Design Studio: A Community of Practitioners?

What constitutes design studio practice, and how do conceptualisations involving communities of practice further our understanding? This analysis is based on key findings of an interview-based research project that examined the insider experiences of final year undergraduate students of architecture, focussing on the network of relationships between peers, places of work and everyday working practices. The analysis critically examines the application of a community of practice model, and draws on Bourdieu's conceptions of habitus and field as a means of understanding how value is conferred upon individual practices through their display in the often challenging social arena of studio culture.