The Bloomsbury Handbook of Service Design: Plural perspectives and a critical contemporary agenda

by Lara Penin (Editor), Alison Prendiville (Editor), Daniela Sangiorgi (Editor)

Overview

Drawing on a diverse array of service and design related thinkers and practitioners, this volume is a timely and critical review of the themes and intersecting disciplines that are questioning and opening up the field towards plural perspectives, showing its complexity, exposing its challenges and offering practical examples and directions.
With the growing popularity of service design both in industry and academia, The Bloomsbury Handbook of Service Design examines the discipline's core principles to develop our understanding of the context, role and impact of this practice. The editors bring together multiple voices from around the world to share experiences and perspectives on how service design interacts with global topics such as climate, social justice and racial issues, and looks at directions for the future.
Organised into five distinct sections, chapters explore a variety of key topics within the world of service design, including Plural Service & Design Cosmologies, A Critical Agenda for Service Design, Contextualising Services, Systems and Change, Developing Service Design Practices and Approaches, and Building Futures

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781350330283
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	01/08/2026
Series:	Bloomsbury Visual Arts Handbooks
Pages:	464
Product dimensions:	6.65(w) x 9.61(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Lara Penin is Associate Professor of Transdisciplinary Design at Parsons School of Design, USA. Author of An Introduction to Service Design: Designing the Invisible (Bloomsbury, 2018), her work is at the intersection of service and strategic design, participatory design and social justice. She is a graduate in Architecture and Urbanism from the University of São Paulo, Brazil, and has a PhD in Design from Milan Polytechnic University, Italy.

Alison Prendiville is Senior Researcher for the Design School at London College of Communication, UK.

Daniela Sangiorgi was one of the first scholars working in Service Design Research. With a degree in Industrial Design, she went on to study for one of the first PhDs in Service Design at Politecnico di Milano, Italy. She was part of the team of who initiated the international Service Design Network (Birgit Mager, Stefan Holmlid, Elena Pacenti, and Shelley Evenson) and the Service Design Research initiative (www.servicedesignresearch.com). She conducted research into service design both in form of design research consultancy (Qfree, Danfoss, Bridgewater Community Services NHS Trust), EU research projects (MEPSS – research on Product Service Systems; EMUDE – design for social innovation), Research Council funded research (EPSRC funded 'Design in Practice' research project) and professional training (Design Council funded SMEs training on Service Thinking and Service Design). She is the co-author of one of the first three academic books on Service Design ('Design for Service', with Anna Meroni, Ashgate 2011). She has taught service design at MA level in the UK, Italy, Brazil, Germany, Sweden, India and South Korea. She chaired the ServDes2014 international conference hosted in Lancaster University in April 2011 and is currently the PI of an AHRC funded research project, Studying Design for Service Innovation and Development.

Table of Contents

1. INTRODUCTION
Introduction: Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi

2. PLURAL SERVICE & DESIGN COSMOLOGIES
Introduction: Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi

2.1 Recognising other service worlds
Main author: Yoko Akama, RMIT University, Australia;
Suggested co-authors: Ricardo Sosa, Monash University, Australia; Tristan Schulz, University of Technology Sydney, Australia

2.2 The web of structures and meanings shaping services
Main author: Miso Kim, Northeastern University, USA
Suggested co-authors: Jeanette Blomberg, IBM Research, USA; Zoy Anastassakis, Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

2.3 Multiple intersections across Service & Design Research
Main author: Lia Patricio, University of Porto, Portugal
Suggested co-authors: Stefan Holmlid, University of Linkoping, Sweden; Raymond Fisk, Texas State University, USA; Laurel Anderson, Arizona State University, USA

2.4 Service Design at the crossroad of multiple knowledge forms and epistemologies
Main author: Alison Prendiville, LCC University of the Arts London, UK
Suggested co-authors: Terry Irwin, Carnegie Mellon School of Design, USA; Noortje Marres, University of Warwick, UK

2.5 Service Design and Digital Transformations
Main author: Paola Pierri, Democratic Society (Berlin), Germany
Suggested co-authors: Lauren Tan, Deloitte Consulting, Australia, Dominic Campbell (on the move now)


3. A CRITICAL AGENDA FOR SERVICE DESIGN
Introduction: Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi

3.1 Justice and Equality in Designing Services
Main author: Lesley-Anne Noel, North Carolina State University, USA
Suggested co-authors: Sasha Costanza-Chock, MIT, USA; Danah Abdullah, University of the Arts London, UK

3.2 Designing Service Work
Main author: Lara Penin, Parsons School of Design, USA
Suggested co-authors: Barbara Adams, Parsons School of Design, USA; Kathi Weeks, Duke University, USA

3.3 The Science and Politics of Participation in Service Design
Main author: Shana Agid, Parsons School of Design, USA
Suggested co-authors: Jakob Trischler, Karlstad University, Sweden; Mahmoud Keshavarz, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

3.4 Service Design at uncertain times
Main author: Fabrizio Ceschin, Brunel University London, UK & Idil Gaziulusoy, Aalto University, Finland
Suggested co-authors: Jerome Lewis, UCL, UK

3.5 A feminist agenda for Service Design
Main author: Daniella Jenkins, The WOW Foundation, UK
Suggested co-authors: Cheryl Buckley, University of Brighton, UK; Caroline Criado Perez (Invisible Women), UK, Lara Penin, Parsons School of Design, USA


4. CONTEXTUALISING SERVICES, SYSTEMS AND CHANGE
Introduction: Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi

4.1 Positioning and paradigms of Service Design in organisations
Main author: Eun Yu, Seoul National University of Science and Technology, Korea
Suggested co-authors: Ileana Stigliani, Imperial College of London, UK; Ingo Oswald Karpen, Karlstad University, Sweden

4.2 A systemic perspective on Service Design
Main author: Daniela Sangiorgi, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Suggested co-authors:Kaisa Koskela Huotari, Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden; Jennie Winhall, Rockwool Foundation Intervention Unit, Denmark; Mieke van der Bijl-Brouwer, TU Delft, Netherlands

4.3 Interrelations between service and policy design
Main author: Sabine Junginger, Lucerne University of Applied Science, Switzerland
Suggested co-authors:Katarina Wetter Edman, Örebro University Holding, Sweden; Emma Blomkamp, University of Melbourne, Australia; Gabriella Gomez Mont, Experimentalista, Mexico

4.4 Service Design and Social Change
Main author: Tomas Markussen, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
Suggested co-authors:Daniela Selloni, Politecnico di Milano, Italy; Joyce Yee, Northumbria University, UK

4.5 Smart and always connected service platforms
Main author: Eric Gordon, Emerson College, USA
Suggested co-authors: Gabriel Mugar, IDEO Cambridge, USA; Shannon Mattern, The New School, USA


5. DEVELOPING SERVICE DESIGN PRACTICES AND APPROACHES
Introduction: Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi

5.1 Embodied service design practice
Main author: Frederick van Amstel, Federal University of Technology – Paraná, Brazil
Suggested co-authors: Kristina Höök, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden; Johan Blomkvist
Linköping University, Sweden

5.2 Toward a reflexive Service Design practice
Main author: Josina Vink, AHO, Norway
Suggested co-authors: Ahmed Ansari, Carnegie Mellon School of Design, USA; Marcus Jahnke, Verksamhetsledare Centre for Sustainable Urban Futures, Sweden

5.3 Community Design and public realm projects
Main author: Sloan Leo, FLOX Studio, USA
Suggested co-authors: Mari Nakano, Service Design Studio New York City, USA ; Adam Thorpe, UAL, UK

5.4 Dialogical approaches and plural voices
Main author: Carla Cipolla, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Suggested co-authors: Indi Young, independent scientist, USA; Sarah Schulman, InWithForward, Canada

5.5 Digital ethnography and data
Main author: Sara Pink, Monash University, Australia
Suggested co-authors: Roberta Tassi, Oblo (consultant), Italy

5.6 Service Design Facilitation skills
Main author: Kelly Ann McKercher, NSW Health Pathology, Australia;
Suggested co-authors: Paola Trapani, Tongji University, China; Nicole Anand, Collectivist, USA; Reuben Stanton, Paper Giant, Australia

5.7 Service Design narratives
Main authors: Janna DeVylder, Meld Studios, Australia
Suggested co-authors: Francesca Piredda, Politecnico di Milano, Italy; , John Bruce, Parsons School of Design, USA



6. BUILDING FUTURES
Introduction: Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi

6.1 Service Design futurizing
Main author: Laura Forlano, ID IIT Chicago, USA
Suggested co-authors: Stuart Candy, Carnegie Mellon University, USA; Tobias Revell, University of the Arts London, UK; Alix Gerber, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, USA; Elliott P. Montgomery, Parsons School of Design, USA; Andrea Cooper, Connected Places Catapult, UK


6.2 Designing for Service Design education futures
Main author: Anna Meroni, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Suggested co-authors: Lesley-Anne Noel, North Carolina State University, USA; Mauricio Manhaes, Savannah College of Art and Design, USA; Nicola Morelli, Aalborg University, Denmark

6.3 Designing Services as new forms of political participation
Main author: Cameron Tonkinwise, University of Technology Sydney, Australia
Suggested co-authors: Virginia Tassinari, Politecnico di Milano, Italy; Eduardo Staszowski, Parsons School of Design, USA; Lucy Kimbell, University of the Arts, UK

6.4 Service Design & (de)humanizing technologies
Main author: Stefana Broadbent, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Suggested co-authors: Nicolas Cova, Geneva University of Arts and Design, Switzerland; Fabien Girardin, Near Future Laboratory, Spain; Martina Caic, Aalto University, Finland

6.5 Designing for a healthy society
Main author: Peter Jones, OCAD University, Canada
Suggested co-authors: Daniela Sangiorgi, Politecnico di Milano, Italy; Glenn Robert, King's College London, UK; Julia Schaeper, London Doctoral Design Centre, UK, Lekshmy Parameswaran and/or László Herczegh, The Care Lab, Spain


7. CONCLUSIONS
Alison Prendeville, Lara Penin and Daniela Sangiorgi