/

is a platform for parametric design in graphic design. It documents the work of students and teachers at the Department of Design at Hamburg University of Applied Sciences (HAW), who are investigating the significance of the system as a conceptual model and design method under the title “Parametric Design in Graphic Design.”

Design is less about intuitive, even ingenious “strokes of genius” and more about a holistic and rule-based (systemic and systematic) process of gaining knowledge and shaping form. It is becoming increasingly important to be able to design dynamic systems that both guide and inspire the design process.

Parametric design refers to this design in and of systems—with rules, their modes of operation, and systematic manipulability. The research project, led by Prof. Heike Grebin, is an integral part of teaching and aims to raise awareness of design as a performative process.

Play the System brings together selected study projects in which the system plays an important role as a design method – whether analog or digital. The works are created in a fruitful symbiosis of theory, design, and technology. Socially relevant issues and positions from philosophy, art, and avant-garde design from around 1900 to the present day are repeatedly discussed.

Play the System is an invitation to become aware of the systemic competence of graphic design and to gain the maturity to use the tools of digital design critically.

Press F to search
Play the System / Workshops /

w19 Karl’s Box

In the workshop Paramat, inspired by Karl Gerstner’s morphological box, 24 posters were collectively designed within eight hours. Working in three groups and across eight iterations, eight students in each group created eight posters. Each poster addressed a specific theme—such as anarchy, limitation, chaos, or utopia. In every round, the posters were further developed according to selected parameters from “Karl’s box,” for example, the parameter group Typography with individual parameters like font, weight, width, and style. Each iteration lasted 35 minutes, during which participants explored both the conceptual and formal aspects of the assigned theme. After each round, the posters were passed clockwise to another group member. Nothing from the previous iteration could be deleted—only changed or added to. Through this collective process, participants freed themselves from imagined expectations and began to experiment openly and playfully. By the end of the workshop, everyone had contributed to every poster within their group.