Four times a year, I have the pleasure of heading up to Cambridge to teach on the Interdisciplinary Design for the Built Environment (IDBE) course. It’s always a highlight. The people on this course arrive with a great deal of experience from across the built environment sector—and that diversity makes for some fantastic conversations.

This week’s workshop focused on exploring the brief, a topic I’ve touched on a lot in this blog and that sits at the heart of much of our conceptual design training at Constructivist . For me, it’s about debunking the idea that the brief in a design project is fixed.

The kernel of the training is, the brief evolves. That realisation fundamentally changes how we approach design. It keeps us open—open to change, open to deeper listening, and open to discovering what the situation is really calling for.

I’m already looking forward to rejoining this cohort in March. In the meantime, here are a few past posts where I’ve explored this topic further.