**2. Materials and Methods**

Nowadays, architects propose solutions not found before and they use technological novelties to create innovative building concepts. It is the first of the architects' roles: creating innovative building concepts which make use of technological achievements and presenting them in attractive visualizations and films used to promote the idea of sustainable smart cities.

Of course, only a few architects become famous innovators and visionaries. Despite this, a lot of emphasis is put on the development of creativity in the education process of architects at the Silesian University of Technology in Gliwice (Poland) [46]. As an example, we can provide a study conducted by the author of the article with second-cycle students at the Faculty of Architecture. The topic was formulated as follows: "How will seniors be participating in the life of a future smart city (in the perspective of 10 years) and what amenities will it be offering them?" It combined two very important issues, i.e., the problem of designing a friendly space for seniors and the problem of a smart city.

The layout of the research work is presented in Figure 1. It shows the duality of the research approach, which has been also demonstrated in the structure of the article, i.e., the "gray path" (on the left) presents the pilot study with the participation of students, and the "blue" path (on the right) presents the expert research documented by the author's own publications, which are listed in the bibliography. Both sources combine to obtain the synthesis of knowledge.

**Figure 1.** Layout of research procedures used in the article. It refers to the indicative level and illustrates the author's pursuit of the synthesis of knowledge and holistic approach to the investigated problem, i.e., "the role of the architect in creating the image of a sustainable smart city friendly to seniors" (author's own study).

The study was conducted in two groups of 12 students, which were then divided into teams of 4. In total, 24 students divided into 6 teams took part in the study. It should be noted that the first group had in-depth knowledge of the needs of the elderly, acquired during the previous research studies. This research concerned a different topic and was conducted under the guidance of Anna Szewczenko [47], associated professor an expert in the field of architectural solutions friendly to seniors. In the course of the study, the group developed, among others, "personae" or characteristics of fictitious people of senior age, who were given names, their health condition was described, scenarios of their functioning and spending free time was conceived, including passions and interests, as well as their social roles, fears and worries. The "personae" characterized in this way were used in the further part of the study described here. The second group of students had only general knowledge in the field of senior related issues.

The scientific objective of the research was to find out the vision of future architects about the life of seniors in a smart city of the future in the perspective of 10 years, and to collect inspiring, innovative ideas. The study had also a didactic goal—stimulating students' creativity, familiarizing them with brainstorming techniques and sensitizing future architects to the problems of older people in cities of the future. The study was conducted using brainstorming, which is an important element of the design thinking method. According to the definition of Willemien Visser: "Design Thinking refers to design-specific cognitive activities that designers apply during the process of designing" [48]. Items explaining design thinking principles are presented in the following publications:

• Brown, T. "Change by Design. How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation" [49],


Examples involving the application of Design Thinking in the discipline of architecture and urban planning, are presented in the following articles:


The brainstorming was carried out with a classic division into two stages (as shown in Table 1):


The collection of ideas for each of the partial topics took five minutes. Ideas were written on post-it notes and stuck on boards assigned to each team.

During the brainstorming the students were to imagine that in 10 years, cities would change, becoming smart cities. There was an auxiliary research question related to this was: "What facilities for seniors represented by the three "personae" should be found in the smart city in the future?" It was clearly emphasized that the smart city had evolved since the creation of that concept—from smart city 1.0 focused on technology to human smart city 4.0 focused on people [56]. Importantly, the problem was to be considered by the students from the architect's perspective.

The diagram of the research methodology (Figure 2) and Table 1 presents the scenario of the research below.

**Table 1.** Research scenario with the participation of students of the Faculty of Architecture of the Silesian University of Technology involving the following research problem: "How will seniors be participating in the life of a future smart city (in the perspective of 10 years) and what amenities will it be offering them?".


**Table 1.** *Cont.*


**Figure 2.** Diagram of the research methodology presents the design thinking method step by step (red path). Additional explanations are presented on left and right side. On the right (grey path) you can see how research activities have been realized on indicative level, and on the right (blue path)—how it should be conducted on investigative level, when the full design thinking methodology in cooperation with sociologist and psychologist should be applied.
