are deciding what and what not to bring, remember that this is a research study, so you will need to go prepared with some of the essential academic resources. You will almost certainly need a laptop as well as some copies of the essential texts you will be studying from during the pre-trip session. (some of which can be divided amongst the group in order to lighten individual loads but you will often find that you want access to your own sources so bring the ones you know you will need.) Items like pens, notebooks, and sketchbooks are often useful in field but these things can also be found and purchased once you reach Italy. There are excellent shops in Rome and Florence where you can buy art supplies and stationary if and when you need it.
If you are bringing a laptop, digital camera, ipod, or other piece of technology (and nearly everyone does) make sure you have taken steps to insure them and have backed up any important data beforehand. There hasn’t been any issue with things getting stolen in years past but that isn’t a license to be careless.
Things do get broken however so back up everything. Make sure that you have at least a second copy of any projects, research documents, photos, interview videos or other artifacts. Ideally you will want to have more than two, and for them to be held by more than one person. Traveling across Italy and Europe is hard on your computers and cameras and things will fail. In 2007 we had 4 hard drive failures and lost a lot of data.
Spend some money on extra storage space. You will never know what resources you may end up needing down the road, even old master AI files from your 391 projects may suddenly become essential. By the time you reach the end of the in-field portion Rome will already seem like a million years away, 391 will be pre-history. Don’t make the mistake of deleting the things you used to make these old projects to free up space. Until the year is up and the next gruppo takes over you may need these files. The group that comes after you may need them.
Research Team Testimonials 