Action Research in the Making: Fab Lab Barcelona’s Academic Contributions

Fab Labs are increasingly becoming critical actors in research, not just as spaces for prototyping or education, but as infrastructures for applied, action-oriented research that responds directly to local needs while contributing to global knowledge production.

  • May 15, 2025

Action research is at the heart of this shift, a participatory and iterative methodology that bridges the gap between theory and practice by involving stakeholders directly in the research process. Rather than observing from a distance, action research calls for co-creation, where communities and researchers work together to diagnose challenges, prototype solutions, and reflect collectively.

By combining the open ethos of maker culture with the rigour of action research, Fab Labs are helping to define a new paradigm of situated, embodied, and participatory research, one that challenges the hegemony of academic institutions and empowers citizens as co-researchers. This shift supports the idea of Fab Labs as civic infrastructures for innovation and inquiry, reimagining how research is done, who participates, and who benefits.

At Fab Lab Barcelona, we structure this exploration through three vertical impact pillars and one horizontal foundation. Future Learning explores hands-on educational models, situated training methodologies, and distributed learning programs. Sense Making focuses on collective awareness platforms and open tools for environmental monitoring. Distributed Design develops decentralised manufacturing models and collaborative design methods. These are all grounded in our Productive Cities approach, which cultivates community-driven innovation spaces and open knowledge ecosystems.

Over the last decade, our team has contributed to a diverse body of academic work that explores how design, technology, and community can shape more inclusive and regenerative futures. This post marks the first time we’re curating our academic publications, papers, posters, proceedings, and collaborative reports, into a single, accessible archive. Each citation below follows academic convention to support further exploration, reuse, and recognition.

Future Learning

Hands-On Educational Models, Situated Training Methodologies and Distributed Learning Programs.

From primary schools to master programmes, from biomaterials to soft robotics, these publications explore how learning can be reimagined as a participatory, hands-on, and future-facing experience.

  • Nadal, O., & Domínguez, X. (2023). Integration of the maker movement in the classroom: a practical experience in the first year of an educational project. UTE Teaching & Technology (Universitas Tarraconensis), (1), e3566. https://doi.org/10.17345/ute.2023.3566
  • Burdiles Araneda, I. M., Dominguez, X., Real, M., Fuentemilla, S., & Pistofidou, A. (2022). Remix The School Project: Socio-Emotional Learning through Biomaterial making: A Methodology for Self-Awareness through Bio-material fabrication for teachers and children. 6th FabLearn Europe/MakeEd Conference 2022, 1–5. https://doi.org/10.1145/3535227.3535242
  • Gerodimou, M.D., Chamorro-Martin, E., & Fuentemilla, S. (2022). Developing maker-centred learning programs to promote critical thinking about technology and design for emergent futures. Fab 17 Research Papers Stream, 145–159. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7432107
  • Solanas, O., Usart, M., Valls, C., & Domínguez, X. (2022). Metodología STEAM-Maker en primaria: un estudio mixto. In XXV Congreso Internacional Edutec 2022. https://edutec2022.uib.es/libro-de-actas/
  • Cabrera Galinzed, A., & Pistofidou, A. (2022). From Textiles to Soft Robotics and the Emergent Approaches in STEAM and Textile Labs. The Future of Education Conference Proceedings. https://conference.pixel-online.net/FOE/files/foe/ed0012/FP/7865-ADU5593-FP-FOE12.pdf
  • Chamorro-Martin, E., & Chadha, K. (2021). Hyper-connected hybrid educational models for distributed learning through prototyping. Jornadas sobre Innovación Docente en Arquitectura. https://upcommons.upc.edu/handle/2117/356107
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Sense Making

Collective Awareness Platforms and Open Tools for Environmental Monitoring.

From air pollution sensors to cablebots in vegetable gardens, our research here explores how data and sensing technologies help communities understand and shape the ecosystems they live in.

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Distributed Design

Decentralized Manufacturing Models and Collaborative Design Methods.

Distributed Design lives at the intersection of digital fabrication, decentralised collaboration, and open-source practices. These works capture a growing design culture that values diversity, local resilience, and global connectivity.

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Productive Cities

Community-Driven Innovation Spaces and Open Knowledge Ecosystems.

From food waste to electric vehicles, this layer connects all our pillars. It’s about embedding fabrication, data, and collective knowledge into the urban fabric to create more liveable, regenerative, and inclusive cities.

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Our Research Is a Map in Progress

This curated snapshot is more than a retrospective. It is a living map of our inquiries, experiments, and collective imagination. Each article is a point of connection between disciplines, between communities, and between possible futures. Spanning from 2016 to 2025, our academic output includes more than 30 publications, many in respected journals like Hardware X, Sustainable Cities and Society, Atmospheric Measurement Techniques, and Fashion Practice. We’ve shared findings at 9 international conferences. Our most active years—2020 and 2022—highlight the acceleration of our practice-led approach to knowledge. From critical STEAM pedagogy to participatory sensing and decentralised design systems, these works trace how Fab Labs are becoming experimental research infrastructures, grounded in action and oriented toward transformation. This archive is an invitation to explore, reuse, challenge, and build upon what we’ve learned together.

Want to Read More? Check Out Our Edited Books

In addition to academic papers, Fab Lab Barcelona has edited books that expand on our research lines in practice.

Here’s a selection of our most relevant books we edited:

Curious about becoming an antidisciplinary researcher?

Join the Master in Design for Emergent Futures.

May 15, 2025