MSTAS '26

OUT OF SCOPE

One of the key concerns of contemporary design practice, the inclusive approach is not merely an attitude that expands existing frameworks within architectural theory and practice; rather, it emerges as a productive interface that enables a rethinking of established design processes, tools, and modes of knowledge production. This perspective, which calls for reconsidering the approaches adopted and institutionalized at different scales, also offers a productive ground for inquiry into digital design practices and methodologies in architecture. In this context, inclusivity encompasses making visible and opening to discussion experimental, implicit, and hybrid modes of production that operate beyond defined and established domains—stretching disciplinary boundaries and evolving at the interfaces between design and research, often remaining not yet fully named. The concept of “out of scope” frames such initiatives as a productive threshold that expands the conceptual, methodological, and pedagogical boundaries of digital design in architecture, multiplies transitions between design and research, and reveals new possibilities of production.

Within this framework, the theme of the XX MSTAS Symposium on Digital Design in Architecture, to be hosted by the Department of Architecture at TED University, has been determined as “out of scope.” The symposium aims to deliberately step “out of scope” by considering interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary productions together, making visible works positioned in the interstitial spaces between design and research, and providing a shared platform for contemporary discussions emerging in these areas. MSTAS 2026 aims to bring together open-ended or experimental practices and to open a discussion on how digital design in architecture is addressed across different contexts, scales, and tools.