Boyscout Designer
The frayed edges of public space is the area Bouke Bruins works in. With his project ‘Boyscout’ Designer he merges the world of design with the world of boy scouts by creating playful urban interventions.
His starting point is that the (over-)designing of public space leads to extreme regulation, which in turn makes users passive. Boy scouts are taught to engage with their environment in an active and responsible manner. The Boyscout Designer is a model for Bouke Bruins to explore his opportunities as a designer.
The Boyscout Designer understands how to bend the rules on behalf of his design, works from the perspective of the user, and gets involved with the community. He travels both the village and the city, and keeps his eyes open for new initiatives, places, objects and services. The Boyscout Designer shares his experiences online and offline and combines design with research. The Boyscout Designer creates guerilla-interventions that provoke reactions in the city of Eindhoven, for a nicer, more stimulating and efficient public space. The concept of the Boyscout Designer is furthermore growing into a movement; a network of users and designers who together pursue a bottom-up approach to using public space.