Click through each image to view its context via the SOS lens.
TRESDA is an independent design institution dedicated to the preservation of human expression, using spatial design.
Most design education focuses on output.
TRESDA focuses on interpretation.
We train creatives to understand themselves, respond to others and translate those relationships into space.
TRESDA’s pedagogy is structured around a progression from Self, to Other, to Synthesis.
SELF
Self refers to position, not personality.
It concerns the assumptions, references, values and histories that shape how one perceives and acts.
Before any response can be made, position must be established.
Without this, expression becomes unexamined projection
OTHER
Other refers to what lies beyond the self: people, contexts, systems, constraints and realities that cannot be authored.
This position demands attention, interpretation, and restraint.
It requires responding without retreating into preference or control.
SYNTHESIS
Synthesis is the act of holding self and other together without collapse.
It is not compromise, nor resolution but coherence.
Here, interpretation is translated into form, and decisions are made accountable — capable of being read, tested and situated beyond the individual.
SELF
Self refers to position, not personality.
It concerns the assumptions, references, values and histories that shape how one perceives and acts.
Before any response can be made, position must be established.
Without this, expression becomes unexamined projection
OTHER
Other refers to what lies beyond the self: people, contexts, systems, constraints and realities that cannot be authored.
This position demands attention, interpretation, and restraint.
It requires responding without retreating into preference or control.
SYNTHESIS
Synthesis is the act of holding self and other together without collapse.
It is not compromise, nor resolution but coherence.
Here, interpretation is translated into form, and decisions are made accountable — capable of being read, tested and situated beyond the individual.
The method is not tied to a single discipline or output.
It describes a way of thinking and making that applies wherever decisions, interpretation and responsibility are required.
At TRESDA, spatial design is used as the pedagogical medium through which this method is practiced, tested and made legible.
WHY THE LIVING ROOM?
Because space demands responsibility.
It requires choices, negotiation and consequence. At TRESDA, spatial design is the medium through which the method becomes transferable.
The living room is neither private nor public. It demands interpretation rather than style and cannot be resolved without understanding who the space is for and how it is inhabited.
For this reason, it is used as a pedagogical device at TRESDA, a consistent condition through which the method can be practiced and made legible.
001 SELF
Locating your position before taking responsibility for form.
002 OTHER
Responding to context, constraint and systems beyond your control.
003 SYNTHESIS
Producing work that can stand publicly and withstand interpretation.
TRESDA is structured as three carefully crafted courses, taken in sequence. Each course applies the same method through increasing levels of responsibility, using spatial design as the pedagogical instrument. A single living room floor plan is used throughout 001 and 002 to establish a controlled spatial condition, allowing decisions to be evaluated through interpretation rather than style.
001 begins with self-orientation, translating one’s own position into space. 002 introduces otherness, requiring the same floor plan to be reinterpreted for another, under constraint and context. 003 completes the path through synthesis and takes place in person, where spatial work is developed, exhibited, and critiqued publicly. The work is no longer submitted privately, but held within an institutional and cultural frame.
THE TRESDA PATHWAY
001 SELF
Locating position before taking responsibility for form.
This stage requires the individual to identify what they are responding from — lived experience, reference, instinct and bias — and translate that position into spatial decisions using a fixed living room floor plan.
The aim is not expression, but clarity: making visible the assumptions that inform how space is shaped.
002 OTHER
Responding to difference without retreating into authorship.
Using the same floor plan, this stage shifts the focus outward. The individual designs for another, working with needs, constraints and contexts that are not their own.
Here, interpretation replaces projection. Decisions must be justified in relation to use, presence, and consequence rather than personal preference.
003 SYNTHESIS
Holding position publicly.
This stage brings self and other into synthesis. Work is developed in person, refined through critique and presented in an exhibition format rather than private submission.
The outcome is not resolution, but coherence — work that can stand, be read, and be held within a cultural and institutional context.
001 SELF
Locating position before taking responsibility for form.
This stage requires the individual to identify what they are responding from — lived experience, reference, instinct and bias — and translate that position into spatial decisions using a fixed living room floor plan.
The aim is not expression, but clarity: making visible the assumptions that inform how space is shaped.
START 001 SELF
002 OTHER
Responding to difference without retreating into authorship.
Using the same floor plan, this stage shifts the focus outward. The individual designs for another, working with needs, constraints and contexts that are not their own.
Here, interpretation replaces projection. Decisions must be justified in relation to use, presence, and consequence rather than personal preference.
START 002 OTHER
003 SYNTHESIS
Holding position publicly.
This stage brings self and other into synthesis. Work is developed in person, refined through critique and presented in an exhibition format rather than private submission.
The outcome is not resolution, but coherence — work that can stand, be read, and be held within a cultural and institutional context.
APPLY 003 SYNTHESIS (A/W 2026)
WHO IS THIS IS FOR?
TRESDA is for individuals who are prepared to take responsibility for how they think, make and position themselves in the world.
It is suited to designers, architects, artists and creatives — as well as those working beyond formal creative disciplines — who recognise that expression without orientation lacks consequence.
This is not a programme for acquiring style, shortcuts or validation.
It is for those willing to be precise about what they are responding from, what they are responding to and what their work ultimately stands for.
No prior conformity is required.
What is required is seriousness of intent.
View the Prospectus
Explore the Method
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Read the Manifesto
View the Prospectus
Explore the Method
Enter 001
Read the Manifesto
TRESDA is an independent design institution committed to the preservation and translation of human identity through spatial practice.
Founded in London, its work spans pedagogy, research, and cultural production — operating with long-term intent rather than short-term cycles.
The institution exists to protect coherence in how we think, make and live in an increasingly automated world.