HousingLab, Exploring new ways of housing the city.

HousingLab is an innovative service design laboratory for housing. It is offering research and experimentation for the development of sustainable housing across 3 main areas: information, coaching and experimentation. HousingLab is using active participation to transform the housing system into a product-service system. In this paper we describe the design process of HousingLab and two ongoing experiments: on-line tools for improved neighbors’ relationship and a coaching method to enable groups of people in envisioning and designing their Collaborative housing solution. From these 2 experiments, it is clear how co-design tools are functional for trust building among all stakeholders (public and private constructors, inhabitants, etc.) and therefore increase the chance for successful projects.