International Masterclass: Co-Design For Public Services

Traveling to Luxembourg is always a treat, even if it’s a bit of a trek. This time I was joined by Helen Ryan, my collaborator from Lancaster City Council. We were going to Luxembourg on the invitation of Jan Glas of Luxinnovation (and a Proud partner). He wanted us to run a master class for the public services on how they can get the maximum benefits from undertaking co-design projects. As part of this Jan wanted us to talk about Beyond the Castle, the co-design project we ran in Lancaster with 2,000 people.

In this sesscion we also debated the 10 principles of co-design from the public sector. These are reproduced in full in the report attached to this post.

The one day workshop attracted a really interesting and eclectic group of architects, designers, public service partners and an applied sociologist. Throughout the day we were surprised by the excellent contributions of the group, this was a dynamic and highly creative group. We were also conscious of the frustration that some of the group felt that they were not able to implement the new processes and projects that they would like. Through the course of the day we explored the challenges and opportunities for co-design they saw in their local contexts. You will see from the report attached here that the proposals were diverse, stimulating and challenging.

One of the most exciting things about this masterclass is that the participants left making plans for more meetings and working out how they could make the processes developed in the masterclass a reality.