Semester 2 Review: Design Inspiration and Reflections in Blogs

Personal Experience

With time flying by, the second semester has basically finished, and it has been an exciting and fulfilling semester due to the fact that we had two design modules and a research proposal for a design dissertation at this stage. It meant that at the start of the semester, we went straight into a high-intensity study style. Fortunately, when writing this semester’s blogs it has inspired me a lot as they are highly relevant to the Housing Alternatives Design Module and Design Dissertation, as well as being points of interest to me. Furthermore, in the process of writing blogs, I have developed my writing ability as well as my logic of thinking further, which is largely due to the fact that blogs require the ability to summarise and logical thinking as they need to express my main ideas clearly in a limited number of words with a certain degree of academics.

Study Journeys

Housing Alternatives: This is the first time I have thought systematically about community and housing design, and the process of writing this blog has encouraged me to learn and read a lot of information to enhance my knowledge about community and housing design. As my aim is to create a sustainable and low-energy neighbourhood, the design of passive houses became one of the focuses, which is also the topic of my first blog. In terms of passive design, to a large extent, I think it is a very clever approach in design because it provides a comfortable living environment for the occupants without largely consuming additional energy. Moreover, during the process of writing this blog I realised that when we consider the sustainability of urban spaces, we also need to recognise that architecture plays a significant role in urban design. For example, a building could communicate its function and some of the character of the city through its façade and create a unique urban skyline.

Design Thesis: My second blog is about the topic of Design Thesis – Urban Leftover Spaces, which was also influenced by the Housing Alternatives project to a certain extent. This is because when I visited the Housing Alternatives project on site, I identified a lot of vacant space and abandoned buildings on the site, which had to lead me to think about the potential opportunities for new neighbourhoods to be created due to the existence of these kinds of spaces. As a result, I was encouraged to think about the value of leftover space in the urban area and to explore some of the overlooked spaces in the Newcastle area, and start to think about why they have been created and how they could be effectively activated.

Future

Overall, there is no doubt that the blog has helped me to develop my ability to express images and writing skills, as well as my ability for creative thinking and logic during the process of writing. Furthermore, blogging has become one of the most important channels for me to understand other people’s interests, which makes it easy for us to find topics of interest in our talk. Thus, in the future, I will continue to develop my writing skills and continue to share interesting ideas and reflections about urban design through blogging.