Academia
My research focuses on co-designing with socio-ecological communities and applying transdisciplinary knowledge to identify interventions for sustainable futures. I am developing a novel multispecies community design process that integrates participatory action research, research-through-design, and multispecies ethnography. Drawing on critical systems theory, post-humanism, new materialism, environmental philosophy, and indigenous knowledge systems, my work explores how design can facilitate more-than-human collaborations within socio-ecological communities.
Publications
Small and remote communities have long been on the periphery of conventional development paradigms. To achieve sustainable and equitable development, it is essential to recognize the unique cultural identities and challenges of these areas. This requires a shift from top-down approaches to holistic, community-driven initiatives that emphasize creativity, agency, ownership, and representation. Participatory design (PD) emerges as a vital tool in this context, enabling the active involvement of diverse stakeholders and ...
The thesis of this paper revolves around a shift of our current understanding of systemic design, to one that includes more-than-human participants of socionatural systems. We believe this inclusion is important and urgent, since approaching systems without considering the complexity of their embedded biotic and abiotic actors, risks creating conditions unconducive to human life on this planet. We propose a post-dualistic mindset, that does not differentiate humans from other life, in their level of involvement in a system. ...
Design Perspectives, Placebeing on an Island in the Mediterranean
(Bofylatos, Charoupia, Nikolakopoulou, Xyntarianos, 2022)
This paper probes the implicit dimension of the experiences of four design researchers living on an island of the Mediterranean. Through introspective methods, their points of view begin to uncover areas of convergence and divergence pivoting on themes of culture, community, and tacit knowledge. We aim to explore how the topos informs design and how it is shaped in turn. Doing research on the island of Syros, we shared our perspectives as we navigate the associations among the means of artistic expression, networks of diffuse creativity, history and heritage, social relations and limitations of our own practice struggling to find words to describe them. ...
Adopting Biomimicry in Design Problem Framing: a proposed application of a post-dualist systemic design process
(Bofylatos & Charoupia, 2022)
What if design as a discipline and practice was informed by a nature-centered approach, as opposed to a human-centered one? What if it was more inclusive, interconnected with its environment, sustainable and place-based? We postulate that this is a highly important shift, considering that design is a mediator of our material and social realities.
Climate crisis and transition to a sustainable way of living in the island of Syros (Masters thesis)
In the present dissertation, the socio-political ecosystem of Syros is studied, throughthe prism of the climate crisis, while using qualitative research methods. Utilizingholistic thinking and the theory of Service Design for Transitions, it is expected, withthe proposed action research, to identify the involved people, collectives, companies,institutions and the relations between them. Through the mapping of the Holon thatwill be created, we expect the emergence and identification of the points where thesystem can accept interventions, both at individual and social level. The aim of theabove process is to submit proposals for the transition to a sustainable way of living,which takes into account the complexity of the climate crisis on the island of Syros,Greece.