“Design is about what is not (yet).”
W. Jonas
RHIZOMA - Design and Research Lab is a space for research and design in the built environment, based in Rome and Barcelona.
We formally founded RHIZOMA Design and Research Lab in 2020, but the idea behind it is much older. We met at the School of Architecture of Roma Tre University back in 2005. Since then, we have been discussing, exploring and reflecting with excitement, curiosity, and wonder on the contemporary issues of the built environment and the pioneering advancements of design research.
North America, Europe, Australia, multiple time zones, different sharing platforms, clouds, myriad of chats, video calls, screenshots, conferences.
A contemporary practice.
At Rhizoma, we understand Design as a multidisciplinary and multiscalar way of thinking. Our diverse design projects explore the concept of the surreal and the experiential, subverting what is expected and actively engaging the user in the spatial experience.
Our Research directions are multiple and yet interconnected, as a rhizome is. We investigate the contemporary concepts of design research and research by design at different levels of professional and academic realms. We also investigate the spatial and experiential dynamics of public space: how people use, enjoy, and transform it.
Our Pedagogical Practice follows our research interests: we run workshops on design research methods and apply design research methods to our Studio teaching. Our Studios focus on spatial experience, inhabitation, and in-between space.
In March 2021, Rhizoma was appointed as Advisor on Public Space for the “City Space Architecture” organisation.
Dorotea Ottaviani
is an architect, researcher, and educator. Currently, she is a Research Fellow at Sapienza University of Rome (IT) engaged in a Horizon 2020 project on NBS and Public Space. Prior to this, she was a a Research Fellow at the University of Bologna (IT).
Priviously, she served as a Senior Project Associate with the College of Architecture and Urban Studies (CAUS) at Virginia Tech (USA). Dr Ottaviani collaborates in a range of special projects central to the implementation of innovative experiential and practice-based pedagogies. As an Experience Researcher for the European Union-funded project ADAPT-r ITN at the Glasgow School of Art (UK), she explored the role of Tacit Knowledge in the Design Research for the Creative Practices.
She is now contributing to the coordination and management of the Practice-based PhD program at Virginia Tech.
Her interests have always been nurtured through both academic research and professional practice and span from urban renewal and architectural adaptive reuse to interior design and design research.
Cecilia De Marinis
is an architect, researcher, and educator. Currently, she is working as an associate professor at BAU, College of Arts and Design of Barcelona.
Prior to BAU, she was a Lecturer in Architecture at Deakin University (AU), where she taught architectural design and design research. Previously, she was a post-doc research fellow at RMIT University (AU) and RMIT Europe (SP), doing research in the field of design research and pedagogy.
She completed her PhD studies in Sustainable Urban Design at the University of Roma Tre (IT), where she also taught and worked as a researcher.
She studied architectural design and has practised as an architect in Italy and Spain.
She investigates space from a phenomenological perspective, analysing the relationship between space and who inhabits it with a focus on the dynamics of public space in cities, looking at inclusive and feminist practices. She also works and researches in design pedagogy, with a focus on design research methodology, its methods and ways of generating knowledge.