Research within the School
Research in the Louis Laybourne Smith School focuses broadly on pure and applied research, research and consultancy for a variety of clients, and research undertaken through the postgraduate program coordinated by Dr Robert Crocker. Outcomes include publications, project designs, artefacts, and exhibition items.
The research approach varies but interdisciplinary, collaborative
and cross-institutional partnerships are encouraged as well as
dialogue and interaction with the professions and wider community.
The Louis Laybourne Smith School’s unique locality offers urban,
suburban, rural and remote resources ripe for discovery,
exploration, analysis and interpretation within the broader national
and international context. In this environment, opportunities for
inquiry and creative thought and making are challenging and diverse.
Current areas of staff expertise include: architectural, urban
design and planning theory and history; cultural design theory;
sustainable construction for remote areas; environmental design and
ecological sustainability; landscape architecture; digital
technologies; design management and theory of product design;
heritage and conservation.
Collaborative research and consultancy practice between
architecture, interior architecture and industrial design staff has
produced a speculative exhibition; a community housing development
in the heart of Adelaide; a student designed, built and installed
miners’ memorial and visitors’ centre at Broken Hill, and a visitor
facility for the Patjarr community in far north-west Australia.
Specialist research skills in industrial design have been
recognised, utilised and extended in industry-specific consultancies
such as the ‘design-for-disability’ project where the processes of
testing and trialing have achieved a more comfortable and responsive
wheelchair.
The Doctor of Philosophy, Master of Design and Master of
Architecture programs in the Louis Laybourne Smith School involve
students with backgrounds in architecture and design, and also
artists, writers and others working with its academics on research
subjects either text based or by project.
Significantly, the Louis Laybourne Smith School is the repository
for the Architecture
Museum, a unique collection of over 170,000 documents donated
by practitioners and educators in architecture and the associated
professions, and an invaluable resource to students and the wider
community. The Archive is developing as a centre for research into
Australian architectural history with a particular focus on South
Australia.
The Louis Laybourne Smith School is eager to encourage, foster and
be challenged by, design discourse in the broader community and we
arrange symposia and conferences, often in collaboration with other
institutions, encompassing areas such as urban design and planning,
architectural and urban history, the transformation of craft and
design practices and interior architecture education. Undergraduate
and postgraduate attendance at and contribution to such events is
strongly encouraged.
- Centre for Settlement Studies
- Visual Art & Design Research Group [VADRG] Comprising members of the LLS School and SASA
- Architecture & Design Virtual Library