Designing Regenerative Systems: Opportunities for Hemsedal

Haley Fitzpatrick and Tobias Luthe

These five synthesis maps are the result of the Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO) Spring 2022 Systems-Oriented Design (SOD) bachelor course entitled “Design for Sustainability,” taught by Prof. Dr Tobias Luthe and Haley Fitzpatrick. This course, along with master’s courses and doctoral research, is part of an ongoing, long-term collaboration between AHO and the rural mountain community of Hemsedal, Norway. The intent of this partnership is to better support sustainability transitions and regenerative ways of living in real-world communities by merging science, design, and place-based transformative praxis. This series of maps represent challenges, leverage points and opportunities around five key themes across the social-ecological systems of Hemsedal. Developed from the students’ many iterations of gigamaps, co-design workshops with stakeholders, scientific secondary data analysis, and previously collected data from prior courses, these synthesis maps organize complex information into thought-provoking artefacts, with the aim to healthily question the “invisible” systems of Hemsedal’s past and present and stimulate new ideas for the future. These maps are currently being displayed in the municipality of Hemsedal. They will also be featured in an interactive exhibition in the annual community-wide farmer’s market, which is part of the upcoming SOD master’s course and Haley Fitzpatrick’s on-going PhD research.