Together with many people and partners, we are visioning, building and investing in social and civic infrastructure for neighbourhoods of the future, rooted in the heart of Birmingham; our home city. More about us.
matter
noun.
physical substance in general, as distinct from mind and spirit; (in physics) that which occupies space and possesses rest mass, especially as distinct from energy.
"the structure and properties of matter"
a subject or situation under consideration.
"a great deal of work was done on this matter"
verb.
be important or significant.
"your ideas matter”
DESIGN MATTERS is the emerging design system of CIVIC SQUARE; an expression of how we design to encompass the different typologies of matter i.e. the properties and attributes that our work is composed of, alongside what matters most to the organisation, i.e. our principles and values. It is the beginnings of a practical and philosophical framework for design at CIVIC SQUARE which lays the foundations for a design system that will be home for our connected patterns and shared practices, coherently organised to equip design across the organisation.
It will provide tools, guidelines and stories to aid team members, collaborators, designers, neighbours and partners with giving form to our shared values, ensuring congruence and fostering connectivity between portfolios and projects across the CIVIC SQUARE ecosystem.
With the CIVIC SQUARE values as its foundation, the design system responds to the key mission areas outlined in our Theory of Change and its various components with a set of design principles, and growing a wiki of design precedents and learnings contributed by the team, our partners, and our wider ecosystem and communities of practice. We are also currently developing our design governance, which runs through the core of our organisation.
This is a new design role as part of the DemoDev mission area of CIVIC SQUARE, working across all 5 portfolios of work that make up our Neighbourhood Regenerative Economics Lab: