Public Collaboration Lab

The Public Collaboration Lab (PCL) is situated in the London Borough of Camden, a diverse and vibrant part of Inner London which has escalating income inequality with a high rate of child poverty.  PCL addresses specific social challenges of the borough in times of unprecedented reduction in public resources.

PCL understands itself as kind of a platform that offers an infrastructure to enable the collaboration of council officers, Heads of Service, design students and residents as well as third sector organizations and businesses who all contribute their expertise and experiences. The projects are based on a wide range of methods, including ethnographic field research and different workshop formats. The process of co-designing and prototyping with users is the central principle. For example, facing the problem of overcrowded living in a context of expensive and hardly accessible living space, PCL took the role of a facilitator. In collaboration with affected families, design students and the council services the challenges of overcrowded housing were specified and resources were identified until a plan of action was set out. The commonly developed prototypes were tested in collaborative workshops with residents. In the next step the project saw residents living in overcrowded homes working with design students, council officers and researchers to co-design a range of adaptable furniture created specifically to address the challenges of overcrowded living.

Find more information about the work of PCL on their homepage (www.publiccollaborationlab.com).