Social Fabrication Laboratory
* This laboratory has been completed.
| Date of establishment | November 1, 2012 |
|---|---|
| URL | http://coi.sfc.keio.ac.jp/ |
| Director |
Hiroya Tanaka
Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies |
| Contact |
E-mail:fabearth［at］sfc.keio.ac.jp
|
Objectives
There are two kinds of distinctive facility that have been experiencing something of a global boom of late, the “Future Center” and the “Fab Lab.” Future Centers are intended to be shared by citizens who play a variety of roles in society, and were started to provide locations for communication and discussion toward problem solving. On the other hand are Fab Labs, small-scale workshops offering digital fabrication devices, in which citizens in local communities can take part in fabricational activities.
In this laboratory, we are aiming to create and establish new creative facilities and activity models, exclusive to Japan, through combining these different yet mutually-complementary resources.
Research Outline and Our Goal
As part of our foundational research, we conduct research and development into (1) facilitation techniques that allow individuals to generate ideas in groups and bring them to form, (2) digital fabrication techniques (rapid prototyping techniques) that quickly transform ideas into practice while maintaining freshness, and (3) open design platforms, that allow knowledge garnered on the spot to be transcribed into an appropriate group share format. We intend to promote development through aggressive collaborations with other facilities, including Future Centers and Fab Labs both in Japan and overseas, and utilize these locations for research opportunities, including user tests and field tests to verify research results.
Our ultimate goal is to develop a total platform package, which can provide services related to design tools, design machines and design methods for more community-minded, group-minded and share-minded “social fabrication,” and go beyond the well-popularized paradigm of “personal fabrication.”
In order to achieve this goal, we plan to mainly promote the following research projects:
- “Fundamental study in Japanese-style Future Centers” project
- “Fab Lab near Yokosuka Line (name tentative)” project
In this laboratory, we initially propose launching a Fab Lab for demonstration experiments and prototype development. We will analyze any problems and make improvements, toward the ultimate goal of developing new creative facilities and activity models, exclusive to Japan. Through these activities, we expect to realize systemization of the design process, and generate both niche and outstanding products and the communities of users of those products. This has not yet been achieved through conventional mass-production methods and desk plans, but we believe will be realized through a number of on-the-spot validations.
Researchers, managers and professors
| Hiroya TanakaDirector | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
|---|---|
| Jun Murai | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Akira Wakita | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Toshiyuki Masui | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Yuji Ohgi | Professor, Graduate School of Media and Governance Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Jin Mitsugi | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Keisuke Uehara | Associate Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Yasuaki Kakehi | Part-time Lecturer Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Research into open source designs, and design support tools |
| Daijiro Mizuno | Associate Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Cultivating Ideation Techniques |
| Fumitoshi Kato | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies Cultivating Observation Techniques |
| Katsuhiko Ogawa | Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies |
| Fumio Shimpo | Professor, Faculty of Policy Management |
| Takashi Iba | Professor Faculty of Policy Management |
| Masahiro Kotosaka | Associate Professor, Faculty of Policy Management Review and proposal of social system and legislative system |
| Tomoaki Watanabe | Project Associate Professor, Graduate School of Media and Governance |
| Takuji Tokiwa | Project Associate Professor, Graduate School of Media and Governance |
| Emu Masuyama | Project Assistant Professor, Graduate School of Media and Governance Research on open source design |
| Noriyuki Aibe | Project Associate Professor, Graduate School of Media and Governance Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Shohei Aoki | Project Research Associate, Graduate School of Media and Governance Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Tsuneo Masuda | Project Research Associate, Graduate School of Media and Governance Development of a Fabrication Environment |
| Kazuo Ohno | Project Researcher, Graduate School of Media and Governance Development of a Fabrication Environment |