Wholeness Egg: Methodology of Designing a 'Living' Workshop by Differentiating a Whole

Abstract

This paper introduces 'Wholeness Egg' as an effective technique for designing 'living' workshops. Christopher Alexander who explored the beauty of architecture emphasized that a creation is about making the design come to life as much as possible. He also put a significant emphasis on the wholeness and the fifteen fundamental properties which can be found in all living structures. Based on his design theory, we invented the Wholeness Egg as a methodology of designing living workshops by grasping the wholeness first and subsequently differentiating it into parts, in the way that it can achieve the properties. This paper presents how a living design is induced on a single egg-shaped diagram, by showing our Pattern-driven Dialogue Workshop as an example. It also shows that the application of this methodology helps people to externalize and open up the individuals' thinking processes and allows them to work collaboratively when designing things. We expect this paper to provide readers with a clear understanding of the Wholeness Egg with a view to using it effectively in their own practices of designing.