Preface, Introduction and Conclusions

Design, in the broad sense, did not escape the paradoxical trend of specialization and unification. In the quest for increasingly more efficient methods and practices it swung from the magical “deus ex-machina” of the past – the artist-designer; to a segmented and fragmentary form of practice in a ‘Taylorist’ company of the last century – the clerk-designer; to a kind of achieved synthesis that ‘differed’ from preceding ones, combining unity and identity, specialist research and global synthesis – the actordesigner. These new design methods and practices – united by the paradigm of collaboration – caught on in a wide range of activities and sectors. In design, however, particularly in the form designated as “Architecture, Engineering and Construction” (AEC), they drew renewed problem-solving impetus and fresh energy from pragmatic practices that had always been present. Indeed, buildings and projects are the outcome of a collective work carried out by specialists with different knowledge, cultural backgrounds, and often divergent objectives. Collaboration is not only necessary, but also desirable, in order to reduce to unity the different aims of the various specialists, putting them all on the same footing in an effort to achieve a whole that is larger than its several parts. Collaboration in design thus became a goal in itself, to be pursued from all standpoints. It has become a well-defined systemic method: collaborative design.