tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/interior-design-7170/articles
Interior design – The Conversation
2024-03-12T12:29:06Z
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/220026
2024-03-12T12:29:06Z
2024-03-12T12:29:06Z
What is the Japanese ‘wabi-sabi’ aesthetic actually about? ‘Miserable tea’ and loneliness, for starters
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580795/original/file-20240309-24-70pplt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C3%2C2046%2C1454&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A perfectly imperfect tea bowl.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/earthenware-bowl-with-glazing-against-black-royalty-free-image/1689830483?phrase=wabi+sabi&adppopup=true">Zen Rial/Moment via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>On a recent visit to New York I stopped at a Japanese bookstore in Manhattan. Among the English-language books about Japan, I encountered a section of a shelf marked “WABI-SABI” and stocked with titles such as “Wabi Sabi Love,” “The Wabi-Sabi Way,” “Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers,” and, in all lowercase, “simply imperfect: revisiting the wabi-sabi house.” </p>
<p>What is wabi-sabi, and why does it rate its own section alongside such topics as sushi and karate?</p>
<p>Wabi-sabi is typically described as a traditional Japanese aesthetic: the beauty of something perfectly imperfect, in the sense of “flawed” or “unfinished.” Actually, however, wabi and sabi are similar but distinct concepts, yoked together far more often outside Japan than in it. Even people who have been brought up in Japan may struggle to define wabi and sabi precisely, though each is certainly authentically Japanese and neither is especially obscure.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two rows of books displayed spine-out in a store." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=680&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580796/original/file-20240309-30-4z3p0j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A wabi-sabi sighting in New York.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Paul S. Atkins</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
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<p>As <a href="https://asian.washington.edu/people/paul-s-atkins">a scholar of classical Japanese language, literature and culture</a>, I too have a professional interest in wabi and sabi and how they have come to be understood outside Japan. A cursory search of Google Books shows that the term began to appear in print in English around 1980. Perhaps this was a delayed reaction to a book by <a href="https://trc-leiden.nl/trc-needles/people-and-functions/authors-scholars-and-activists/yanagi-soetsu-1889-1961">Japanese art critic Yanagi Soetsu</a>, “<a href="https://kodansha.us/product/the-unknown-craftsman/">The Unknown Craftsman</a>,” which was translated into English and published in 1972.</p>
<p>In it, in an essay titled, “The Beauty of Irregularity,” Yanagi wrote about the art of the tea ceremony and its simple grace. More broadly, as the title suggests, he was captivated by a sense of beauty apart from traditional ideals of perfection, refinement and symmetry. </p>
<p>Behind “roughness,” Yanagi wrote, “lurks a hidden beauty, to which we refer in our peculiar adjectives ‘shibui,’ ‘wabi,’ and ‘sabi.’” </p>
<p>Shibui means austere or restrained, yet it was wabi and sabi that caught on abroad – perhaps because they rhyme.</p>
<p>After taking off in America and other countries, the phrase wabi-sabi was imported back to Japan as a compound term; the mentions I found in online Japanese sources typically addressed such topics as how to explain wabi-sabi to foreigners. Wabi-sabi does not appear in standard dictionaries of the Japanese language.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The interior of a simple room with faded walls, wooden beams, and a simple scroll hanging in the background." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580798/original/file-20240309-20-kp1zde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A tearoom in Kyoto, Japan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/tea-room-low-angle-view-royalty-free-image/200552152-001?phrase=japan+tea+room&adppopup=true">Karin Slade/Corbis Documentary via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Miserable poetry</h2>
<p>Wabi is a noun derived from the classical Japanese verb “wabu,” related to the modern verb “wabiru” and adjective “wabishii.” Wabu means to languish or be miserable. </p>
<p>Here is a celebrated example from a ninth-century waka poem, <a href="http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/japan_600ce_waka.htm">the brief verse of 31 syllables</a> that forms the backbone of classical Japanese poetry. The poet, a courtier named Yukihira, was a provincial governor who, by some accounts, <a href="https://asia453.wordpress.com/literary-locations/locations2016/lack-and-loneliness-on-the-shores-of-suma/">was exiled to Suma Bay</a>, a famous stretch of coastline in western Japan.</p>
<blockquote>Should by chance<br>
Someone ask for me,<br>
Answer that I languish<br>
At Suma Bay, shedding<br>
brine upon the seaweed.</blockquote>
<p>Suma Bay wasn’t all misery for Yukihira; according to legend, <a href="https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/78554">he loved and was loved</a> by two sisters there. But his poem well captures the pain of wabi – the misery of having been exiled from the courtly world he knew.</p>
<h2>Miserable tea</h2>
<p>Eventually, the misery of wabi made its way into one of Japan’s most iconic traditions: tea.</p>
<p>The custom of drinking powdered green tea, called matcha, entered Japan around 1200. Zen monks returning from China brought the powder home, using it as a medicine and a stimulant. Over time, tea spread to the rest of the population; by the middle of the 16th century, it was a mundane part of everyday life.</p>
<p>It was precisely then that the preparation and serving of tea was sublimated to high art, now known as “chadō” or “sadō,” <a href="https://www.urasenke.or.jp/texte/about/chado/">the so-called Way of Tea</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two people kneeling in a small, roofed room open to the outdoors, set in a garden, look at the photographer." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=479&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=479&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=479&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=602&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=602&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577821/original/file-20240226-20-q7p9f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=602&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A Japanese couple in a 19th-century tearoom.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/japanese-couple-in-teahouse-news-photo/534244298?adppopup=true">Historical Picture Archive/Corbis Historical via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>As the tea ceremony gained in popularity, powerful warlords competed in acquiring the most coveted utensils, including braziers, kettles, scoops, whisks and the bowllike cups in which the tea was whipped and sipped. The tearoom itself might be decorated with rare works of art, such as paintings or calligraphy mounted on hanging scrolls, elaborate flower vases and incense burners.</p>
<p>Then there emerged a group of connoisseurs and teachers of tea who championed a more severe and austere style of presentation: “wabi-cha,” which literally means miserable tea. Whereas newly ascendant warriors and merchants used the tea gathering to flaunt their wealth, <a href="https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/76335">wabi-style tea</a> emphasized subtlety, frugality and restraint.</p>
<p>It is not hard to see traces of wabi in old tearooms, with their patina of age and elegant but unobtrusive furnishings, and in the utensils themselves – in particular, the misshapen, cracked or somber-hued teabowls. </p>
<p>Wabi-style tea perhaps reached its pinnacle in the 16th century, when the celebrated tea master <a href="https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1028&context=arch_facultyschol">Sen no Rikyū</a> introduced innovations still used today. These include bamboo tea scoops, black raku-style ceramic teabowls and the “crawling entrance”: the 2-by-2-foot door through which attendees wriggle in order to enter the cozy, womblike tearoom.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A plain black bowl with a faint golden pattern, resting against a white backdrop." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/580799/original/file-20240309-30-b210tf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A raku-ware teabowl with a design of geese, made in the 18th or 19th century.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/raku-ware-tea-bowl-with-design-of-descending-geese-18th-news-photo/1365697034?adppopup=true">Heritage Art/Heritage Images via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>A lovely loneliness</h2>
<p>Like wabi, sabi is a noun: in this case, derived from the classical verb “sabu.” Today, the verb “sabiru” means to rust, with its connotations of age and decay. The modern adjective “sabishii” means lonely.</p>
<p>Classical poems yield many examples of sabi but it really took off as an aesthetic ideal in the 17th century. Poets often tried to capture its particular kind of loneliness in the 17-syllable poetic form of haiku.</p>
<p>As the scholar <a href="https://news.stanford.edu/2020/10/02/makoto-ueda-stanford-japanese-literature-professor-emeritus-dies-89/">Makoto Ueda</a> remarked, sabi is “not the loneliness of a man who has lost his dear one, but <a href="https://press.umich.edu/Books/L/Literary-and-Art-Theories-in-Japan">the loneliness of the rain</a> falling on large taro leaves at night, or the loneliness emerging out of a cicada’s cry amid the white, dry rocks, or the Milky Way extending over the rough sea, or a huge river torrentially rushing in the rainy season.” </p>
<p><a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/basho">Matsuo Bashō</a>, a 17th-century master of haiku, saw sabi <a href="https://www2.yamanashi-ken.ac.jp/%7Eitoyo/basho/shitibusyu/sumidawara1.htm">in this verse</a> by his disciple Mukai Kyorai, translated by Ueda: </p>
<blockquote>Under the blossoms<br>
Two aged watchmen,<br>
With their white heads together—.</blockquote>
<p>The juxtaposition of wabi-sabi as a single term is of recent, not ancient, vintage, and it does not seem to have occurred in Japan. Nonetheless, the terms originated in Japanese aesthetics: sabi out of poetry and wabi out of tea. </p>
<p>Combined, they appear to fill a gap in the Western vocabulary for talking about art and life – a leaning away from perfection, completion and excess, and a yearning toward leaving something undone, broken or unsaid.</p>
<p><em>This story has been updated to correct the description of a tearoom door’s dimensions.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220026/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>I was a student of Professor Makoto Ueda.</span></em></p>
‘Wabi’ and ‘sabi’ are Japanese words with long histories, but they are rarely used together in the way Western designers have come to use the term.
Paul S. Atkins, Professor of Japanese, University of Washington
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/182706
2022-05-16T16:24:39Z
2022-05-16T16:24:39Z
Cluttercore: Gen Z’s revolt against millennial minimalism is grounded in Victorian excess
<p>Have you heard maximalism is in and minimalism is out? Rooms bursting at the seams with clashing florals, colourful furniture and innumerable knick-knacks, this is what defines the new interiors trend cluttercore (or <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bricabracomania-Bourgeois-Remy-G-Saisselin/dp/0500234248">bricabracomania</a>).</p>
<p>Some say it’s a war between generation Z (born 1997-2012) and minimal millennials (born 1981-1996), symptomatic of bigger differences. Others say it’s a pandemic response, where our domestic prisons became <a href="https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20210430-cluttercore-the-joy-of-a-maximalist-home">cuddly cocoons, stimulating our senses, connecting us with other people and places</a>. But what really lays behind the choice to clutter or cull?</p>
<p>Why do some people revel in collections of novelty eggcups? Or have so many framed pictures you can barely see the (ferociously busy) wallpaper? And why do those at the other end of the spectrum refuse to have even the essential stuff visible in the home, hiding it behind thousands of pounds’ of incognito cupboards?</p>
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<img alt="Quarter life, a series by The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><strong><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/quarter-life-117947?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">This article is part of Quarter Life</a></strong>, a series about issues affecting those of us in our twenties and thirties. From the challenges of beginning a career and taking care of our mental health, to the excitement of starting a family, adopting a pet or just making friends as an adult. The articles in this series explore the questions and bring answers as we navigate this turbulent period of life.</em></p>
<p><em>You may be interested in:</em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/rihanna-and-radical-pregnancy-fashion-how-the-victorians-made-maternity-wear-boring-182000?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Rihanna and radical pregnancy fashion – how the Victorians made maternity wear boring</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/goblin-mode-a-gothic-expert-explains-the-trends-mythical-origins-and-why-we-should-all-go-vampire-mode-instead-180282?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Goblin mode: a gothic expert explains the trend’s mythical origins, and why we should all go ‘vampire mode’ instead</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/william-morris-how-a-great-thinker-and-poet-was-overlooked-for-his-wallpaper-169111?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">William Morris – how a great thinker and poet was overlooked for his wallpaper</a></em></p>
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<p>One important reason for the clash between minimalism and maximalism is simple: the relentless pendulum swing of fashion. Whatever psychological or cultural rationale pundits may suggest, fashion is always about the love of what strikes us as new or different.</p>
<p>This struggle might seem new but it is just history repeating itself, encapsulated in the interior struggle between less and more that began between class-ridden <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=KmiaAAAAIAAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=victorian+commodity+culture&ots=SOdRDxjp-h&sig=eNBp04bAgNJjPeUMDI5ZPFYSROg#v=onepage&q=victorian%20commodity%20culture&f=false">Victorian commodity culture</a> and modernism’s seemingly <a href="https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/what-was-modernism">healthy and egalitarian dream</a>.</p>
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<h2>A lot of stuff</h2>
<p>Victorians liked stuff that they could put on display. These things communicated their status through solid evidence of capital, connectedness, signs of exotic travel and <a href="http://www.title-magazine.com/2014/03/yinka-shonibares-the-victorian-philanthropists-parlour/">colonial power</a>. Think inherited antique cabinets and Chinese ivory animals. Then imagine the labour required to not only create, but <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-75397-9">polish, dust, manage and maintain these myriad possessions</a>. </p>
<p>But this deluge of stuff was made possible for more people as mass-produced commodities – especially those created from synthetic materials – became cheaper.</p>
<p>All this created a novel and lasting problem: how to choose and how to organise a world with so much aesthetic possibility – how to make things “go together”. The 19th and 20th-century guardians of culture and the “public good” were just as concerned about the spiritual chaos of too much clutter as modern “organisational consultants” like <a href="https://konmari.com/">Marie Kondo</a>. </p>
<p>In response, they set up design schools and educational showcases, like the <a href="https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1418247/the-great-london-exhibition-of-paper-peepshow/">Great Exhibition of 1851</a>, the 1930 New York World’s Fair and the Festival of Britain in 1951.</p>
<h2>Very little stuff</h2>
<p>The minimalist mantra “less is more”, courtesy of German art school <a href="https://www.vam.ac.uk/event/rpjNjKpV/bauhaus">the Bauhaus</a> was established in the 1920s. For some modernists, “needless decoration” was a sign of an “uncivilised” (read feminine and non-white) mind. They nevertheless also looked to “primitive” cultures for bold aesthetics and authenticity superior to western excess.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/modernism">Modernists</a> believed that simplicity and elegant functionality, enabled by mass production and cost-effective new materials (like tubular steel and plywood), could promote social equality in interior design. They had a point. Without staff, what working person can, realistically, keep “curated” clutter looking cool (and clean)? </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A mid-century modern room with desk and bookcase." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463284/original/file-20220516-16-82nukb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=496&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Modernists revolted against the interior excess of the Victorians, favouring sleek design with clean lines.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/black-retro-typewriter-on-unique-wooden-1203948283">Photographee.eu/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But, what about “cosiness”? That feeling, described in the 1990s as “<a href="https://faithpopcorn.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/faith-popcorns-brainreserve-future-of-homes.pdf">cocooning</a> or providing a "warm welcome” to guests? </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/12183/volumes/sv07/SV%20-%2007">1980s American study</a> found that the “homeyness” desired in interiors was achieved by successive circles of stuff – from the white picket fence, to the wisteria on the exterior walls, the wallpaper, pictures and bookshelves lining the interior walls and then furniture arranged also in roughly circular formations. </p>
<p>These layers would then be overlain with decorations and texture, making symbolic entry points as well as enclosures. “Homey” was aesthetically the total opposite of modern minimalism, whose “functionality” was perceived as cold, unsympathetic and unwelcoming.</p>
<p>Despite this popular rejection, modernism was the postwar default for European “good taste”, seen in design HQs and high-end interiors magazines. But wasn’t it all not just uncomfortable, but also a bit boring? And, unfortunately, every bit as unforgiving without a lot of cash and a team of cleaners? </p>
<p>Modernism on the cheap is just depressing (see <a href="https://www.ribapix.com/1960s-british-social-housing">the concrete blocks of 1960s UK council flats</a>). Sleek built-in cupboards cost a lot. And smooth, unadorned surfaces show every speck of dirt. </p>
<p>Rebelling against modernist mantras, <a href="https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/what-is-postmodernism">1980s design</a> sought to put “the fun back into function” for sophisticates. However, ordinary people were always buying fun stuff, from plastic pineapples to granny chic knick knacks.</p>
<h2>The impossibility of it all</h2>
<p>Nowadays, the “safe” and default mainstream option is a broadly-defined “modern” look characterised by Ikea. But it’s not really minimalist. This look encourages an accumulation of stuff that never quite functions or fits together and which still fills a room according to the ethos of homeyness – even though each object may “look modern”. </p>
<p>It fails to tell a convincing story of the self or remain tidy, prompting further purchases of “storage solutions”. Minimalists strip this back to a minimum of objects with a neutral palette. Fewer mistakes equals less chucking out. Less stuff equals less to change when you tire of it.</p>
<p>But minimalism is more difficult than ever. We are powerless against the tides of half-wanted incoming consumer stuff – especially if you have children – which makes achieving minimalism all the more impressive. People who do achieve it frame their shots with care and they chuck a lot of stuff away.</p>
<p>Making a more elastic aesthetic look good is also difficult, maybe more difficult. Clutter lovers range from sub-pathological hoarders, to upper middle-class apers of aristocratic eclecticism, to ethical “keepers”. An aesthetic mess can look like an accidental loss of human control, identity or hope. It takes a lot to make harmony out of all that potential noise – and keep it tidy.</p>
<p>Cluttercore is perfect for now, a vehicle to display the curated self, the “interesting” and “authentic” self so demanded by social media. And it hides behind the idea that anything goes, when in fact, maybe some things must.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/182706/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vanessa Brown does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
More is more in #cluttercore, the new interior trend championed by the young maximalists of TikTok.
Vanessa Brown, Course Leader MA Culture, Style and Fashion, Nottingham Trent University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/164635
2021-07-21T20:10:41Z
2021-07-21T20:10:41Z
Layer upon layer: uncovering the terrazzo treasures of the west and celebrating legacy floors
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411836/original/file-20210719-13-46x0z0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=15%2C6%2C2020%2C1345&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Underneath/Uncovered - Rebecca Mansell</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Communities are built from a complex layering of influences. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.derbalnara.org.au/placenames/walyalup">Fremantle Walyalup</a>, like many towns across Australia, is like a terrazzo floor made up of the contributions of the many cultural groups that live here. These rich fragments combine into a cohesive pattern over time, with each element bringing its own flavour, nuance and colour to the amalgam. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.10nightsinport.com.au/whats-on/underneath-overlooked/">Underneath/Overlooked</a> is the latest homage to terrazzo’s popularity in Australia. It follows the contemporary works of Ukrainian-Australian artist <a href="https://www.heide.com.au/exhibitions/stanislava-pinchuk-terra-data">Stanislava Pinchuk at Heide</a> and the devotion shown to the terrazzo texture on popular <a href="https://9now.nine.com.au/the-block/bathroom-design-inspiration-terrazzo-tiles-ideas/5d87a500-0955-47fc-987e-8cefd8cd5c96">home renovation television shows</a>, <a href="https://www.archdaily.com/918313/terrazzo-is-back-production-installation-and-samples-in-architecture">design blogs</a> and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CRf3iiwtMEp/">furniture designs</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dont-forget-the-west-mid-century-modern-and-david-foulkes-taylor-30759">Don't forget the west: mid-century modern and David Foulkes Taylor</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>The Italian connection</h2>
<p>One of the more vibrant components of the Fremantle Walyalup terrazzo is the Italian contribution. </p>
<p>The first Italians arrived in the early years of European occupation, their community building in waves as groups sought refuge from famine, political upheaval and war. Fishermen from Capo d’Orlando, Molfetta and Calabria found a new home and built a community that soon attracted others. So, when <a href="http://fremantlestuff.info/people/scolaro.html">Guiseppe and Anna Scolaro</a> arrived in 1948 seeking a better life for their young family, they settled in Fremantle. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="terrazzo tile" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411841/original/file-20210719-23-1dnk5gj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A tile revealed and celebrated in Underneath/Uncovered.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Underneath/Overlooked</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With the skills developed in his small mechanical business in Capo d’Orlando, Guiseppe began making terrazzo tiles to meet the needs of the post-war building boom, establishing the Universal Terrazzo Tile company in 1952. </p>
<p>In Victoria, <a href="https://collections.museumsvictoria.com.au/articles/11021">De Marco Brothers Terrazzo Granolithic and Concrete Placing</a> was established in 1914 by Italian brothers Annibale and Severino De Marco. They completed flooring for the Australian War Memorial’s Hall of Memory in 1955. </p>
<p>Using marble chips imported from Italy, the Scolaros designed tiles to be laid in renovated homes and newly constructed buildings alike. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="young family" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411834/original/file-20210719-23-12pyr6g.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The young Scolaro family built a future out of terrazzo in Western Australia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Supplied</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/shoeshops-tailors-tv-repairs-a-photographic-homage-to-melbournes-vanishing-small-businesses-is-a-form-of-time-travel-158612">Shoeshops, tailors, TV repairs: a photographic homage to Melbourne's vanishing small businesses is a form of time travel</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Tradition</h2>
<p>Venetian artisans began constructing decorative, durable and easily maintained flooring for their terraces (<em>terrazzo</em>) <a href="https://www.terrazzorestorationblog.com/the_history_of_terrazzo/">in the 15th-century</a>, using discarded marble offcuts set within a coloured, concrete matrix. </p>
<p>Abraded and polished to create a smooth finish it was a low-cost solution with a decorative embellishment. </p>
<p>The popularity of terrazzo grew in the early 20th century with new grinding and production technologies. As the Italian diaspora spread around the globe, it was used extensively in public and domestic buildings.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="woman making terrazzo tile" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411837/original/file-20210719-15-76uvvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Workshops are part of the current exhibition.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Rebecca Mansell</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/design-makes-a-place-a-prison-or-a-home-turning-human-centred-vision-for-aged-care-into-reality-156937">Design makes a place a prison or a home. Turning 'human-centred' vision for aged care into reality</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Covered with carpet</h2>
<p>Terrazzo enlivened many homes and offices built in Western Australia from the 1950s until the 1970s. The floors injected a cosmopolitan modernism into the built environment and generated a <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-02-09/post-war-australian-housing-future-urbanism-southern-europe/11924116?nw=0">familiar ambience for the Italian community</a>. Easily maintained, decorative floors were the perfect blend of the traditional with the aspirational.</p>
<p>Over time, these flamboyant floors fell out of favour and were covered over with carpet, forgotten until new families took up residence and discovered the hidden treasures below. </p>
<p>When visual artist <a href="https://pennybovell.com.au/">Penny Bovell</a> moved into a new studio in 2000, the intricate and ornate tiles were a revelation. </p>
<p>“The repeat patterns, contrasting colours, textual aggregates, and aged patinas become an intensely expressive language,” she explains. </p>
<p>It was the catalyst to discover more. She bought the Scolaro’s first home and found each room with a unique flooring character. On a quest, she set to find other houses and meet their besotted owners who lived each day with this wondrous bounty. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411838/original/file-20210719-25-1rxdkgq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forms can also guide colour designs.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Rebecca Mansell</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Recreating magic</h2>
<p>The Underneath/Overlooked exhibition at the Moores Building in Fremantle, presented as part of the Ten Nights in Port festival, is Bovell’s tribute to Guiseppe, Anna and their artistry.</p>
<p>Bovell and daughter, Gabby Howlett, had to find innovative ways of translating the unique presence of these environments into a public gallery. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411839/original/file-20210719-27-8w03oq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Gabby Howlett and mother Penny Bovell worked on the exhibition and share a passion for terrazzo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Rebecca Mansell</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Set within the lofty main space within this heritage building, they have recreated the Scolaros’ first home. Printed on silk with the patterns of the various tile layouts of each room, the half-scale floating reconstruction is transformed into a magical space. </p>
<p>Panoramic photographs of floors from other houses activate the walls. On the floor, stacks of tiles printed on foam core can be rearranged to create new pattern variations.</p>
<p>This exercise brilliantly replicates Guiseppe and Anna’s working methodology. Each new client was offered the chance to create a unique pattern using combinations of templates and colours. </p>
<p>Speaking at the exhibition opening, their son Armando said his parents would lay out tiles, chat about colours and develop a floor that had its own character and reflected the preferences of the commissioning patrons. </p>
<h2>Old floors, new custodians</h2>
<p>The project is a social document. It chronicles the impact of Italian migration to Australia and documents the individuals who made and commissioned these remarkable floors and the new custodians who discovered the bounty beneath their feet. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="terrazzo tile" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411840/original/file-20210719-25-fos6az.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A tile from the exhibition.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Underneath/Overlooked</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As home owner Stephanie Hammill notes in the exhibition catalogue, the floors are “a precious resource linking different generations and populations. They help us to define us as a community: who we are and where we come from”.</p>
<p>Terrazzo was reinvigorated around 2017 when it was named an <a href="https://www.vogue.com/article/how-terrazzo-moved-out-from-under-our-feet-to-absolutely-everywhere">official Pinterest trend</a>. Since then, it has become ubiquitous in magazines, on screens and stores. </p>
<p>Like all trends, the current interest will fade — unlike these marvellous floors and the Scolaro legacy.</p>
<p><em><a href="https://m.facebook.com/events/167359288755758">Underneath/Overlooked</a> is on until Sunday July 25th.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/164635/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ted Snell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Australia’s love and rediscovery of terrazzo floors form the foundation for a new exhibition.
Ted Snell, Honorary Professor, Edith Cowan University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/159961
2021-04-29T16:08:21Z
2021-04-29T16:08:21Z
Boris Johnson’s Downing Street refurbishment: might a law have been broken?
<p>The Electoral Commission has announced that Boris Johnson, the, erm, prime minister of the United Kingdom, is under investigation. Well, to be precise, the Commission will investigate whether any transactions relating to refurbishment undertaken at Johnson’s flat are an offence under political financing law. In fact, in its official statement, the Commission suggested that there are “reasonable grounds to suspect an offence or offences may have occurred”. But what has actually happened here? What are the laws that might have been broken? And why is it a problem anyway?</p>
<p>The row begins, as will be all too familiar in homes across the globe, with a bit of good old-fashioned DIY. Every prime minister gets £30,000 a year in public money to renovate their private residence. The accusation laid at the door of Johnson and fiancée Carrie Symonds is that their works came in at <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-56878663?at_custom2=twitter&at_campaign=64&at_custom1=%255Bpost+type%255D&at_custom4=twitter&at_custom3=%2540BBCPolitics&at_medium=custom7">as much as £200,000</a>.</p>
<p>This wasn’t an issue until the prime minister’s former adviser Dominic Cummings entered the fray. He launched a <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-56863547">blistering attack</a> suggesting that Johnson planned to have donors (most notably <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/apr/27/lord-david-brownlow-tory-donor-paid-no-10-refurbishment-boris-johnson">Lord David Brownlow</a>) “secretly pay” for the refurbishment. Adding that it was “unethical, foolish, possibly illegal and almost certainly broke the rules on proper disclosure of political donations if conducted in the way he intended”.</p>
<h2>What are the rules?</h2>
<p>So if it was (possibly) illegal and did break the rules, <a href="https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/sites/default/files/2021-01/Donations%20and%20loans%20guidance%20for%20regulated%20donees%20in%20Great%20Britain.pdf">what are those rules in the first place</a>? In the main, it is an issue of disclosure. Any donation of over £7,500 to a party or £1,500 to an MP must be declared to the Electoral Commission within 30 days. This rule applies to money that is loaned and also applies to lots of donations that might not look like a simple cash transfer.</p>
<p>So, if you buy an MP a photocopier, if you sponsor meetings and events, if you do paid research, or, indeed, if you provide £58,000 (either as a loan or otherwise) to decorate their house, it needs to be declared. This is the crux of the rule that may or may not have been broken and the questions that the Electoral Commission will put to Johnson and his associates. </p>
<p>Johnson insists that he has paid for the renovations with his own money but continues to evade questions about whether Lord David Brownlow paid for them in the first instance before being repaid. If the money was donated (or loaned) by Lord Brownlow either to Johnson or his party and it wasn’t declared in a timely manner, then electoral law has been broken. There are, of course, legislative complexities but, at the end of the day, it’s as simple as that.</p>
<h2>What happens next?</h2>
<p>A long investigation lies ahead to get to the bottom of this matter. In terms of outcome, the sanctions the Electoral Commission can hand down are small. It can issue a maximum fine of £20,000 and involve the police if further laws are deemed to have been broken. However, the political damage could be vast.</p>
<p>As well as having (not all that punitive) sanctioning powers, the Commission also has significant investigatory powers. It can call on anyone it likes to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/apr/28/how-much-trouble-is-boris-johnson-in-maybe-quite-a-lot">give evidence</a>. That might include Symonds, cabinet secretary Simon Case and/or Lord Brownlow. It can subpoena private WhatsApp messages, emails and other evidence and – <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7345281/Electoral-Commission-accused-anti-Brexit-bias-raiding-Farages-party-HQ.html">as the Brexit Party discovered</a> – visit party offices for more information if needed.</p>
<p>The investigation, then, which will run and run, has the potential to be as damaging as any sanctions that might come from it.</p>
<h2>99 problems, of which a kitchen is one?</h2>
<p>Beyond the legal, there is also the question of tone. In general, no one will deny a prime minister the right to do up the flat that they live in. But defending that right in itself leads to rather awkward situations that can make those in power seem pretty out of touch.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gzNAeFSqOyI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Johnson comes unstuck over his wallpaper in PMQs.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>MPs found this during the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2009/may/13/mps-expenses-houseofcommons">expenses scandal of 2009</a>, when their claims for lavish decor created the sense that their idea of reasonable costs were far removed from those of the wider public. In this case, one particularly out-of-touch contribution came from Daily Mail columnist Sarah Vine, wife of Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove, who reminded us that the prime minister <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/we-cant-expect-pm-to-live-in-a-skip-insists-michael-goves-wife-sarah-vine-rxs3505zp">“can’t be expected to live in a skip”</a>. </p>
<p>“Cash for curtains” is also damaging because it is happening at the same time as numerous inquiries into other potential scandals <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-56813196">surrounding lobbying</a>. A drip-feed of revelations has raised significant questions about standards and ethics in public life – and left many with the sense that these are not things the current administration has all that much interest in.</p>
<p>However, there is, as yet, limited evidence of the all-important <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/5d2e7434-a6b0-11eb-b000-cc13f23b4eff?shareToken=e903b1fe5964c55b5c5e90aff27549ab">“public cut through”</a>. The law is complex, and very few people really want to get stuck in to the minutiae of regulating donations. Are MPs inboxes filling up in the same way as they did in the wake of Cummings’ trip to <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-asked-people-if-they-were-breaking-lockdown-rules-before-and-after-the-dominic-cummings-scandal-heres-what-they-told-us-139994">Barnard Castle</a>? <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/apr/28/how-much-trouble-is-boris-johnson-in-maybe-quite-a-lot">Apparently not</a>, yet.</p>
<p>Moreover, mud doesn’t seem to stick to Johnson as easily as it does other politicians. He is no stranger to issues with regards to personal standards of good behaviour and yet continues to be popular. All this may be priced in for voters. </p>
<p>However, we know that things can snowball rather quickly, as they seem to be doing at present. I often think of Johnson’s predecessor, David Cameron – and his rather abrupt downfall – in situations like this. Remember, he was known as the <a href="https://capx.co/this-referendum-may-be-an-essay-crisis-too-far-for-david-cameron/">“essay crisis”</a> prime minister. He would always, somehow, get out of a sticky situation at the last minute. Then, one day, he didn’t.</p>
<p>So, whilst you might not bet your house on it being curtains for Boris just yet – the snowball is getting bigger and bigger. And it is rolling towards Downing Street at quite a skip now.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/159961/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sam Power has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.</span></em></p>
The Electoral Commission says there are “reasonable grounds to suspect an offence or offences may have occurred”.
Sam Power, Lecturer in Corruption Analysis (Politics), University of Sussex
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/147637
2020-10-19T14:27:44Z
2020-10-19T14:27:44Z
House plants were our link with nature in lockdown – now they could change how we relate to the natural world
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363258/original/file-20201013-19-ije6ig.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=486%2C697%2C3328%2C1789&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/small-green-cactus-clay-pots-pastel-1140516020">Rachasie/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>They’re not the first generation to keep house plants, but millennials seem to have earned a reputation for gratuitous indoor foliage. Bloomberg reporter <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-04-11/the-one-thing-millennials-haven-t-killed-is-houseplants">Matthew Boyle</a> claimed that young people have helped revive “the once moribund market for house plants” in the US, where, according to the National Gardening Association, sales surged 50% between 2016 and 2019. In the UK, the <a href="https://www.rhs.org.uk/press/releases/RHS-grows-houseplant-and-floristry-offering-as-ind">Royal Agricultural Society</a> reported a 65% increase in house plant sales in 2018 alone.</p>
<p>Why young people in particular might be so fond of house plants has invited numerous explanations. Lifestyle reporter <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/millennials-obsessed-houseplants-instagram_l_5d7a976de4b01c1970c433b9">Casey Bond</a> argued that house plants offer something to nurture that’s cheap and doesn’t involve a lot of maintenance, with obvious appeal to a generation whose entry into parenthood is stymied by <a href="https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/uk-average-house-price-rise-2020-millennials-versus-baby-boomers-property-ladder-060042411.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAEB84LlmZFsNTokd-kxf2HFZXpB5M_lQhZNMVcKQDBuUevGNEPHF8y2GNnE7xm_bdrYrgdZNrnENbC95LxdHuqCfekpSaSlJN6S99Z0fartMMnBdzbAAsHvvoa425lyGr5lsYK9h6UvugjtPP83kxYKjVT2TL-9cwdileX-xdpEo">house prices</a> and <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/241f0fe4-08f8-4d42-a268-4f0a399a0063">economic instability</a>. Young people today are thought to be more conscious of mental health and self-care too, and plants have been <a href="https://journals.ashs.org/horttech/view/journals/horttech/30/1/article-p55.xml?ArticleBodyColorStyles=fullText">proven</a> to reduce stress levels and improve mood.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A large-leafed house plant with frilled edges." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363249/original/file-20201013-21-148ttto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Monstera (or Swiss cheese plants) are particularly popular.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/zcVArTF8Frs">Kara Eads/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But the <a href="https://canongate.co.uk/books/2902-rootbound-rewilding-a-life/">universal appeal</a> of house plants, according to writer <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/feb/07/succulent-mania-smuggling-millennials-roots">Alice Vincent</a>, is that they provide “a tangible way of connecting with nature that is absent from an increasingly screen-based world”. That could explain why their sales ballooned again during lockdown, and not just among younger customers. </p>
<p>Anthropologist Gideon Lasco described the phenomenon in his native Philippines as a “<a href="https://www.sapiens.org/column/entanglements/covid-19-houseplants/?fbclid=IwAR32a9PK_rf4GsMQ0pTRPlE3LXvNtRgJch48YaCGMztStvc-VN6ZHxNykpY">botanical boom</a>” that seized Manila. Plants, far more mobile than locked down humans, were ordered online in record numbers and ferried to anxious households where they acquired names and were photographed alongside their new family. Patch, a British online plant store established in 2015, reported a sales increase of 500% during lockdown, with stock intended to last 12 weeks <a href="https://supplycompass.com/blog/feature/inconversationwith/patch/">vanishing in two</a>.</p>
<p>Since June 2020, I’ve been talking to people around the world to better understand the role plants play in these times of forced isolation. My project, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/careforplants/">Care for Plants</a>, started by collecting photographs and videos of people caring for their plants and asking them to explain what they meant to them. By interviewing some of these people, I learned how plants provide care for their human companions too. </p>
<h2>A potted history</h2>
<p>Plants offered not only bonding, but recreational and educational opportunities to their human families during lockdown. Brian started growing tomatoes with his children – part scientific experiment, part family pastime. Mai had to keep her toddler busy, and turned the chore of watering and re-potting her plants into a fun activity. </p>
<p>With her access to the outside world restricted, Aoife found solace in nature, and would gently submerge her hand in the soil to decompress and heal after a long day. Likewise, Aveline described her experience with plants as one that “empties the mind so that I can stop being anxious”. Merima talked about her lawn as a “void filler” for her family. “In the lawn we can still talk about the future. What should we plant and do next and it’s a very positive experience.”</p>
<p>The pandemic tore away our shared sense of normality. Amid the rupture, caring for plants invited welcome new routines – watering, feeding, trimming and re-potting. Plants provided an escape from the anxieties of everyday life, offering beauty and proof that life could still flourish in the darkest times. Xin, who showed me her indoor jungle over a video call, told me that “more plants make a place feel luxurious. A sort of lockdown luxury for those who can work from home and create a nest”. </p>
<p>But one of the most interesting aspects of my research was listening to stories about how people discovered a need to appreciate plants. Laura explained that she felt a new responsibility towards her plants because she more fully appreciated their companionship. Lucia, whose vibrant social life had made her largely unavailable to her plants, was finally able to keep them alive and wanted to learn how to make them feel appreciated, as a way of acknowledging how they enriched her life in lockdown. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/CBSnV6WAwaM","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<h2>New shoots</h2>
<p>Conversations about care have multiplied during the pandemic. We clapped for carers and saw grassroots <a href="https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745343167/pandemic-solidarity/">mutual aid networks</a> emerge, providing care in our neighbourhoods and often filling in for <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/books/3706-care-manifesto">inadequate public provision</a>.</p>
<p>But speaking with plant owners in lockdown, I unearthed new networks of care and solidarity between humans and other species. The gratitude that people felt for their floral companions challenged the view that nature exists simply to be used by humans and made many see for the first time how non-human beings enrich our social world. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/humanity-and-nature-are-not-separate-we-must-see-them-as-one-to-fix-the-climate-crisis-122110">Humanity and nature are not separate – we must see them as one to fix the climate crisis</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The stories I collected suggest we need a broader understanding of social relationships and solidarity; one that appreciates the importance of non-humans in everyday life. Many hope that the pandemic marks a turning point in the way humans interact with the rest of the natural world. Perhaps this watershed could be reached in our own homes, by recognising that the non-humans we share our lives with are equal partners in building a more sustainable and just future. </p>
<p><em>All names have been changed to protect the individuals’ identities.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/147637/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Giulia Carabelli does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
House plants enrich our domestic lives in ways we often fail to notice. But lockdown may have changed all that.
Giulia Carabelli, Lecturer in Sociology, Queen's University Belfast
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/123682
2019-09-23T20:10:22Z
2019-09-23T20:10:22Z
‘Transformer’ rooms and robo-furniture are set to remake our homes – and lives – before our eyes
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/293505/original/file-20190923-23796-1bn4c6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=2%2C48%2C1914%2C1028&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Ori 'Cloud Bed' is lifted and lowered from a ceiling recess to create space that doubles as bedroom and living room.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ori/YouTube (screengrab)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>With two-thirds of a global population of 9.4 billion people <a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/en/news/population/2018-revision-of-world-urbanization-prospects.html">expected to live in urban areas by 2050</a>, we can expect a change in the domestic living arrangements we are familiar with today.</p>
<p>In high-density cities, the static apartment layouts with one function per room will become a luxury that cannot be maintained. The traditional notion of a dedicated living room, bedroom, bathroom or kitchen will no longer be economically or environmentally sustainable. Building stock will need to work harder.</p>
<p>The need to use building space more efficiently means adaptive and responsive domestic micro-environments will replace the old concept of static rooms within a private apartment.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/urban-density-matters-but-what-does-it-mean-58977">Urban density matters – but what does it mean?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>These changes will reframe our idea of what home means, what we do in it, and how the home itself can support and help inhabitants with domestic living.</p>
<h2>So how will these flexible spaces work?</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90399075/alphabet-is-betting-that-the-future-of-real-estate-is-robotic">Sidewalk Labs</a> and <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90358727/ikea-is-quietly-debuting-robotic-furniture">IKEA</a> are collaborating with <a href="https://oriliving.com/">Ori</a>, a robotic furniture startup that emerged from the <a href="https://news.mit.edu/2018/startup-ori-robotic-furniture-0131">Massachusetts Institute of Technology</a>, to transform our use of increasingly sparse urban living space. They have developed ways to enhance existing apartments with pre-manufactured standardised products to make living spaces flexible. </p>
<p>Leading product designers have produced tantalising concepts of how these newly developed products could enhance our lives in cities where space is at a premium. One example is based on a floor plan measuring just 3m by 3.5m. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4uuEQxmEum8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Yves Béhar and MIT Media Lab’s design for a robotic furniture system for small apartments, which reconfigures itself for different functions.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The more intensive use of building space with hyper-dense living will have impacts on circulation spaces. It will require more services in tighter spaces and a vigilant eye on emergency evacuation pathways. Public space will be much more crowded and play a more important role in our well-being.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/people-friendly-furniture-in-public-places-matters-more-than-ever-in-todays-city-83568">People-friendly furniture in public places matters more than ever in today's city</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The robotic furniture that is available now could also help people with some form of impairment negotiate their home environment. An example is a bed that tilts up into a position that makes it easier to get out. </p>
<p>Some furniture now on the market has similar mechanically assisted functions to help people get out of a chair. This can be expanded into a broader range of facilitated living aids for people with physical and other impairments.</p>
<h2>Ease of transformation is the key</h2>
<p>Mobile furniture is not a new idea. The late 1980s and early 1990s spawned a whole range of mobile furniture, such as tables on wheels and sideboards with castors. </p>
<p>We have always tried to make rooms adaptable. Japanese screens or room dividers were one way. We have space-saving and transforming furniture from IKEA such as folded-up hallway tables that can become dining tables. </p>
<p>The idea of being able to transform our living space made these mobile furnishings enticing. But they all required a range of manual actions and this effort meant that, after a few initial experiments with them, they ended up in one static position. These mobile items became integrated and firmly located within the accumulations of <a href="https://academic.oup.com/jcr/article/15/2/139/1841428" title="Possessions and the Extended Self">things that make up our private sphere and who we are</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/reinventing-density-co-living-the-second-domestic-revolution-66410">Reinventing density: co-living, the second domestic revolution</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Industrial designers such as the late <a href="https://www.apnews.com/c902ea0b489e4a5892e0382965cdd8df">Luigi Colani</a> designed pre-manufactured <a href="https://www.designboom.com/architecture/luigi-colani-rotor-house/">dwellings with rotating interiors</a> – but the ease of transformation is what really makes a difference now. It’s likely to have reverberating effects.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Qlr7JnOuUEE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Luigi Colani’s Rotor House.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The term robotic furniture conjures up <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055683/">Jetsons</a>-like images, but what this means is we will have adaptive spaces. Rooms will transform from bedroom into living room or from study into entertainment space at the touch of a button, a gesture, or a voice command. </p>
<p>While the videos (above) of beautifully designed spaces make the idea tantalisingly attractive, we need to bear in mind these are initial concepts, even though well-developed. But this heralds the beginning of an entirely new way of conceiving and inhabiting space. We have reached a time where everything is in flux.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TbgLp9EpTyI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The Ori Cloud Bed in action.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It introduces another element into our daily routine. The time it takes for the transformation to be completed plays a big role. Too slow and we think twice about it, too fast and it might knock a few things about. In the examples shown (above) they are workable and safe.</p>
<p>If we take this development a step further, the way our cupboards store and provide access to our things might be next in line for robotic optimisation.</p>
<h2>It’s not just rooms that will be transformed</h2>
<p>There are still questions to be answered. For example, will the speed of the spatial transformation taking place influence the speed of our personal routines, like the time we allow for our morning coffee routine before heading out the door?</p>
<p>How will these new flexible spaces affect our sense of belonging and feeling at home, when everything can change with a voice command? </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/control-cost-and-convenience-determine-how-australians-use-the-technology-in-their-homes-114510">Control, cost and convenience determine how Australians use the technology in their homes</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Robotically optimised homes might change culture in similar ways to how digital communications altered our conversations, social conduct, personal relationships, and behaviour.</p>
<p>The way we think about building and living in high-rise apartments, which we have done for hundreds of years, is about to take a turn. It could transform how we conceive of and inhabit vertical space. </p>
<p>Existing building typologies and the ways and means of how buildings are designed and developed will change entirely. This has the potential to have a massive and disruptive impact on real estate development, building design and regulation, construction methods, housing and social policy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/123682/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christian Tietz receives funding from the Australian Government's Department of Industry, Innovation and Science's Smart Cities and Suburbs Program</span></em></p>
With space at a premium, robotic furniture can transform a room in seconds. How will this affect our sense of belonging and feeling at home, when everything can change with a voice command?
Christian Tietz, Senior Lecturer in Industrial Design, UNSW Sydney
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/106962
2019-02-15T11:18:22Z
2019-02-15T11:18:22Z
Interior design of the future will seem like magic
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258742/original/file-20190213-181619-7unjk6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/color-palette-guide-paint-samples-colored-557422801?src=gozdqSLTMJwySAj0_USy7Q-1-0">Bokeh Art Photo/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Imagine a house where the walls change colour depending on your mood, or your tablecloth changes shape when you’re having a dinner party. A house where every item, from your cushions to your lampshades, interact with you. This might sound like something out of Harry Potter, but such magic interior design could become a real part of our lives in the near future.</p>
<p>Many homes are already smart. <a href="https://www.statista.com/outlook/279/109/smart-home/united-states">Research from Statista</a> predicts that by the end of 2019, more than 45m smart home devices will be installed in US homes, and analysts predict that the smart home devices industry will reach <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/global-smart-home-market-2018-2023-with-profiles-of-honeywell-johnson--johnson-adt-control4-united-technologies-siemens-philips-acuity-brands-and-vivint-300596953.html">US$107.4 billion by 2023 globally</a>. One in four people in Britain own one or more <a href="https://yougov.co.uk/topics/technology/articles-reports/2018/08/10/almost-quarter-britons-now-own-one-or-more-smart-h">smart home devices</a>, such as smart speakers, thermostats and smart security, and the UK government has begun <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/smart-homes-to-help-older-and-disabled-people-get-digital-skills-and-tackle-loneliness-in-rural-areas">investing money</a> in teaching elderly and disabled people how to use smart tech in their homes.</p>
<p>But our view of smart homes tends to veer more on the side of sci-fi than cosiness. Most of us are likely to imagine our homes of the future as having clear glass walls and gadgets that anticipate our every need. A house where Alexa rules the roost. But what if the future smart home was more than gadgets, wires, and flashing lights? What if instead, we used technology to make the existing spaces around us more beautiful?</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258747/original/file-20190213-181599-1b0mxha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kitchen magic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/using-holograms-handsome-young-cook-smiling-1163831491?src=uSNLa3BVVS829rDPy9stbA-1-1">Dmytro Zinkevych/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I see a near future when technology is literally weaved into the fabric of everyday objects, when interiors will be designed as interactive, and decorative objects will no longer be static. Technology can be more than a tool to help us become more productive or make our lives easier. It can enhance the spaces we live in. I call this blend between interior design and interaction design “interioraction”.</p>
<h2>How it works</h2>
<p>For my PhD, I’ve been working with Newcastle’s <a href="https://openlab.ncl.ac.uk/">Open Lab</a> and <a href="https://northlab.uk/">NORTH Lab</a> teams to create new types of interactive living objects that can be used in interior designs. We use thermochromic fabric which changes colour, SMA wires which move and crumple, and e-textiles for seamless sensing.</p>
<p>We create decorative objects that will shift and change depending on how they are interacted with, instead of remaining static in the home. Take, for example, a dinner party – what if instead of a normal table runner, you had one that changed depending on touch and physical interaction with tableware around it. Such changes include not just the pattern, colour and texture of the fabric, but also its shape and form. Dinner guests would delight as the table runner moves and morphs among them, making their dining experience even more special and memorable. This is just the beginning of what is possible with decorative objects – that could soon be interacting with each other, with us and with the environment.</p>
<p>You don’t need imagine such a thing: <a href="https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=3196709.3196761">we have already created one</a>. When we tested it with people in a live setting, many became curious of the object. Some began to pet it, treating it as if it were alive. Check it out in this <a href="https://youtu.be/g7Tp-a1X804">video</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=373&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=373&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=373&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258746/original/file-20190213-181589-jr1017.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Meet the ActuEater.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sara Nabil</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Such decorative objects recreate themselves, standing out from the background of our homes. We would no longer suffer from display blindness, not noticing the beautiful artwork in our homes after staring at it for too long. Each day, a vase might shift, or our paintings change.</p>
<p>I envision a future where you can change the pattern of your sofa at a whim much as you would swipe your screen on a smartphone, or make the towels look that little bit posher for when your in-laws make a surprise visit.</p>
<h2>Positives and negatives</h2>
<p>These decorative objects could do more than just move around to delight those around us. Your bedroom could change depending on whether it’s morning or night – go to sleep in a cosy warm room, and awake to a fresh space that eases you into the morning. It could be linked up to anything from the moods of your friends or even the heartbeat of long-distance partner.</p>
<p>These spaces could also have practical applications – we could create classrooms that change based on activities. Different colours are known to have <a href="https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3024981">different psychological effects</a> – what teacher wouldn’t love to have a room that could help calm down a bunch of rambunctious five-year-olds?</p>
<p>Of course, there could be a dark side to this type of technology – we would need to rethink a number of ethical, social and legal challenges, most notably inhabitants’ privacy and the use of their personal data. Considering the latest GDPR changes, maybe ten years from now you might need to sign an explicit consent to sit on your host’s couch while visiting. </p>
<p>Because if interactive interiors become part of our homes, log and respond to our preferences, behaviours and psychological or physiological data, we might soon need new kinds of safeguard and consent for entering rooms or even for living with everyday objects such as a new hallway rug. To imagine such consequences, I’ve authored four <a href="https://www.springer.com/gb/book/9783319708744">dystopian fiction stories</a> about the potential implications of personal data use in future smart homes.</p>
<p>Over the course of <a href="https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3064745">my research</a> I’ve worked with architects, interior designers and artists, building fully interactive interiors in public spaces, galleries and museums – including <a href="https://saranabil.com/pages/ImmersiveHive.html">a human-scale beehive</a> for the Bees Exhibition held last year at the Great North Museum, Newcastle UK.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258983/original/file-20190214-1721-1gmn957.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=357&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The immersive hive.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Sara Nabil</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The human-sized hive was designed as a sticky and multi-sensory experience where people could wander about and interact with its soft pollen and honey-sticky hexagons, embedded with seamless touch-sensitivity and audio feedback, and learn about the mysterious life inside the beehive.</p>
<p>You may not want to live in a life-sized beehive, but with this new type of research and technology a whole new way of living could be possible. Many people fantasise about the magic of Harry Potter. They dream of the moving paintings and staircases. This magic could, someday soon, be real, and in true Hogwarts style – you won’t see the wires, you’ll just feel the magic.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/106962/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sara Nabil receives funding from Newcastle University under the Doctoral Training Award (SAgE DTA) scholarship program.</span></em></p>
Many homes are already smart – but they’re about to get much smarter.
Sara Nabil, PhD Candidate, Newcastle University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/103952
2018-10-29T16:33:48Z
2018-10-29T16:33:48Z
Six steps to make your room feel like home (on a budget)
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238344/original/file-20180927-48647-tcjbmr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=634%2C332%2C3473%2C2186&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/woman-looking-photos-hanging-on-decoration-1061269208?src=7vaYBN6Fxvt7oLHATm63-w-1-88">Shutterstock.</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>With the prospect of home ownership <a href="https://theconversation.com/millennials-home-ownership-hopes-dashed-by-a-broken-housing-market-91992">a distant dream</a> for the majority of millennials, many young people opt to rent a room in a shared flat or student accommodation. While tenancies can be short, research <a href="http://reports.mintel.com/display/859195/?__cc=1">shows that</a> a poor home environment can very quickly become a source of stress – and that’s the last thing you need, when studying or starting out in a new job. </p>
<p>Fortunately, as an experienced interior stylist and lecturer in textiles, I can reassure you that there are all sorts of fantastic things you can do to help your room feel like a home – and you don’t have to spend a lot to do it. First thing’s first: come up with a “colour story” and try to stick with it. A good way to do this is to pick three colours. </p>
<p>The first colour will act as the main colour, taking up about 60% of the space, while the second will act as a complementary colour, taking up 30%, and the third will be an accent, using only about 10% of the space.</p>
<p>Once you have decided on your colour story, you need to start thinking about all the other objects in the room, and how they interact with one another. Apply your colour proportions to them, thinking about how much space the different elements take up.</p>
<hr>
<h1>Step 1 – paint (if you’re allowed)</h1>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/BoNKYhCnGms","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Walls take up a large proportion of your room and act as the backdrop to everything else, so the colour of them can make a big difference. Get in touch with your landlord to find out if you’re allowed to paint your walls – and offer to restore the original colour when you leave. </p>
<p>Colours can help to <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-can-use-colour-to-communicate-how-we-feel-heres-how-90157">convey a mood</a>, so think carefully about the paint you’ll use – do you want your room to feel lively? Then pick a bright colour such as yellow, pink or blue. Do you want your room to have a more relaxed feel? Then opt for more muted tones.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-can-use-colour-to-communicate-how-we-feel-heres-how-90157">We can use colour to communicate how we feel – here's how</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Raid your parents’ garage for some old pots of paint and mix them together to create your own customised shade. You can even just paint one feature wall if you don’t have enough paint to cover the whole room.</p>
<p>If you intend on buying new paint, purchase a store’s own brand as this is a lot cheaper than the other brands that they sell. But before you do, get hold of paint charts – these are free and will help you to see how colours work together in order to make a choice.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Step 2 – refresh the bedspread</h2>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-64M0Xv-koM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Bedspreads cover quite a large surface area, so the design and colour can really impact a room. If you’re not painting your walls, this is where you should inject your primary colour. And if your budget doesn’t stretch to buying new bed linen, here are ideas to spruce yours up or make your own:</p>
<ul>
<li>Dip dye your existing set with a complementary colour, using supermarket fabric dyes.</li>
<li>Tie dye your existing set, using one of the many Shibori techniques, with supermarket fabric dyes.</li>
<li>Use fabric pens to draw your own design.</li>
<li>Pick up some old sheets you like from a market or charity shop and sew them together to make a duvet cover.</li>
</ul>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=755&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=755&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238354/original/file-20180927-48659-6fnsni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=755&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">You can never have too many pillows.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/stylish-bedroom-interior-design-black-patterned-346084220?src=sUmRutUx_U8SHOny7nUiBA-1-56">Shutterstock.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Step 3 – add soft furnishings</h2>
<p>Add some scatter cushions to your bed in your complementary and accent colours. Buy plain cushions from a charity shop or market and add your own embellishments and designs. You can use dye techniques, fabric paint, pens, pompoms or tassels.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Step 4 – hang pictures</h2>
<p>If you’ve got prints for the wall, charity shops often sell inexpensive frames, and you can paint them different colours using sample paint pots from a hardware store. Instead of scrolling through pictures of family and friends on social media – which can sometimes <a href="https://theconversation.com/social-media-is-it-really-to-blame-for-young-people-being-lonelier-than-any-other-age-group-104292">make you more lonely</a> – you can peg printed images to a string of fairy lights or bunting.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=188&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=188&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=188&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=236&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=236&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/238360/original/file-20180927-48665-1d5g8at.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=236&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Colour swatch art.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/crazyoctopus/8103733893/sizes/h/">Crazyoctopus/Flickr.</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If you don’t have any art, but want something colourful for your wall, take the free paint swatches at the hardware store and stick them to a sheet of card. Pay attention to the colours you put together – do you want to create a colour theme, or are you going for a rainbow effect? </p>
<hr>
<h2>Step 5 – adjust lighting</h2>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/BoJ9wOan1Wc","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Lighting is very important for the feel and ambience of a room. You can create warmth by zoning your room with floor and table lamps, which you can switch on in the evenings instead of your main light. This helps to create cosy corners and a feeling of relaxation, which a bright overhead light doesn’t achieve.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Step 6 – style books and plants</h2>
<p>These are the finishing touches. You can colour code your books for a gorgeous rainbow effect (this looks super styled and colourful). And plants bring a bit of life indoors, while the green foliage looks very sophisticated. Plants also absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen, and have some capacity to <a href="http://time.com/5105027/indoor-plants-air-quality/">reduce indoor air pollution</a>. There is also evidence to suggest that indoor plants can <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4419447/">reduce physiological and psychological stress</a> and flowers in particular can <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/4579/34396b30e9c08dff6426b0245ce096607998.pdf">improve your mood</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/Bn3whaDFQh2","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<hr>
<p>Feel inspired to create a lively, relaxing space to escape to at the end of your busy day. Think of your room as your favourite colourful painting – but one that you can walk around in.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/103952/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sian Elin Thomas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Practical advice from an expert about lighting, decoration and furnishings.
Sian Elin Thomas, Lecturer in Textiles, Cardiff Metropolitan University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/98941
2018-07-25T20:08:21Z
2018-07-25T20:08:21Z
Live in a small place? An interior designer’s tips to create the illusion of space
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229204/original/file-20180725-194137-1tthsbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There are a few tricks that architects use to make spaces appear bigger – and you can use them too.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">from shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Research shows humans don’t like being caged in, preferring to be in larger, more <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27230490">open spaces</a>. And different factors – such as the shape of rooms, the colour of surfaces and the positioning and brightness of lighting – all influence how we perceive space. </p>
<p>These are the elements designers and architects consider when creating spaces. And there are several tips you can use yourself to make your apartment, or any living space, seem roomier.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australians-love-tiny-houses-so-why-arent-more-of-us-living-in-them-44230">Australians love tiny houses, so why aren't more of us living in them?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Extending space</h2>
<p>If your apartment has outside views, you should use these. By facing living areas and furniture towards the window or balcony, the outside landscape becomes an extension of the inside space, increasing the perception of the room’s size. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229223/original/file-20180725-194149-8b8fis.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Frank Lloyd Wright made the surrounds feel like an extension of the interior of his famous Fallingwater.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">from shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Architects (including Frank Lloyd Wright in his famous work Fallingwater) have long used this tactic to draw the eye outside, as a contrast to smaller spaces with low ceilings. A window doesn’t need to be large to create this effect, but some <a href="http://www.academicjournals.org/journal/SRE/article-abstract/C49A20017716">research has shown</a> it needs to take up about 20% of the wall to improve satisfaction with the interior space.</p>
<p>You can also place a mirror opposite that view, which will <a href="https://www.afr.com/lifestyle/home-design/in-a-reflective-mood-20150706-gi62mp">reflect the outside</a> and contrive another illusory kind of “outside”. A mirror’s view into another room would have a similar effect.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229188/original/file-20180725-194131-fj07ee.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A strategically placed mirror can create the illusion of extended space.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">from shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Ceilings with light fittings tend to shrink a space. Lights are best located on walls, about 300mm below ceiling height and directed to shine up across the ceiling and down the walls. This spreads light over the surfaces, rather than concentrating it in a single direction, creating an illusion of size. </p>
<p>Standing and desktop lamps provide the same diversity of spread and reflection. </p>
<h2>Using colour</h2>
<p>Interior designers do follow guidelines based on studies of <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/486871">colour</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00038628.1999.9696847">light theory</a> to create the appearance of more space, though these may be seen as subjective and relying on intuition. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-red-warmer-than-blue-what-colours-can-tell-you-24614">Is red warmer than blue? What colours can tell you</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Lighter colours, for instance, best reflect light and so create the appearance of space. Darker colours, decorative wallpapers and patterned fabrics shrink space and absorb light. Studies have shown lighter ceilings are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26822335">perceived to be higher</a> than darker ceilings.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229196/original/file-20180725-194155-1bdtzq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lighter colours help expand the perception of space.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/9ZvuWg8deho">Hutomo Abrianto/Unsplash</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Dark colours for floors can constrict a space. Deeply ornate textures and fabrics also shrink volume, as do exaggerated patterned carpets and rugs. Open and continuous flooring surfaces, like timber boards, engineered flooring, broadloom carpet and tiles, create an appearance of space. </p>
<h2>Flexible space</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=832&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=832&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=832&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1045&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1045&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227731/original/file-20180716-44082-obq7hq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1045&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A wall at door height doubles as a cupboard that faces the bedroom side of the divide.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jason Busch/Stanhill Studio renovation by Normam Day&Associates, Architects.</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>You could reorganise the apartment to change the functions of the rooms. Think, for instance, are the bedrooms well placed, or should the living areas be relocated? </p>
<p>Generally, external views are best adopted for the daylight hours and so for the living and working areas. And bedrooms rely less on broad outside views. </p>
<p>Melbourne’s heritage Romberg’s Stanhill Building was designed in 1950 with flexible apartment spaces that could be used as residences, offices and medical suites. </p>
<p>Later renovations repurposed the dining and living spaces as smaller bedrooms. The original bedrooms were redesigned as open-plan living and dining spaces, with views to Albert Park Lake.</p>
<p>A studio renovation (see photo above) in the building adopted a storage unit (facing into the bedroom area) to door height, which acts as a screen to divide the nominal “rooms”. </p>
<p>Things that normally work for a single purpose can take on more functions, which aids in using a small space for many purposes. For instance, if you own the apartment, you could replace a normal brick or timber dividing wall with a built-in cupboard which can face, back-to-back, into both rooms. </p>
<p>For the apartment renovation in the same building, a storage unit was designed to be a bookshelf taking up most of a wall (below).</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227733/original/file-20180716-44097-1ds5gox.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A wall can become a storage unit to save space.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Trevor Mein/Stanhill Aptartment 2013 Norman Day & Associates.</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Using furniture</h2>
<p>While there is limited research on the perceived spatial dimensions of furniture and its effect, <a href="http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0113267">studies do show</a> the more furniture you put into a space, the smaller it appears. And most of us know the less “stuff” we have in our apartments the bigger they seem.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-apartment-dwellers-need-indoor-plants-80196">Why apartment dwellers need indoor plants</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Fitted living room furniture with built-in side tables that hug the wall is better than having large single units and isolated tables. TVs and sound systems incorporated into storage are more space-efficient than stand-alone units. </p>
<p>Big furniture, like settees and coffee tables, ornate bedheads and oversized loose chairs, also overcrowds space. It’s not comfortable to have to walk around large pieces of furniture rather than through space.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229222/original/file-20180725-194149-1hlygxl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The less stuff you have, the more spacious things appear.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BilnL1FHdIb/?taken-by=elisabeth_heier">@elisabeth_heier/Instagram (screenshot)</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The best types of furniture to use in small spaces are simple open-framed chairs and tables, furniture with light frames, steel or timber, and open backs.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98941/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kirsten Day is a director of Norman Day + Associates Architects. </span></em></p>
Using mirrors, lighting and certain types of furniture can add the illusion of space to your otherwise tiny apartment.
Kirsten Day, Course Director Interior Architecture, Swinburne University of Technology
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/98374
2018-07-05T10:38:07Z
2018-07-05T10:38:07Z
Shelter design can help people recover from homelessness
<p>Some <a href="https://endhomelessness.org/resource/the-united-states-conference-of-mayors-hunger-and-homelessness-survey/">544,000</a> people in the United States have no shelter every night, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Homeless families make up over <a href="https://endhomelessness.org/resource/the-united-states-conference-of-mayors-hunger-and-homelessness-survey/">one-third of this total</a>. </p>
<p>Beyond exposing them to weather, crime and unsanitary conditions, homelessness can also damage <a href="http://www.traumacenter.org/products/pdf_files/Shelter_from_storm.pdf">people’s self-esteem</a>, making them feel <a href="https://works.bepress.com/sburn/10/">helpless or hopeless</a>. Being homeless is a traumatic experience, in part because of the <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G18/007/65/PDF/G1800765.pdf?OpenElement">stigma associated with this situation</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.uky.edu/%7Eeushe2/Bandura/Bandura1999JASP.pdf">Recovering from homelessness</a> may therefore involve not just finding a job and permanent home but also rebuilding one’s self-esteem. </p>
<p><a href="http://interiordesign.fsu.edu/jill-pable/">My research on the built environment</a> suggests that the interior design of homeless shelters can either <a href="https://www.healthypeople.gov/2020/about/foundation-health-measures/determinants-of-health">support or hinder</a> people’s ability to assert control over their future.</p>
<h2>How design affects people</h2>
<p>Research has long demonstrated that <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/environmental-psychology-for-design-9781501316821/">physical spaces</a> affect human moods and behaviors. </p>
<p>Office environments with many common spaces <a href="https://www.informedesign.org/Rs_detail/rsId/3547">foster collaboration</a>, for example, while stock investors who work on higher floors <a href="https://theconversation.com/stock-investors-on-higher-floors-take-more-risks-heres-why-92655">take more risks</a>. </p>
<p>Homeless shelters, too, can influence how residents <a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062199188/welcome-to-your-world/">see the world and themselves</a>. A shelter with sterile corridor and glaring lights may silently send the message that, “People don’t think you deserve a nice place to live.” </p>
<p>Homeless housing designed with warm colors, thoughtful lighting and useful signage, on the other hand, can <a href="https://nextcity.org/features/view/new-york-rikers-closing-prison-design-humane-jail">send the opposite message</a>: “Someone cares.”</p>
<p>In my experience, most homeless shelters are designed simply to house as many people as possible. Others are so dilapidated, violent or dirty that <a href="https://www.npr.org/2012/12/06/166666265/why-some-homeless-choose-the-streets-over-shelters">people actually prefer to sleep outside</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223826/original/file-20180619-126553-1r7y8kz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">These hallways send contrasting messages to residents, staff and visitors. Right: Kearney Center, Clemons Rutherford Architects.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jill Pable</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What unhoused families need</h2>
<p>I undertook a three-month <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/264692272_The_Homeless_Shelter_Family_Experience_Examining_the_Influence_of_Physical_Living_Conditions_on_Perceptions_of_Internal_Control_Crowding_Privacy_and_Related_Issues">field experiment</a> at a shelter in Florida to understand how bedroom design could support or hinder two families trying to transition from homelessness into permanent housing. </p>
<p>Each family consisted of a single mother with two children. One family had two girls, ages 3 and 4. The other had two boys, ages 3 and 18. </p>
<p>Both parents had generally positive relationships with their children, had completed high school through the 10th grade and were living in the shelter because they had lost their jobs.</p>
<p>Initially, both families stayed in identical 9-by-12 bedrooms. Each had two metal bunk beds, one dresser, pale green walls, a single light fixture and a bathroom shared with a family of four. With so little storage, the families piled their belongings on the unused fourth bunk. </p>
<p>The bedroom door had no lock, so that staff could check in on residents as needed. This is common in shelters. </p>
<h2>Housing that looks like jail</h2>
<p>After two months, one family moved into a room that our team had upgraded with 18 new features intended to empower residents by offering them control over their environment. </p>
<p>These included drawer-and-bin storage for their possessions, lap desks, privacy curtains around the beds, bulletin boards and shelving. We also painted the walls a light blue. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/226015/original/file-20180703-116129-1s13gph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Unaltered shelter room, left. Upgraded room, right.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jill Pable</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I interviewed the mothers in the beginning and the end of their experience. </p>
<p>The mother who would later move into an upgraded room felt “aggravated and frustrated” in the first space. The mother who stayed in that room for all three months described it as “crowded,” “claustrophobic” and “grim.” She even said the metal beds and hard, cold floors reminded her of jail. </p>
<p>Both families piled their belongings on the unused fourth bunk for lack of other storage. </p>
<p>“The more time you spend in it, the more you feel like the walls are closing in,” she told me after four weeks, explaining that she often stayed out late to avoid coming home to this cramped situation.</p>
<p>So did her older son, who sometimes spent all night in the shelter’s computer lab. His mother worried about her son’s “vampire” hours. </p>
<p>This family seemed agitated throughout the three-month study. They sought relief from their housing situation – and from each other – elsewhere. </p>
<h2>The family’s experience in the altered room</h2>
<p>Things looked different for the other family. </p>
<p>The good lighting and wall cushions encouraged them to read together. They had guests more often. A case worker told me that the family would sometimes spend the entire day together in their shelter bedroom – something they’d never done in their previous space.</p>
<p>Though the two rooms were the same size, a divided dutch door and bed curtains allowed the residents in the altered room to create personal spaces for listening to music or reading. </p>
<p>They organized and put away their possessions in the storage provided, reducing clutter. </p>
<p>The children liked drawing on the marker boards, so the mother allowed them to use it as a reward for good behavior, exerting parental authority in a positive way. </p>
<h2>Signs of ownership</h2>
<p>Tellingly, the families also expressed themselves differently in the two rooms.<br>
In the upgraded room with shelving, the family displayed photographs, art and beloved stuffed animals. The kids played dress up in front of the mirror. These are both <a href="https://academic.oup.com/jcr/article-abstract/17/3/303/1822547?redirectedFrom=fulltextlink">territorial acts that define and confirm identities</a>. </p>
<p>The family in the unaltered bedroom displayed little art, in part because the mother felt it was an imposition to ask shelter staff for tape to affix items to the wall. </p>
<p>When her 3-year-old boy tried to play cars on the floor, his mom told him it was too dirty. Bored, he would peel paint off the wall near his bed. </p>
<p>She reprimanded him for this behavior, causing arguments. The children also argued frequently with each other. </p>
<h2>A place to call home</h2>
<p>At the study’s end, I asked the mother living in the upgraded space how she would have felt if her family had stayed in the unaltered bedroom. Her answer reflected the role housing plays in keeping a family happy and healthy.</p>
<p>“I don’t know if I would say I would be depressed, but I would have had a different feeling,” she responded. “Sometimes you just want peace and quiet” – which the bed curtains and dutch door now offered her.</p>
<p>She also thought her kids might have eventually “cracked,” she said, because they couldn’t act as they would in “a regular home.” </p>
<p>“My older girl will pull the curtains and read books to her sister” now, the mother said. “She feels like she has something that belongs to her.” </p>
<p>The new bedroom, which could be adjusted to fit the family’s needs, empowered them to take ownership of it. I believe such actions may help combat underlying feelings of helplessness. </p>
<p>This small, only partially controlled study is not the final word in shelter design. </p>
<p>But it certainly suggests that <a href="http://designresourcesforhomelessness.org/">shelter architecture</a> can help families experiencing homelessness by giving them a calm, positive and supportive home base <a href="https://works.bepress.com/sburn/10/">for planning their future</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98374/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Pable receives funding from the Council for Research and Creativity at Florida State University. She is affiliated with the non-profit organization Design Resources for Homelessness. </span></em></p>
Studies show that people’s environments influence their mood. The same is true of homeless shelters, which can either help or hurt residents’ psychological well-being — and, possibly, their futures.
Jill Pable, Professor of Interior Design and Architecture, Florida State University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/86069
2017-10-23T10:00:22Z
2017-10-23T10:00:22Z
How IKEA used affordable and innovative design to transform the homes of everyday consumers
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191185/original/file-20171020-22940-12q60wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Recognisable to all.</span> </figcaption></figure><p>For decades, IKEA has filled homes across the world with bookcases, beds, cardboard boxes and countless tea lights. The company’s business model, based on huge production runs of identical stock, allowed it to export Scandinavian style at an affordable price. </p>
<p>Its products are so popular and so ubiquitous, that you might find yourself in a friend’s home sitting on a sofa that is very similar to your own, looking at a bookcase that matches yours and eating with very familiar looking cutlery. IKEA created a reasonably priced way for customers to express themselves at home, and while it may also have helped build a world of indentikit interiors, it opened consumers to what was otherwise expensive design. </p>
<p>As a product design specialist I applaud IKEA for how they have developed their business and invested in design to bring great products to the masses, including the use of materials to drive down prices – look inside one of their coffee tables and you’ll find a hollow core supported with card. </p>
<p>IKEA’s trades on the idea of family connections and aims for an emotional connection with customers. Instead of relying on numbers, for example, products are named after Scandinavian islands, names of people, birds and berries.</p>
<p>They continue to innovate in materials and production techniques which drive prices lower and lower. When the first UK store opened in 1987 (the company is celebrating its 30th British birthday) the <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/timeseries/czoh/mm23">cost of a loaf of bread</a> was around 40p, and the classic “Lack” coffee table retailed at £18. Today, three decades on, that same table costs £14.</p>
<p>IKEA are widely considered as the “kings of flat pack furniture”, having cleverly exploited the potential of DIY assembly. Being able to visit a store, pick a wardrobe, chuck the cleverly packaged parts into the boot and drive home proved to a very popular approach, avoiding waiting weeks for delivery and simple – even if the accompanying instructions aren’t always as simple as they look. Social media is <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IKEAarguments?src=hash">full of insights</a> about IKEA-instigated arguments over how to construct furniture (or even just trying to navigate the stores’ pathways). But the company remains <a href="http://www.lansons.com/lego-ikea-bmw-group-top-list-uks-reputable-companies-uk-plcs-lag-way-behind/">highly thought of</a>. </p>
<h2>Scando-chic</h2>
<p>IKEA’s Scandinavian roots and design DNA made it stand out when it arrived in the UK (it was already well established in Germany, France, Japan and Australia). Along with Habitat, IKEA spearheaded a clear departure from chintz and overly decorative furniture and homeware. The new shopping experience of choosing from “rooms” set up with IKEA goods excited customers who came from far and wide to visit the distinctive blue and yellow box-like stores. </p>
<p>IKEA’s range of products has expanded and evolved in the last 30 years but some items like the famous Billy bookcase, continue to sell as they have done for decades. The Billy is a beautifully simple product that can be transformed with hundreds of options, whether you want to change the colours, add doors, or expand the size of your collection.</p>
<p>The popularity of IKEA means so many people have the same furniture, bedding and accessories in their homes. But it also means a lack of individualism in the very places we like to think most reflect our personalities. Nevertheless, some aim to customise: “<a href="http://www.ikeahackers.net/">IKEA hackers</a>” turn colanders into lamps or shelves into headboards, producing unique pieces from mass produced products. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gJ6cND1FsBQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>Modern design</h2>
<p>IKEA itself has not become lazy or complacent when it comes to design. The <a href="http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/products/lighting/ceiling-lights/ikea-ps-2014-pendant-lamp-white-turquoise-art-40251119/">PS 2014 pendant lamp</a>, one of their most famous recent additions, is an engineering masterpiece. </p>
<p>Closed, the lamp forms a white sphere with a jigsaw style pattern. But with the simple pull of a string the sphere opens, revealing its interior copper colour and increasing the brightness of the light emitted. It works beautifully and offers a great user experience. It is something to show off, and a real talking point.</p>
<p>Other <a href="https://www.houseandhome.ie/news-events/sneak-peek-hay-x-ikea-ypperlig-range-landing-stores-october-20206">parts of its range</a> demonstrate great Scandinavian design at a much higher price point. </p>
<p>In my own home, I have a Malm bed, assorted cushions, candles, bedding and cutlery – simple, stylish and good quality. And they didn’t cost the earth. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t own at least one IKEA product. From its humble and fitting beginnings on a kitchen table in Sweden in 1943, IKEA has transformed the modern design world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86069/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dan Lewis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The company has made the world flat (packed).
Dan Lewis, Course Leader, Product and Transport Design, Staffordshire University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/80126
2017-07-13T01:53:12Z
2017-07-13T01:53:12Z
The next step in sustainable design: Bringing the weather indoors
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177381/original/file-20170707-29852-1rs701f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Dancing sunlight patterns reflected onto an interior ceiling from a wind-disturbed external water surface.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A building’s primary purpose may be to keep the weather out, but most do such an effective job of this that they also inadvertently deprive us of contact with two key requirements for our well-being and effectiveness: nature and change. </p>
<p>In the 1950s Donald Hebb’s <a href="http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Hebb/">Arousal Theory</a> established that people need a degree of changing sensory stimulation in order to remain fully attentive. And 30 years later, <a href="https://mdc.mo.gov/sites/default/files/resources/2012/10/ulrich.pdf">landmark research</a> by health care designer Roger Ulrich showed that hospital patients in rooms with views of nature had lower stress levels and recovered more quickly than patients whose rooms looked out at a brick wall. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, many buildings – especially in cities – are not blessed with green surroundings. I am part of a group of architects and psychologists at the University of Oregon that has been examining ways to overcome this problem using an aspect of nature available anywhere: the weather. Think of rippling sunlight reflecting from water onto the underside of a boat, or the dappled shadows from foliage swaying in a breeze. Other examples can be seen at <a href="http://www.vitalarchitecture.org/">vitalarchitecture.org</a>.</p>
<p>When we brought these kinds of natural movements indoors, we found that they <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.18848/2325-1662/CGP/v10i04/41-56">reduced heart rates and were less distracting</a> than similar, artificially generated movement. Early results suggest that seeing live natural movement of this kind in an indoor space may be more beneficial than viewing outdoor nature through a window, and could not only help to keep us calm but also improve our attention. </p>
<p>These findings are consistent with the <a href="http://willsull.net/la270/LA_270_Readings/LA_270_Readings_files/Kaplan%201995.pdf">Attention Restoration Theory</a> proposed by University of Michigan psychologists <a href="https://lsa.umich.edu/psych/people/emeriti-faculty/rkaplan.html">Rachel</a> and <a href="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Eskap/">Stephen</a> Kaplan. Among other things, their work suggests that familiar natural movement patterns of this kind have the capacity to keep us alert without being distracting.</p>
<h2>Beyond green building</h2>
<p>Over the last two decades architects and engineers have developed approaches to building design that greatly reduce the impact of buildings on the natural environment (<a href="http://www.worldgbc.org/what-green-building">“green” buildings</a>) and their human occupants (<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.8988">“healthy” buildings</a>). But these movements focus primarily on new buildings, which benefit only a relatively small number of people compared to the many who could be helped by making existing structures more habitable. </p>
<p>Moreover, most people – including many of those responsible for ordering the construction and remodeling of buildings – are not aware of these advances. Many key features of green buildings, such as energy and water conservation, for example, are not immediately noticeable, and as a result, these simple but important practices are significantly underused.</p>
<p>Several leading commentators on sustainable design, including <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Biophilic-Design-Practice-Bringing-Buildings/dp/0470163348">Judith Heerwagen and the late Stephen Kellert</a>, have suggested that in order to have any meaningful impact on the daunting environmental problems we now face, green buildings can no longer simply “do no harm.” Rather, they argue that buildings need to actively demonstrate ways of living in harmony with nature. Our work suggests that bringing the movements of sunlight, wind and rain indoors could make passive energy-saving features in buildings more obvious to the people who order and occupy them, and so greatly increase their usage.</p>
<h2>Bringing the weather indoors</h2>
<p>Light shelves, for example, are devices that are commonly retrofitted to the windows of existing buildings to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.18848/2325-1077/CGP/v08i01/55098">reflect daylight deeper into an interior</a>. Former University of Oregon master’s degree student Aaron Weiss and I have shown that when a shallow layer of water is added to the top of a light shelf and is disturbed by the wind, the shelf reflects moving sunlight patterns onto the ceiling inside. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=621&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=621&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177616/original/file-20170710-5989-1hq9hok.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=621&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A water light shelf reflecting wind-animated sunlight onto an interior ceiling; the arrow on the right represents air movement.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In controlled experiments using a windowless room, with a fan and powerful light to represent the wind and sun, we found that this kind of wind-animated light not only lowered occupants’ heart rates but was also <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.18848/2325-1662/CGP/v10i04/41-56">less distracting than similar, artificially generated moving patterns</a>. Importantly, adding wind movement did not reduce the amount of light the shelves transmitted. However, it did make the shelves much more visible to people using the space. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=661&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=661&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=661&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177615/original/file-20170710-587-g2t02t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Water light shelves being tested on a dental clinic waiting room in Eugene, Oregon.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We found the same was true of a range of other key passive energy-saving techniques, including solar heating, shading and natural ventilation. Adding sun, wind or rain-generated movement did not reduce their environmental performance, and in many cases it revealed their operation to those using the building.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177723/original/file-20170711-14421-w5ibtc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A glazed internal courtyard can bring weather-generated movement into its surrounding indoor spaces. (Click to zoom.)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The calming effects of natural indoor animation could be particularly helpful in stressful locations, such as hospitals and doctors’ offices – especially in places where people experience the additional stress of waiting. Aquariums are often used in medical waiting rooms, for example, because they have been found to have a <a href="https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/07/150729215632.htm">calming effect on patients</a>. The stress reduction can be even greater, however, when indoor movement comes from uncontrolled nature such as the weather.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1009&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1009&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177618/original/file-20170710-5935-1g77ui5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1009&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wind-animated foliage shadows projected by the sun onto an interior surface. (Click to zoom.)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But how can we invite the movements of the elements indoors without undermining a building’s first task – sheltering us from the weather? There are three simple ways. We can enclose weather-generated movement in glass courtyards; use sunlight to project movement from outdoors onto interior surfaces; or project it onto the outside of translucent materials, such as obscured glass. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1042&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1042&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177619/original/file-20170710-5989-103qpj2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1042&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Allowing the sun to project wind-animated shadows onto the exterior of translucent materials, such as obscured glass, can also effectively bring that movement indoors. (Click to zoom.)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>No real substitute for live nature</h2>
<p>There are many kinds of recorded natural phenomena available today. We can watch <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmPzbZVUp3g">videos of gently rolling ocean waves</a>, or fall asleep to the <a href="http://www.sequoiarecords.com/x016mp3/Relaxing+Rainstorm%3A+Nature+Sounds+for+Meditation%2C+Relaxation+and+Sleep.html">recorded sounds of falling rain</a>. There are even sophisticated <a href="https://www.noisli.com/">software programs</a> that can generate these effects digitally. So why go to the trouble of redesigning buildings to bring these effects indoors? </p>
<p>To answer this question, former University of Oregon graduate student Jeffrey Stattler and I projected a digital tree shadow onto the wall of a windowless room and <a href="http://search.proquest.com/openview/c98e488917d567132f63da431014ab69/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y">tested whether there was any difference</a> in people’s responses depending on whether the electronic tree moved with live changes in the wind outside, or according to a computer program. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=728&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=728&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=728&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=915&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=915&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/177620/original/file-20170710-5982-1x9lfyw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=915&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The digital tree shadow developed by Jeffrey Stattler can move realistically with live changes in the speed and direction of the wind outside. (Click to zoom.)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kevin Nute</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Most people could not tell whether the tree movements were generated by the wind or by computer. But when they believed the movement was wind-generated, their assessments of its beneficial effects were significantly higher in all categories. </p>
<p>In other words, indoor sensory change is likely to have a much greater beneficial effect on us when we think it is natural and live. So unless we are prepared to mislead people, there is no real substitute for using the real thing. </p>
<p>According to the Environmental Protection Agency, most people in the United States now <a href="https://nepis.epa.gov/Exe/ZyNET.exe/9100LMBU.TXT?ZyActionD=ZyDocument&Client=EPA&Index=1986+Thru+1990&Docs=&Query=&Time=&EndTime=&SearchMethod=1&TocRestrict=n&Toc=&TocEntry=&QField=&QFieldYear=&QFieldMonth=&QFieldDay=&IntQFieldOp=0&ExtQFieldOp=0&XmlQuery=&File=D%3A%5Czyfiles%5CIndex%20Data%5C86thru90%5CTxt%5C00000022%5C9100LMBU.txt&User=ANONYMOUS&Password=anonymous&SortMethod=h%7C-&MaximumDocuments=1&FuzzyDegree=0&ImageQuality=r75g8/r75g8/x150y150g16/i425&Display=hpfr&DefSeekPage=x&SearchBack=ZyActionL&Back=ZyActionS&BackDesc=Results%20page&MaximumPages=1&ZyEntry=1&SeekPage=x&ZyPURL">spend more than 90 percent of their lives inside buildings</a>. Features that make us more relaxed and productive in those indoor environments, then, could have significant positive effects on a great many lives.</p>
<p>Lighting, heating and cooling those buildings <a href="https://www.c2es.org/technology/overview/buildings">accounts for almost 40 percent of U.S. energy consumption</a>. The same natural indoor animation effects could also help to reduce that figure by increasing public awareness of passive energy-saving in buildings. </p>
<p>In addition to its practical benefits for people and the environment, weather-generated indoor animation also shows us that, while separating us from its extremes, buildings can also reconnect us with nature.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/80126/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kevin Nute does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Research shows that bringing nature indoors, in the form of movement created by light, wind and water, makes occupants calmer and more productive. It also could promote interest in sustainable design.
Kevin Nute, Professor of Architecture, University of Oregon
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/71698
2017-01-23T01:29:50Z
2017-01-23T01:29:50Z
Going for gold: Trump, Louis XIV and interior design
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153770/original/image-20170123-30995-1rxd9r0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">US President Donald Trump, flanked by Senior Advisor Jared Kushner (standing, L-R), Vice President Mike Pence, Staff Secretary Rob Porter and Chief of Staff Reince Priebus - in front of the new Oval Office gold curtains. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jonathan Ernst/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/white-house-trump-oval-office-makeover-44940453">Yellow-gold swagged curtains</a>, glimpsed in the first pictures from the Trump administration’s official duties in the Oval Office, have fuelled speculation over whether America’s new president will bring his signature taste in interior design to the White House.</p>
<p>Striped crimson curtains and <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4145428/Donald-Trump-changes-curtains-Oval-Office.html">a rug with quotes</a> attributed to former presidents installed by former President Obama, have been replaced with patterned gold drapes and a sunburst rug (reportedly designed by Laura Bush during her husband’s presidency). Framing himself with gold and sunbursts, America’s new president appears to be unperturbed by those who have compared his ostentatious style with that of The Sun King. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153771/original/image-20170123-30949-56i2db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The old Oval Office curtains.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Carlos Barria/Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The media and popular bloggers have been quick to draw a link between <a href="http://www.idesignarch.com/inside-donald-and-melania-trumps-manhattan-apartment-mansion/">the famous glittering décor of Trump’s Manhattan penthouse</a> and Louis XIV’s Palace of Versailles. Kate Wagner creator of the popular satirical blog McMansion Hell, asked <a href="http://www.curbly.com/trump-is-a-living-mcmansion">Whose Style is That? Louis XIV or Donald Trump?</a></p>
<p>The comparison holds at a cursory glance: the acres of marble, gilt capitals on columns, fountains and painted ceilings in the Trump triplex nod in the direction of the Sun King’s palace. But a confusion of references to interiors and furniture made over more than 130 years in the two long reigns of Louis XIV (1643–1715) and his great-grandson Louis XV (1715–1774) makes it impossible to classify this style in relation to a specific period. Trump’s apartment might, then, best be described as neo-French grand manner.</p>
<p>It is easy for a historian of French decorative arts to point out the errors of reference in Trump’s apartment to the designs that inspire it. The proportions are all wrong: the columns are wide and squat, the entablature above the gilt capitals too narrow, and the cornice below the painted ceiling far too wide. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KouKXa4pw3Y?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Not to mention the heavily gilt Louis XV inspired armchairs (or fauteuils to use the proper term) that have none of the sinuous appeal of their 18th-century forbears. Proportion governs elegance in the palaces of the Bourbon kings, and such errors would have been considered extremely poor taste then, as they are now.</p>
<p>Trump is far from the first to emulate the decorative style developed for Louis XIV and his heirs. Some of the most extraordinary examples of neo-French grand manner design are found in the palaces of the reclusive Bavarian king Ludwig II (r. 1864–86).</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=624&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=784&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=784&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153776/original/image-20170123-7318-47llzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=784&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A copy of the Hall of Mirrors built for Ludwig II at Schloss Herrenchiemsee, Bavaria.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Obsessed with old-regime France and all that it entailed, Ludwig built a replica of Versailles on an island in the Chiemsee lake, 60 kilometres south of Munich. Among his many follies, the Bavarian king employed an army of artisans to recreate the Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors at Schloss Herrenchiemsee.</p>
<p>Robber barons of late-19th-century America had a penchant for the decorative arts of Bourbon France too. Alva Vanderbilt, one of the most flamboyant patrons of the Gilded Age, is said to have started the fashion at William K. Vanderbilt House on Fifth Avenue, New York (called the Petit Chateau), with rooms lavishly decorated in period styles. </p>
<p>Alva and her peers wanted the real thing when they could get it, and imported 18th-century boiseries (carved wooden panelling) looted from crumbling French chateaux to install in their mansions and set off their superlative collections of art and furniture. Vanderbilt’s homage to the old regime was, perhaps, more successful than chez Trump, but the nod to a stately French style to show off new money serves the same purpose in both cases.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153775/original/image-20170123-7318-1rbdryv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Dining Room designed for Alva Vanderbilt, Marble House, Newport.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Gavin Ashworth</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Putting questions of taste and period style aside, it is worth considering the comparisons made between Trump and Louis XIV. Trump’s opponents are keen to point to his taste as evidence of an unscrupulous and self-serving man with despotic tendencies.</p>
<p>Popular wisdom holds that there is a direct link between the grandiose decoration of French Royal palaces and the 1789 French Revolution; Versailles has come to represent a gilded style of tyrannical opulence for the privileged few at the cost of the many.</p>
<p>Scholars of Louis XIV France tell another story. Louis XIV’s enterprising minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert sought to boost the French economy by supporting luxury industries, creating new manufactories for all the things that wealthy people wanted to buy: mirrors, tapestries and furniture; silks and lace for fashionable clothes.</p>
<p>Heavy embargoes were placed on imports, and the French elite were forced to buy local. Versailles became a showcase for these magnificent luxury products, and it worked! </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153778/original/image-20170123-30985-10u9fog.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Hall of Mirrors, Palace of Versailles.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>That Paris is still considered the capital of fashion, and French decorative arts still copied by Trump, and many others besides, attests to the enduring success of Colbert’s plan.</p>
<p>Trump’s call for a protectionist economy in America in his election campaign and inauguration speech is perhaps the closest comparison we could make between him and Louis XIV. </p>
<p>If he is inspired by the Sun King (and he has made no public admission to this) he would do well to look to leading contemporary artists and designers for inspiration on how to become a world leader in matters of style.</p>
<p><br></p>
<p><em>This article is drawn from a forthcoming book on Louis XIV style from the 18th to 21st centuries, and will be presented at The National Gallery of Australia conference: <a href="http://nga.gov.au/symposia/versailles/">Enchanted Isles, Fatal Shores: Living Versailles this March</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71698/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert Wellington does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Yellow-gold, swagged curtains have appeared in the Oval Office. But if Donald Trump wants to emulate the Sun King, he would be advised to look to contemporary artists and designers for inspiration.
Robert Wellington, Lecturer, Art History and Visual Culture, Australian National University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/69174
2016-11-23T14:30:17Z
2016-11-23T14:30:17Z
The underappreciated art of nightclub design, and why clubs are worth fighting for
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147189/original/image-20161123-19696-4zwj9p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Crowd_and_laser.jpg">Fabric</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The march of gentrification through British cities has brought with it a steady sterilisation of urban spaces. Among the casualties have been nightclubs, with the UK losing more than half its nightclubs since 2005 including – in the past six months alone – <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/observations/2016/05/bad-vibes-why-britains-nightclubs-are-closing">popular and respected venues</a> such as Passing Clouds in London and the Arches in Glasgow, and. While London’s famous Fabric closed and has since <a href="http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/fabric-to-reopen-after-deal-struck-with-islington-council-a3401086.html">reopened</a>, others have not been so lucky.</p>
<p>Nightclubs, live music venues and artists’ studios are being sacrificed on the altar of a lucrative property market. It is ironic that the popularity of such spaces often heralds their own gentrification-fuelled demise, as the cultural capital they add to frequently deprived parts of cities paves the way for a steady upwards trend in the area’s property values. </p>
<p>This was the ultimate fate of the Haçienda, the <a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/whats-on/music-nightlife-news/its-been-20-years-hacienda-11536168">legendary Manchester nightclub</a> which opened in an unloved part of central Manchester in 1982. Playing host to many underground and mainstream musical acts selected by Factory Records label boss Tony Wilson, the Haçienda was synonymous with the growth of the city’s acid house and Madchester music scenes. But the club was not just important for its musical contribution, but for its interior design, too. </p>
<p>Created by <a href="http://benkellydesign.com/hacienda/">British interior designer Ben Kelly</a>, the former yacht showroom was an exercise in postmodernism: an industrial theatre set, in which everyone was on stage and performing amid industrial readymades that included bollards, road cat’s eyes, and black and yellow striped girders. The “industrial” aesthetic so commonplace today began at the Haçienda.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/146820/original/image-20161121-4564-19ugh0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Haçienda’s transformation from club to anonymous flats.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/raver_mikey/448748521">raver_mikey</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Haçienda closed its doors in 1997, and by 2007 the site had been purchased, demolished, and rebuilt as luxury flats. Notably the developers used both the club’s name and its iconic black and yellow stripes as part of its branding. That the developers chose the strapline “Now the party’s over … you can come home” in their sales literature only added to the outrage at the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2002/aug/29/communities.arts">corporate appropriation of this once important cultural site</a>.</p>
<h2>Designing night-time spaces</h2>
<p>As a design historian, I’m interested in <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21685519-lights-are-going-out-night-clubs-all-over-europe-less-ecstatic">what is also lost as clubs close</a>. The British architect Nigel Coates is one of those to have recognised the creative importance of clubs. As he <a href="http://aabookshop.net/?wpsc-product=aa-files-1">wrote in AA Files in 1981</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Invariably hidden beneath ordinary city buildings, these clubs take on the project of the night by burying themselves. Underground they are free to promote what rarely could happen in the streets, to give a contrived reality to what would otherwise be unlikely, taboo, or at best, occasional.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In 1990, Coates transformed a former textiles factory in Istanbul into <a href="http://nigelcoates.com/projects/project/taxim_club">Taksim Park</a> nightclub, another example of the club’s entry into the city through its derelict spaces. He belongs to an international roster of architects to have designed nightclubs, alongside the likes of <a href="http://www.isozaki.co.jp/">Arata Isozaki</a>, <a href="https://www.architecture.com/Explore/Architects/JosephRykwert.aspx">Joseph Rykwert</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/architecture-design-blog/2013/dec/17/fat-architecture-break-up">FAT</a> and the Italian radicals, such as <a href="http://www.bjp-online.com/2016/01/the-radical-architects-who-designed-the-discos-of-post-war-italy/">Superstudio</a> and the lesser-known <a href="http://www.plugin-lab.it/?p=1208">Gruppo 9999</a>. </p>
<p>In 1969, Gruppo 9999 opened Space Electronic, a nightclub on the site of a former engine repair shop. The type of subterranean, sealed-off site that Coates advocates, Space Electronic characterised other architectural and design traits of nightclubs in that it was in effect a blank canvas: a black-walled container that came to life when its lights, projectors and speakers were switched on each night. </p>
<p>Its movable furnishings made for a multi-functional and participatory space, the dancefloor used for everything from theatre performances to experimental architecture classes – even a vegetable garden. Like all nightclubs, Space Electronic was different every night, its design a means to generate experiences co-designed by those frequented it.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147186/original/image-20161123-19689-17fahyi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Space Electronic nightclub in Florence during the Mondial Festival, co-organised by architects Gruppo 9999 and Superstudio, 1971.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Gruppo 9999/courtesy of Carlo Caldini</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This aspect of architectural creativity has been largely marginalised in architecture and design history, limiting our understanding of the creative significance of nightclubs for both their creators and those that experience them every weekend. The Haçienda established Kelly’s reputation as a designer and fed into his subsequent work, as can be seen in his <a href="https://yonder.e20.org/t/gym-box-westfield/998/115">yellow and black striped industrialist design for the Gymbox chain</a>.</p>
<h2>Clubs’ cultural cross-pollination</h2>
<p>The Blitz club in Soho, frequented during its heyday in the 1980s by fashion students from London’s art schools and the likes of Boy George and Spandau Ballet, provided a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/gallery/2013/jan/25/bowie-nights-billys-club-pictures">platform for fashion experimentation</a> that fed into mainstream dress culture. Today, venues such as the Bussey Building and Corsica Studios in South London exemplify how clubs have been incorporated into multi-purpose venues that are able to showcase multidisciplinary creative activities of all kinds.</p>
<p>Whatever guise they take, nightclubs offer places to experiment with new music, technology and identity, to experiment with design and architectural innovation. Clubs are the proving grounds for the creativity that the UK’s cultural economy is so reliant on. Fortunately, there are signs that the importance of clubs is being recognised, from the establishment of the <a href="https://www.ntia.co.uk">Night Time Industries Association</a> and the <a href="http://www.nightlifematters.com">Nightlife Matters campaign</a>, to the appointment of <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-a-night-czar-can-do-to-help-nightlife-survive-67253">London’s first Night Czar</a>. Such support is important – beyond their creative value, clubs offer escapism and freedoms, qualities we need to fight to protect today.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69174/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catharine Rossi has received support in research on nightclubs from the Association for the Study of Modern Italy, Space Electronic, the Institute of Contemporary Arts, the Biennale di Venezia, and Vitra Design Museum, where she is currently co-curating an exhibition on the design history of the nightclub. </span></em></p>
Whatever guise they take, nightclubs offer places to experiment with new music, technology and architectural innovation.
Catharine Rossi, Senior Lecturer in Design History, Kingston University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/21535
2014-01-19T19:37:50Z
2014-01-19T19:37:50Z
Inside out: why do so many great buildings have drab interiors?
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39306/original/6xxvjnd4-1389937631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C24%2C4091%2C2584&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Planet Krypton? Nope, it's the Shanghai skyline.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sparkjet</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>For me, one of the most exciting features of Superman’s comic strip adventures would occur when he travelled into the Fourth Dimension to visit his parents Lara and Jor-El on their planet Krypton.</p>
<p>He would emerge into a fantastical urban utopia, revealing wondrous, strangely contorted, soaring buildings intersected by a labyrinth of organically fluid superhighways in the sky.</p>
<p>Back on Earth, you can see the real-life version of these futuristic cityscapes in several rapidly developing cities, such as Doha in Qatar, Singapore and the Pudong district in Shanghai.</p>
<p>But all too frequently there is a disappointing mismatch between the exterior flourish and the interior spaces. </p>
<p>Once you progress beyond the public circulation zones to reach the office tenancy spaces of British architect Norman Foster’s Swiss Re building in London (better known as “the Gherkin”), you will find uninspiring interior environments lacking the grandeur created by the exterior. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39203/original/pggzsbkz-1389866840.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The exterior of London’s Gherkin building.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Keogh</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39204/original/fknsftvk-1389866951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Inside the Gherkin building.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">diamond geezer</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s like a reverse TARDIS: excitement generated by the building’s external shape is so often crushed internally. </p>
<h2>Transforming the exterior</h2>
<p>Why, then, are the interior spaces of these expressively extravagant buildings often rather underwhelming? </p>
<p>Throughout the majority of the 20th century, architectural concept sketches, models and working drawings were still produced using pen and paper by highly skilled hands.</p>
<p>With some notable exceptions, this modernist architectural period produced the simple, repetitive and undecorated barefaced buildings <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/prince-charles/10433574/Prince-Charles-a-lifelong-love-of-architecture.html">so famously reviled</a> by Prince Charles. </p>
<p>This manual process was prevalent in architectural practice up until the early 1980s when CAD (computer aided design) was <a href="http://www.cadalyst.com/cad/product-design/cad-a-glance-1982-2007-timeline-cadalyst039s-25th-anniversary-celebration-part-5-">gradually adopted</a>. Over the next 20 years, innovations and improvements to software were transformational. The method of designing a building evolved from a cumbersome two-dimensional process into a tantalising three-dimensional exploration.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39248/original/mmsqg2df-1389917928.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">London’s “Cheesegrater” building (left) and “Gherkin” building (right).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Michael Garnett</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>More recently, the CAD system of design and documentation has led to a fundamental change to the appearance of our cities. It has become plausible, at least, to now design and build complex and non-repetitive buildings without incurring prohibitive additional labour costs.</p>
<p>Superman’s home city is finally being built – all around the world.</p>
<p>Twisted, contorted, dynamic building forms are emerging that sometimes seem to confound gravity. An extravaganza of shapes is now appearing on our skylines. The skilled manipulation of 3D CAD software enables architects to achieve usable gross floor space within an enticingly sinuous, but build-able, envelope. Think of buildings such as the Quadracci Pavilion at the Milwaukee Art Museum, or the <a href="http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/galaxy-soho/">Galaxy Soho</a> building in Beijing. </p>
<p>Office buildings, sports stadia, shopping centres, airports, transport hubs and sometimes hospitals are seen as opportunities for iconic cultural interpretation. Individual buildings increasingly become marketing tools of civic distinction. Building developers clearly understand this enormous potential for impact.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=572&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=572&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/38348/original/3dj9vwfm-1387498808.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=572&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Quadracci Pavilion in Milwaukee.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Creative Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>London has “the Gherkin” (the Swiss Re building), “the Cheesegrater” (the Leadenhall Building) and the “Walkie Talkie” (20 Fenchurch Street). Shanghai has “the Bottle Opener”. Beijing has “Big Pants” (the CCTV building) and “the Bird’s Nest” (the Beijing National Stadium) and so on all around the world.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39249/original/mmgx8j2y-1389918491.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The CCTV Headquarters in Beijing, known as the “Big Pants” building.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Axel Drainville</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>CAD, with its links to manufacturing and construction processes, has made possible this effusive architectural expression, at least externally. </p>
<p>The ground level lobby spaces often do manage to retain some of the external excitement but the interior working spaces, particularly in commercial office buildings, tend to lose this grand gesture.</p>
<h2>Uninspiring insides</h2>
<p>The internal activity – the very reason for the existence of the building – takes place in monotonous spaces that seem driven predominately by the need to accommodate workstation furniture and administrative functions in dire need of reconsideration.</p>
<p>Externally, architects have been liberated by their software programs.
Internally, tenancy spaces seem absorbed in grappling with the impact of technology on workplace behavioural possibilities, at the expense of the interior environment as a whole. </p>
<p>There are several reasons for this external/internal disparity.</p>
<p>First, the direct links between architectural design, manufacturing and construction that have made possible these expressive buildings are often not applied when it comes to interior fit-out construction. </p>
<p>Second, there’s the issue of life expectancy. Nowadays a commercial building is expected to remain largely unchanged for 30 years or more, whereas the lifespan of an interior office space is five to 10 years. Non-repetitive, complex forms and shapes are expensive to produce in relation to the average duration of a commercial internal space.</p>
<p>Third, the focus of research and development in this sphere is predominately driven by the large workstation suppliers such as <a href="http://www.steelcase.com/en/Pages/Homepage.aspx">Steelcase</a> and <a href="http://www.hermanmiller.com.au/">Herman Miller</a>. Outcomes tend to be focused on modifications to commercial furniture systems rather than entire environments.</p>
<p>There are, of course, notable exceptions. The <a href="http://www.hassellstudio.com/en/cms-projects/detail/anz-centre/">ANZ Centre</a> in Melbourne’s Docklands, designed by the architectural firm HASSELL and built in 2012, demonstrates a refreshing reinvention of the way we can function in internal spaces.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/nZYg9nGmlIM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>During the past decade, a significant amount of <a href="http://www.afr.com/p/shaping_the_future_zmlwOuT8msp15VPgT1P3DLenvironment">research</a> and <a href="http://www.woodsbagot.com/news/workplace-a-hot-topic">reappraisal</a> has been undertaken to examine how we work, the impact of technology and the workplace environment.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, office interiors in particular are lagging behind the external architectural effusion. </p>
<p>Perhaps Clark Kent could help us.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/21535/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Molloy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
For me, one of the most exciting features of Superman’s comic strip adventures would occur when he travelled into the Fourth Dimension to visit his parents Lara and Jor-El on their planet Krypton. He would…
Michael Molloy, Lecturer in Interior Design, Queensland University of Technology
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.