Advancing Design Knowledge Reuse: A Framework for Circular Design Principles

Promoting the evolution of design knowledge is one of the most challenging tasks in design science research (DSR). Designers must build upon the available body of knowledge, reuse it within another setting, and reflect on the lessons learned during the use to advance the state of the art. As recent research points to limited reuse of both design knowledge and design artifacts, we believe that the process of codifying, enhancing, and building on previous research can be enriched by nuanced viewpoints and supportive practices. Against this backdrop, we transfer well-established theories for creating value through reuse from the field of circularity into a coherent framework for ‘circular design principles’. Our framework complements the existing guidance on reuse by (1) introducing lifecycle thinking of design knowledge, (2) theorizing about the process of reusing in DSR, as well as (3) diversifying the concept of reuse. In line with the accumulation tradition of research, we seek to aid scholars in operationalizing and complementing existing knowledge as well as positioning their papers as a form of reuse research.