How to Respond to a Changing User
"To understand why a certain environment thrives and another similar environment does not, demographics and economics should be studied, but the individual identities of actors must be known too. Similarly, a specific built environment may uniquely develop, prosper, or decline because of the way its inhabitants act as agents, independent of prevailing trends and conditions."
I found this quote interesting because I think it is very telling of how a building may or may not be used in its intended way. I think as designers we imagine a building interacting in a certain way with its user and serving a specific function. We design a school with classrooms, a hospital with surgical rooms, a home with a living room, bedrooms, kitchen, and bathroom. But what happens to those rooms when the user decides not to use them the way we as designers intended? What happens 30 years down the road when the building may be totally re-purposed and the hospital becomes a school and the house becomes a business?
I question this because I wonder if design so strongly influenced by a single user is practical when that user no longer owns the space. Habraken talks a lot about the "agents" in his article and how people take over a space and make it their own by moving furniture, adding accessories, etc. I think the challenge for designers is understanding how to make a space flexible for multiple users to come while still making it structured enough to be programmed and not just empty space that a user has trouble filling. On top of that I question are we designing for now or for the future? As Habraken states, "the living environment can persist only through change and adaptation." How do we as designers balance designing for our current user's needs while anticipating change and growth of the building's future?
I found this quote interesting because I think it is very telling of how a building may or may not be used in its intended way. I think as designers we imagine a building interacting in a certain way with its user and serving a specific function. We design a school with classrooms, a hospital with surgical rooms, a home with a living room, bedrooms, kitchen, and bathroom. But what happens to those rooms when the user decides not to use them the way we as designers intended? What happens 30 years down the road when the building may be totally re-purposed and the hospital becomes a school and the house becomes a business?
I question this because I wonder if design so strongly influenced by a single user is practical when that user no longer owns the space. Habraken talks a lot about the "agents" in his article and how people take over a space and make it their own by moving furniture, adding accessories, etc. I think the challenge for designers is understanding how to make a space flexible for multiple users to come while still making it structured enough to be programmed and not just empty space that a user has trouble filling. On top of that I question are we designing for now or for the future? As Habraken states, "the living environment can persist only through change and adaptation." How do we as designers balance designing for our current user's needs while anticipating change and growth of the building's future?
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