What ‘matters’ in making and cloth(ing)-led Facilitation in healthcare?… Towards a practice framework for advancing participation and collaboration in Design for Health settings.


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Design for Health in the UK has become increasingly democratised, yet complex. A recent, systemic turn within the sector has resulted in the co-creation of services and products that not only draw diverse communities together, to achieve a common goal, but require understanding of the tacit experiences of service users and providers. Design Facilitation is recognised for its ability to address complexity within this field, by taking a materials-driven approach. However, few Facilitators hail from making-led specialisms.

My PhD is situated in the context of an emergent set of professional practices in which Making and Clothing-led materials are harnessed in Facilitation methods in healthcare. Two distinct types of Facilitation methods are surveyed through the research : 1. A Facilitated Workshop and 2. A Wardrobe Probe - each respectively, applied in contexts of collective and individual creativity. Semi-structured interviews with select practitioners, accompanied by reflections on my own creative practice, examine approaches to facilitating collaborations in socially complex groups. My design and deployment of a Wardrobe Probe, to understand the effects of breast cancer on service users, additionally provides insight into the function and value of intimate, self-directed methods, that facilitate participation. The study exposes the mechanics of these methods - at the micro, meso and macro scale - to evidence what they ‘do’, but, more importantly, ‘how they work’.

Overall, the research aims to advance understanding of the relevance and potential of Making and Cloth(ing)-led Facilitation in Design for Health settings. It has generated a practice framework of 50+ Facilitation techniques to support future designers working within this field. And has developed a series of methods that ethically support breast cancer service users to reflect on and share their experiences with designers and clinicians. 

This study has been kindly supported by the charity, Breast Cancer Haven - it’s clinical staff and research team. It has been funded by The Arts and Humanities Research Council and London Doctoral Design Centre.

I am eternally grateful to all of the people who took part in this study, who so generously gave their time, wisdom and energy. And whom without, the project simply would not exist.

KEYWORDS - Breast Cancer Lived Experience, Co-Creation, Collaboration, Complexity, Design Facilitation, Design for Health, Embodied Practice, Individual and Collective Creativity, Making and Cloth(ing)-led Facilitation, New Materialism, Participation, Participatory Design, Systemic Turn, Wardrobe Probe.