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Designing a Counter: the Constitutive Entanglement of the Social and the Material in Architectural Desi

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Architecture, Materiality and Society

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Abstract

The relationship between the design and construction of architectural objects — the material — and the social context in which these objects are shaped and used — the social — is a key issue within the sociology of architecture. The relationship between the material and the social is contested: some tend to reify one, be it the material or the social, at the expense of the other, whereas others consider the material and the social to be ‘constitutively entangled’ (Orlikowski 2007:1437). In keeping with the latter perspective, we investigate the recursive interplay between the material and the social in the context of a design process that involved both architectural and organizational design. Particular emphasis is given to how extensive user participation was brought to bear in developing the architectural design and the implications of this for the users’ sense of their work and organization, as well as for the architectural designers’ sense of their professional practice.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Copenhagen Business School, Denmark

    Marianne Stang Våland

  2. Aalborg University, Denmark

    Susse Georg

Authors
  1. Marianne Stang Våland
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  2. Susse Georg
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Bremen, Germany

    Anna-Lisa Müller

  2. University of Konstanz, Germany

    Werner Reichmann

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© 2015 Marianne Stang Våland and Susse Georg

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Våland, M.S., Georg, S. (2015). Designing a Counter: the Constitutive Entanglement of the Social and the Material in Architectural Desi. In: Müller, AL., Reichmann, W. (eds) Architecture, Materiality and Society. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137461131_3

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