As you might gather from my last message I feel that Ken's challenge 
does illuminate something but I'm not sure it's a significant something 
in relation to understanding designing, except maybe illustrating the 
folly of trying to atomise an essentially holistic activity.

Ken gave the example of a project, by Benktzon & Juhlin, where intensive 
work was done to understand the product's environment and use before 
commencing to design. I would never criticise such research and I 
encourage students to undertake it far more completely and rigorously 
than is normal. However Ken's example reminded me of the early work by 
Bruce Archer who invested very heavily in this kind of preliminary 
research, famously in his development of the Kings Fund Hospital bed 
specification in the 1960s, arguably one of the first examples of 
intertwining professional practice and research in design.

The Kings Fund bed set the benchmark for UK hospital beds right down to 
the present day. In evolutionary terms it is a supremely successful 
design that matches Nil Gulari's (2007) concept of a "Killer Product" 
whose presence in the marketplace prevents the survival or emergence of 
competitors. I'd like to make two observations about it based partly on 
my own recent investigations of design and healthcare, including 
interviews with hospital bed manufacturers and designers (1), and 
observations made by Ghislaine Lawrence, former curator of medicine at 
the Science Museum, London, in her doctoral thesis on Bruce Archer and 
the Kings Fund bed (Lawrence 2003).

Lawrence demonstrated how Archer's passion for detailed analysis created 
a very complete and convincing specification and demonstration design. 
However it was based entirely on what was available to be analysed and 
what was politically desirable at the time. In particular Archer was 
able to pay close attention to the ergonomics of nurses' work, partly 
because this was a political priority at a time of labour shortage and 
partly because nurses were accessible to researchers and could 
articulate and demonstrate their work in useful ways. Archer also paid 
attention to a variety of clinical practices that would benefit from 
functional additions to the bed design, notably the ability to tilt 
patients in ways that helped certain therapies.

The fundamental weaknesses of Archer's approach were rooted in this 
backward-looking "snapshot" approach. The labour shortage vanished when 
lots of immigrants came to work in the health service, therapeutic 
features of the design, still present years later, were obsolete before 
the beds were in wide use because of developments in clinical practice, 
and the beds did not then, and do not today, provide well for patients' 
needs (not Archer's priority), for example compromises in the mechanical 
design aimed at clinical and ergonomics requirements led to thinner 
mattresses. Despite all these problems, manufacturers in Britain are 
paralysed still today because the Kings Fund specification has created 
an institutional environment in which only it can survive.

I would argue this is partly because of the power of Archer-style 
reductive, analysis before synthesis that is very attractive to 
institutions who would  find the alternative - a more speculative 
approach led by synthesis and accepting/allowing for a high degree of 
openness about what the future will need - most uncomfortable. I would 
also argue that much of this current list debate seems to be focused on 
top-down analytical rhetoric and I feel much more comfortable with 
efforts to synthesise the field from the ground up (starting where 
designers are), retaining plenty of openness and remembering that taking 
something apart can destroy its meaning.

best wishes from Sheffield
Chris

Gulari, N. (2007) "Killer Products in the Market Ecosystem, The Role of 
Design in Creating Killer Products" Proceedings of European Academy of 
Design Biennial Conference, Izmir, November 2007

Lawrence, G.M. (2003) "Hospital beds by design : a socio-historical 
account of the King's Fund Bed : 1960-1975"* *PhD Thesis, University of 
London 2003

(1) Should be available in 2008 in a book titled "Design and Healthcare" 
to be published by Gower press. I just need to wrestle some relevant 
photographs from the various people whose material is described in the book.

*********************
Professor Chris Rust
Head of Art and Design Research Centre
Sheffield Hallam University, S11 8UZ, UK
+44 114 225 2706
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www.chrisrust.net