Interior Design at a Crossroads: Embracing Specificity through Process, Research, and Knowledge

Abstract

Tiiu Poldma is Vice Dean of Graduate Studies and Research in the Faculty of Environmental Design, and associate professor at the School of Industrial Design at the University of Montreal. Tiiu Poldma received a BID at Ryerson in 1982 (Toronto), MA in Culture and Values in Education in 1999 and Doctor of Philosophy in 2003, both from McGill University in Montreal, Canada. She teaches interior design studio and theory within the Bachelor of Interior Design program at the University of Montreal, and advanced research methodologies in the Masters of Science and Ph.D. programs at the Faculty of Environmental Design. She is currently the Director of the Research Group GRID(Group for Research in Illumination and Design) and heads up the Colour, Light and Form Lab (Laboratoire Forme*couleur*lumiere) at the faculty. She accredits design programs as a site evaluator for CIDAboth in Canada and the United States, and is also a member of the Editorial Board of Inderscience where she is the Regional Editor of the Journal of Design Research (JDR), and serves on the Editorial Board of Design/Science/Planning (Techne Press, Amsterdam).

A Survey on Practitioner Attitudes toward Research in Interior Design Education

“…While some educators have been advocating for the MID as the first professional degree (Dohr, 2007; Guerin, 2007; Guerin & Thompson, 2004; Thompson & Guerin, n.d.; Weigand & Harwood, 2007), the results from this study suggest that this degree may not be valued and shows a disconnect between the academy and practice. As stated by Poldma (2008), “In interior design, unfortunately, part of the problem is that quite often the realms of education, academic research, and practice are worlds apart” (p. vii).…”

Making the Case for Practice-Based Research and the Imperative Role of Design Practitioners

“…Gauging the current state of design research. All research typologies are needed to build design professions' BOK (Poldma, 2008). For example, Figure 2 demonstrates a research program advancing a profession through varying classifications of research studies.…”

2009 Accreditation Requirements: Comparison of CIDA and NAAB

“…As a profession, interior design has a documented body of knowledge (BOK), which defines its professional boundaries (Guerin & Martin, 2001; Poldma, 2008). Like every profession, interior design's BOK includes abstract knowledge that is unique to its practice and other knowledge that it shares with or has gleaned from other professions (Abbott, 1988).…”