The Device InFormation studio operates at the scale of the interior and the membrane of a building, looking for proposals that brings about very specific effects, while a being applicable to different environments. The proposals should in this way be considered design systems, addressing issues of design, production and performance. These design systems should make use of parametric principles on different levels, primarily considering the effect of spatial conditions, while implicating structural, organizational and production aspects. The formal effects should suggest functions and programs rather than be defined of them.

Today technology enables new modes of architectural operation in which design and production become closely linked; the architectural drawing moves from to simulation and instruction for production. The prototype replaces the sketch and the working model. Parametric and scripted modes of design allow exploration into fields of design solutions as well as new mass customized production rationales.

The Device In Formation studio addresses the design of architectural components operating as parametric devices both during the design process, and by retaining multifunctional capacities as interior elements. Device should here be understood in its double sense, both being an intelligent mechanism, a prototype, with specific operational qualities, and a pattern, an ornament or a decorative structure. As a conceptual foundation of a design, it can take on a range of programs. As a differentiated and composite component, it can take on a number of forms, but will primarily operate on an interior scale. In particular, they will be developed according to their behaviour and effect, rather than technical or functional performance, transforming a given site accordingly. The field of operation for the devices in formation is situated in between the consumer product and the customized environment, the mass produced and the crafted and/or the inert and the malleable. It will introduce new ideas around architectural design based on the establishment of parametrical design systems, benefiting from collaborative development and in close relation with the production techniques and performative qualities of the designed spaces.

The Cell-Tales studio takes its name from the cell, which can be explained as the smallest structural unit within a larger organization, and tale which is something that is fabricated a fiction, but most interestingly takes its name from the tell-tales which operates as indicators, used as guides when trimming a sail, or in cybernetics feedback mechanisms that involves sensory members that indicates performance. The Cell-Tales studio will explore cellularity in architecture, its structural qualities, capabilities of providing enclosure and openings, and how cellular systems can allow for programmatic differentiation and discontinuities. Further the fabrication and the design or trimming of cells and cellular structures that allow for specific architectural performance.

This course we will be looking at the double aspects of architecturally informed materiality. How the architecture is influenced by rather visible forces such as structural, functional, physical parameters, as well as less visible forces such as cultural, political, temporal parameters. What new aesthetic affects can this informed material complex produce? Affect is something that goes beyond the material physical limitations and starts to engage with the surrounding environment, creates an ambience. In a series of text seminars we will address the aspect of architecturally informed materiality and that of affect.

Swedish Public Service is today facing the problem of how to shrink. At the same time Swedish Public Service is housed in facilities that are culturally, physically, organizationally and technologically becoming obsolete. When the so called Radio- and TV-City in Stockholm was built in the 60s it was described as a "technological giant" rather than a building. The design and the organization of the building complex were guided by the idea of "central decentralization." Since than, the organization of Public Service and the modes of production have gone through drastic changes which requires new kinds of built facilities.

The London field trip was part of the Device InFormation studio and focused on meeting people rather then seeing buildings. The Device In Formation studio was fortunate to meet the most advanced research departments within high end architectural and engineering practices. The 17 participating students from the studio were joined by three KTH diploma students, and tutors Jonas Runberger and Thomas Wingate.

The trip also featured exchanges with students from Architectural Association diploma units 12 and 16 as well as Metropolitan University unit 4 though a Generative Components Workshop and a Parametric Design Symposium.

The trip was made possible by the Architecture In-Formation sponsors, and the generous contribution of all London hosts.