Swansea Metropolitan University - Fighting crime with good design - 6 June 2008

Safer Sustainable Cities - Hosted by Swansea Metropolitan University in partnership with the Design Against Crime Research Centre. Co-organized by Chris Thomas and held at The Grand Reading Room in the Welsh School of Architectural Glass, Swansea, Wales.

The seminar attracted the attention of the local authorities and focused on designing out crime. Swansea City was awarded EU funding to redevelop the city centre infrastructure which includes the cycling links into and within the city. It focused not on detective work or CCTV but on cutting-edge design. Lorraine Gamman, a keynote speaker at the Safer Sustainable Cities event at Swansea Metropolitan University, is director of the Design Against Crime Research Centre at the University of the Arts London. She said: “Crime-proof designs make products more sustainable, as they become harder to steal, and so we don’t need to keep replacing them.”

Reported on the Times Higher Education website.

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Adam Thorpe and Lorraine Gamman participated in many media events taking about their Bikeoff research that generated the new Broxap anti bike theft bike stands located in Camden. The stands were featured by Design Technology Alliance/Design Council to mark Home Secretary’s launch of Home Office’s design out crime initiative. Thorpe and Gamman were also interviewed on BBC Radio 4, the Today Programme, BBC National Lunch Time News and Design Council Film as benchmark design against crime.

Adam Thorpe’s account of how to design out bike theft and latest Bikeoff designs was also subsequently covered by Korean and Mexican TV .

Download radio interview

Lorraine Gamman and Adam Thorpe Design as Socially Responsive Design, to the Research Community at Glasgow School of Art. With full reference to bike crime and anti theft bike design and Bikeoff research projects. A warm reception from a lively group of researchers and potential future links for research collaboration.

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THORPE, A. and GAMMAN, L. (2007) Bikes: Home Safe? Domestic Storage and Other Creative Strategies to deal with Bike Crime, MA Industrial Design (Course Director: Ben Hughes), Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. The project included organising:

• Briefing and talks - 07.11.07
• Interim Critique - 16.11.07
• Interim Critique - 22.11.07
• Final Critique - 17.01.08

Lorraine Gamman and Adam Thorpe presented to GLA, TfL and CCoE on Design Against Crime’s review of Anti Terrorist Bike Parking Strategy - it seems that counter terrorism agendas DO NOT prohibit bike parking although some architects quote “security considerations” when asked why no parking is provided. With careful consideration designers can provide for cyclists AND avoid increasing risks of terrorism.

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Lorraine Gamman and Adam Thorpe curated ‘Holborn Unlocked’ An exhibition of bicycle parking design solutions from CSM MA Industrial Design held at The Lethaby II Gallery, Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. Find out more about the exhibition and the project at the Holborn Unlocked website.

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caMden bike stand featured in London Cyclist 2007 April/May 2007 issue along with an overview of other bicycle parking furniture.

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THORPE, A. and GAMMAN, L. (2007) Domestic Bliss: Indoor Bike Storage, BA (Hons) Product Design (Course Director: Paul Sayers), Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. The project included organising:
• Project Introduction - 22.01.07
• Briefing - 29.01.07
• Interim Critique - 07.03.07
• Final Critique - 13.03.07

A brief was run with BA (Hons) Product Design that explored three themes:

1. how users interact with objects and their functions;
2. the impact that technology has on the method of interaction; and
3. impact of crime on object storage like bikes.

It asked designers to analyse how people ‘interact with and live with’ their bikes within a domestic environment and the problems and opportunities this creates to develop new experiences.

More here at the Domestic Bliss website.

Adam Thorpe and Lorraine Gamman curated the Reinventing the Bike Shed 2 exhibition at New London Architecture. The exhibition aimed to explore elements of the passion and the challenge of inner city cycling that was linked to the major show at the London Architecture Biennale.

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