Mina Kouvara is currently a Junior Research Fellow at the Tallinn University of Technology in Estonia, where she is also pursuing a PhD as a core member of the 'Cosmolocalism' research group. Her thesis explores sustainability in the context of an alternative mode of production and technology development based on the commons. She focuses on vernacular, grassroots and non-western perspectives. Mina’s background is in architecture, and she holds a MSc in Environment and Development of Mountain Regions from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece. She is a founding and former core member of an NGO which conducts research on traditional building techniques, and the co-creator of the art initiative 'Quokka'. Mina is affiliated with the research collective P2P Lab.

This is an interview with Mina Kouvara conducted by Lydia Hooper.

I'd love to hear just a little bit about yourself and how you find yourself in the field of design justice.

I've just started realizing what design justice means and that’s the result of a personal process. During my studies in architecture and then working as a professional architect, I felt that something was always missing, something was wrong. The idea of design justice was limited to designing toilets or ramps for people who use wheelchairs. Design was about efficiency, about saving money, time, not really caring about the impact of our work. So, after many internal conflicts, I decided to change paths and started learning about building with natural materials and traditional techniques. Working with these alternative practices, which are more sustainable, felt better, but again I realized that there are still many challenges until design justice is integrated in architectural practice. In the case of Greece, for example, doing sustainable architecture is exclusively for people who can afford the high cost of quality materials, slow-building and fair labor. Or those who are eager to design and build by themselves.

Thinking about such obstacles somehow led me to becoming a researcher, currently working on a collaborative project that explores different aspects of design and manufacturing, practical ones and policy related. Design justice makes better sense to me now, and is part of my research and practice.

So what does it mean to you?

It’s about happy, confident, healthy people. At the moment I mostly resonate with Principle Six which I find very intriguing. Speaking as an architect, I sometimes feel that as professionals or experts we think that it is only our point of view that is right and matters. And maybe that's part of the way architects are educated. Generally, our society teaches us to become more dependent on expertise. And forget that we can still think and make things on our own or in collaboration with experts. I think this is very problematic. But also something that needs to change in my opinion. It is very challenging and requires the effort of both experts and non-experts to help each other communicate better.

Does this principle - We believe that everyone is an expert based on their own lived experience, and that we all have unique and brilliant contributions to bring to a design process - apply to something that you've worked on?

Recently, this principle came up during a discussion and made me realize how difficult it is to accept it if you have the role of the expert.

As a practitioner, I had to deal with this within myself first. I had to lower my ego. For example, while working for a project on traditional building, I needed to collaborate with craftspeople and really listen to what the local community had to say. The craftspeople are experts as well. Experts in their art. It is not even that you could call them non experts. We had to communicate and find a balance to build something together. And also the locals shared their experience, feelings and knowledge of the place, and the reality of everyday life, which are extremely valuable for doing architecture. I think that was the first experience I had where I understood what considering other points of view actually means. Expertise is very relative.

That's where you see yourself, how you have been trained and how arrogant you have become thinking that your contribution is the most important. Sometimes this happens even if it is not your intention. But thinking like this is not true at all. I believe that it is extremely challenging to consider the opinions of others in the design process, and we need to find ways to do so without creating chaos. It’s part of the work that we're doing now, with the group that I'm working with as a researcher.

So what are you working on now, and what are you planning to do next? What do you want to share about the projects that you're currently engaged in?

I'm a member of an interdisciplinary group working on a project that is called Cosmolocalism. It is proposing an alternative mode of production, different from the capitalist one, let's say. It's based on the commons, meaning on principles like equity, openness, and distribution of knowledge, self-organization, sustainability and so on. The design justice principles are part of it, and one of our goals is to incorporate them into our work both in terms of theory and practice.

We are now developing two pilot makerspaces in remote mountain villages. One is in Greece and the other is in Bhutan. They are spaces for researchers and designers and the local communities to meet and manufacture tools for small scale farmers. But the design process also takes place online. So a global community can be part of it. Through this exchange of experiences we have seen how the current global system of production creates similar problems to different parts of the world. And despite the differences between the countries we are looking into solutions for our common problems. We have also realized how difficult it is to actually make tools in a collaborative and horizontal way. We are learning to accept imperfection, deal with all sorts of problems that arise, resolve conflicts, and establish good communication between experts and non experts. It's a process, and we have just started. Now that things are settling we can feel the potential. We'll see about that!

Is there anything else you want to share?

I’d like to share the story of a friend from Syria. I met him in Greece in 2015. He had just arrived on a boat from Turkey as a refugee and his experiences inspired me to discover the meaning of design justice. I mention him not to tell his story as a refugee but his story as a person with a disability.

He has a disorder with his bones and he is in a wheelchair but cannot use his hands to move independently. That’s only possible with an electric wheelchair. I met him at a refugee camp in Athens, Greece, where he spent a long time living inside a container, the ones used as temporary housing in such cases, and he was not able to move around. We spent a lot of time together, and told me stories about his life. He was describing his life in Syria and then in Turkey, where he stayed before coming to Greece. He told me that life was really difficult due to his disability, and although he fled Syria because of the war it was his only chance to have a better quality of life. That’s because in some countries, people that are not the average body have very limited or no access to proper care and they are not cared for in terms of architecture, urban planning etc. In a way, they are deprived of the right to live independently, go out, move freely, enjoy life. For example, he had to stay in an apartment in a block of flats where there was no elevator. And his carers could not really do much about this. He was just trapped in there most of the time and without proper equipment to allow him some level of freedom. Luckily, he is now in the Netherlands receiving the support he needs to live on his own. He is doing great and wants to become a graphic designer!

Simple things like an elevator or a good wheelchair or a decent pavement can make a huge difference for the lives of some of us. Yet we don't really take this reality into account neither in architecture or construction, nor in design and manufacturing. And sometimes end up with shiny things that might be more interesting for the market but don’t really matter for life.

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You can learn more about Mina by visiting https://www.cosmolocalism.eu and https://www.p2plab.gr/en and/or following @P2PLab on Facebook.

This interview was conducted and written by Lydia Hooper, who can be reached through www.lydiahooper.com.

Would you be willing to share your experiences with the Design Justice Network? There are no prerequisites (including a traditional design background), and past stories have featured members working in a variety of fields such as social work, community organizing, and handicrafts. We make the process easy for you (no writing involved!) and will only share what/how you consent for us to. We are particularly interested in hearing from members outside of Europe and the North American East Coast. If you have questions or interests, please contact designjusticenetwork@gmail.com.