In Spring 2021, Turnstone was invited to give a guest lecture at University of Portland. At UP’s Shiley School of Engineering, an interdisciplinary Innovation minor draws diverse students majoring in business, engineering, arts and sciences, nursing and education. This course, run by long-time friend and Turnstone collaborator, trans-media designer, Salvador Orara, follows the shift from traditional definitions of design innovation to more critical and speculative approaches. As he puts it, “from IDEO to Dunne and Raby and beyond”.
Familiar with Turnstone’s perspective on throwing around ‘design’ and ‘innovation’ in politics, business and engineering, Prof. Sal asked Turnstone for a talk that not only points students at both buzzwords but also stretches them to specific practices and values that produce tangible, valuable, meaningful outcomes. So this talk drew on products, spaces and programs from the Turnstone portfolio and on recent themes developed for my teaching at SVA, specifically from a workshop called Society Needs to See. My goal here, as there, was to articulate how our specific stance, deliberate narrative approaches and discipline can (and do) reimagine, inform and change large systems, policy and individual everyday experiences.