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Abstract

At the core of this design research is the profound question of how to nourish,
shelter and foster the well-being of our burgeoning population on earth, in a
regenerative and equitable manner. Contemporary housing and food systems in
Australia, as in many developed settings, are largely modernist legacies
reflecting a bygone era of cheap and plentiful resources, and persistent
anthropocentric perspectives disconnecting humans from our ecological
dependencies. Viewed from a resilience perspective, dominant housing types
and food system institutions are deeply implicated in widening ‘ecological
overshoot’ and biospheric disruption, as are associated practices of design.
In response, I propose how housing and food systems can be integrated as an
urban resilience strategy through a merger of ecological design research and
resilience inquiry. The re-visioning of the homescape central to the thesis builds
upon recent developments in urban agriculture, emergent ‘productive housing’,
alternative food movements, and broader sustainable living strategies.
The design research approach, interrelating resilience strategies, practice
theories, questions of type and participatory design, was conducted over three
overlapping phases. Phase 1 – research into design – involved a socialecological
analysis of dominant food culture and domestic design centred on
the kitchen, thereby establishing critical context for Phases 2 and 3. Phase 2 –
research for design – comprised my ethnographic participation in 12 Tasmanian
food-producing households, representing a range of density and tenure types.
In Phase 3 – research through design – householders engaged in participatory
design workshops to speculate how the home could better support their food producing
practices. In this final phase, I also undertook design iterations in
response to a design meta-brief synthesised from the Phase 2 and 3
participatory methods.
The resulting regenerative food axis design patterns address high-density,
medium-density, inner urban, suburban and peri-urban housing, and are
represented using schematic models and indicative spatial layouts. In these design outcomes, the kitchen-garden interface is illuminated as the catalyst of
regenerative energy, water and nutrient cycles, in addition to important social
functions. I follow with discussion of material and immaterial design
considerations, scaling out from the kitchen-garden system to community-based
alternative food networks.
Home-based food production is further located within a resurgence of
homecraft, the know-how and making skills of which I highlight as
complementary threads in enhancing urban resilience. In order to activate
ecological restoration in our vast suburban tracts, I explore roles for design
practice embedded within ‘living labs’ and grassroots networks. The thesis
concludes with a strategic framework for integrating housing and regenerative
food systems aimed at Australian design practice and design education, and for
re-contextualisation in other developed and developing settings.

Item Type:	Thesis - PhD
Authors/Creators:	Fountain, WG
Keywords:	design, resilience, housing, food, regenerative systems
Copyright Holders:	The Author
Copyright Information:	Copyright 2015 the author
Item Statistics:	View statistics for this item

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