The New Jackson Brewery: Exploring Design as an Account of Connected Events

In a world where designs are often becoming a collage of ideas drawn from various digital sources, there is no clear sense of how they came into being. The physical processes of the design are becoming less important. By contrast, this thesis explores the design process itself, specifically one based in narrative. It suggests that every design project comes with a history and on-going story, and that the role of the designer is to help that story unfold. The process begins with an uncovering of the site's physical and cultural history. A dialogue ensues, with the designer responding imaginatively to the story and the developing story inspiring the next design move. Looking at the stories and qualities of the spaces through the eyes of a variety of characters and representing them as a series of drawings, the thesis uses the abandoned Jackson Brewery to test a narrative based design process.