Paul Denison

Biography

Paul graduated with a degree in Modern Languages and European studies (French, History and Politics) from LSU College in Southampton in 1983. Having developed personal interests in the History of Design, he started his own business dealing in 19th and 20th century design objects. Between 1990 and 1992 he completed the prestigious Royal College of Art / Victoria and Albert Museum joint History of Design Masters programme, specialising with a study into French Modernism in the post-second world war period. Since 1992 Paul has been a tutor with responsibility Design History and Material Culture on a range of courses including the BA (Hons) Product Design courses at Teesside University. Paul's portfolio also includes International Recruitment and Collaboration. As part of this he works closely with international partners to foster relationships which allow the mobility of Teesside students towards international destinations, and which encourage international students to study at Teesside. As part of this, he works with senior colleagues and peers in the school to implement strategies to deliver transnational education and to internationalise the curriculum. Paul's teaching experience ranges over some 20 years. In this time he has delivered lectures and seminars at Prague College in the Czech Republic, Tsinghua University and Suzhou Institute of Art and Design Technology in China. In November 2013 Paul ran a joint design project entitled Design for our Future Selves with the Suzhou Institute of Art and Design Technology. This was designed to encourage internationalisation of the curriculum and for design students to think about cross-cultural design solutions for an ageing population.

Research Interest

Paul's academic interests are wide-ranging. He recently helped to form (and is Chair of) the Christopher Dresser Society, in recognition of the contribution of the renowned Victorian designer to the History of Middlesbrough. He organised the first Christopher Dresser Symposium in 2013 and is in the planning stages of a Middlesbrough wide Dresser Festival in the summer of 2015. Paul's other significant specialism is in the field of Sustainable Design theory. He has presented papers at a number of UK and International conferences including the Changing the Change conference in Turin (July 2008) and co-edited a special issue of the Design Philosophy Papers dealing with the role of design historical writing in the context of the sustainability debate. In 2013 he presented his most recent research on 'Design History, Connoisseurship and Sustainability: Object Lessons and Collecting as Learning Tools for Designers' at the EKSIG /Design Research Society conference at Loughborough University.