"Background of project:Design has become an everyday concept.The aim of this project is to research different cultural, geographical as well as philosophical approaches to the concept Design with the students to support their own ideas in the field of architecture, furniture construction and interior design. For this, the students will study both European similarities and regional and national characteristics in order to become more self-confident in designing and crafting.During the project the students visit international furniture fairs (Cologne and Milan) to get new ideas, to improve their knowledge of modern design and to compare their ideas and final products with ideas proposed by famous designers. This project encourages students to work efficiently in international teams.Objectives:The target of the project ""Design - a Definition Approach in a European Context"" ist to engage students in research of well-renowned designers coming their own national background. The outcome will be presented in international teams which gives students the opportunity to learn and perceive cultural and professional differences by comparison and contrasting. Different cultural and historical background of team members will foster cross-cultural communication abilities.The next project phase contains the development of specific furniture objects using cutting-edge technology such as 3D-planning tools or augmented reality tools. At the end of this creative work phase students from Austria, Finland, and Latvia will meet for a workshop giving them the chance to manufacture models and prototypes of their ideas.Finally the outcomes of the workshop will improved and discussed with regard to economic, ecological implications. A final meeting in Riga, Latvia will be scheduled to evaluate the project, extract learning experiences and to plan professional dissemination of project outcomes.Participants:The participants are 2-3 teachers focusing on design theory, art history, and manufacturing technology from each participating school, respectively. These teachers supervise student teams up to 20 persons, age 15 to 20 years old. During work phases, 4 students will be chosen from each national team to represent their sending school at the international meetings described before. They are responsible for presentation and communication with the whole group.All students involved have a background in interior design or craftmanship.Activities:First of all, students will be engaged in research to get a good overview about design history of Europe. The teachers involved will meet in Brussels to widen their horizon and to visit EU-institutions in order to qualify them for knowledge transfer of EU-topics. The students involved will have a first project meeting in Raahe, Finland, where the output of the design phase is discussed. Afterwards the teams will develop specific furniture objects. It is planned to enable them to visit the interior design fairs in Cologne and Milano. These high-end trade fairs will give immediate feedback on the quality of own drafts. As a next interaction, selected team members will travel to Hallstatt, Austria to take part in a realisation workshop. Models and prototypes of furniture will be the output. Finally, real objects will be produced at each institution. These will be presented in the framework of a final project-meeting in Riga, Latvia, where the whole project will be critically discussed and the learning process will be evaluated. The remaining time will be used for the dissemination of project results.Methodology:Methodically, learning will be fostered by working on real-life projects and by the work in international teams. In other words a common project language - English, different cultural backgrounds and differeing problem solving strategies demand a high degree of flexibility and intercultural communication. Training these key competences throughout the projects is likely to improve the students competence to contribute to a progressive and peaceful European community.Results:At the end, the project should generate promising furniture object-drafts, high-quality visualisations (including virtual reality studies), technical drawings of the designed objects, real size prototypes, and a website showing the results.From a meta-level students professional and social abilites should be improved by the project and their interest for pan-European working should be enhanced. Finally, the organisations involved should expand their experience about EU-projects to go on with further projects in future.Impact:The impact we strive for is a positive connotation of Europe in students' minds. Also, the cooperation in a multi-cultural team is likely to lead to innovative designs, open-mindedness for different cultures, and improved English-language skills. From an organisational point of view, the project improves the EU-project management competence at the schools involved."