Buildings That Feel Good

STRELITZ, Ziona. 2008.

Buildings That Feel Good
London: RIBA Publishing.

Strelitz has a background in social anthropology, town planning and interior design. In 1990, she founded ZZA Responsive User Environments, a research and advisory practice that helps to shape effective and sustainable buildings and settings.

I found reading this book both entertaining and thought provoking, with many of the topics discussed within the book bearing a strong relation to my MA proposal. Furthermore, it was valuable from a learning standpoint in the way that it discusses and analyses buildings. A number of excerpts which I found particularly relevant have been included below.

When talking about a building’s role in supporting and perpetuating thoughts and values about the organisation it houses and represents…

Pg 2,

“Socially, buildings have a potential role in expressing and perpetuating cultural memory, an attribute that may have special relevance in times of widespread change to the building stock.”

Pg 35, referring to EMI Group Headquarters,

“EMI needed a global headquarters to accommodate some 320 staff from different parts of its business that were occupying different buildings. The new building’s role was to facilitate efficiency by locating operations together, enhance communication between departments, and serve as a flagship, with a distinct, contemporary work environment that engendered a sense of community and promoted awareness of EMI’s brand to its staff and the public.”

Pg 43, referring to ERCOL’s building,

“The building’s spatial organisation reveals the sequence of activities involved in the overall process it supports, offering participants and visitors an appreciation of all aspects of the enterprise’s success, and fostering recognition of everyone’s role.”

Talking specifically about installations and the role they play in enhancing the experience of a building’s occupants:

Pg 26, referring to Citigroup’s Central London offices and talking about the integrated artwork,

“The atrium’s role at the heart of the Citigroup building is accentuated by the vast hanging sculpture by artist Bridget Riley, suspended over 16 floors across the inner atrium elevation of the eastern tower. The commission of this significant artwork is integral to the building’s architecture and to users’ experience of the building. With its bright palette that contrasts with the atrium’s muted colours, this lively textured plane is seen from the office areas and every vantage point in the atrium, including the essential circulation routes. The gentle movement of its aluminium parallelograms and their alteration in appearance with variations in light contribute further to a dynamic experience of the space. Their positions relative to one another also vary, as do the views through the spaces between them, as one moves up, across and around the atrium.”

Pg 51, referring to the Issey Miyake Store, corner of Conduit Street and Savile Row,

“Sculptural Lighting.
A distinctive shell mesh ceiling feature, commissioned from the lighting designer Ingo Maurer, combines great delicacy with a strong presence and adds to the experience of movement in the store. Twelve gold-coloured ventilators in its cylindrical body generate air movement that causes hundreds of silver leaves that hang beneath the cylinder to flutter. The shadows of the leaves falling on the plastered wall surfaces also move, providing still more stimulus and interest.”

Pg 108, referring to Wellcome Trust’s Gibbs Building,

“The base of the atrium, conceived as an internal ‘street’, is readily visible and reached directly from the lobby. The Gower Place entrance, on axis with the main entrance, is central in one’s view on arrival. The internal street accommodates a café, informal seating and meeting areas, planting and a very large glass sculpture by Thomas Heatherwick, close to Gower Street.”

Pg 109, again about the Gibbs Building,

“Rich benefits from the artwork.
The installation of Thomas Heatherwick’s sculpture at the western end of the street is a masterstroke. Constructed on site, this specially commissioned work, Bleigiessen, comprises 150,000 glass spheres suspended by wire from the sixth floor. Its scale and position poise it to enrich the experience of building users – who see it in a dynamic way as they move around this part of the building – as well as attracting the interests of people outside the building, who can enjoy its shimmering luminance through the glazed entrance.”

Pg 136, Lesson 15,

“Artwork integral with architecture.
Building interiors are not cities in themselves, and buildings designed entirely anew lack historic elements to incorporate. The introduction of artwork to enliven interior spaces has an obvious role. Conventional approaches to image display and the use of plasma screens do add visual interest. However, art that is integral to the architecture, rather than ‘stuck on’, contributes more profoundly, not least because it invites three-dimensional engagement that offers a dynamic experience as people move around it.”

Pg 137, Lesson 16, relating to legibility and comfort: assurance, safety, society,

“Building signage has grown in prominence as a set of elements that needs to be procured, and much of this is well designed, but buildings that rely on signage to give users a sense of orientation and direction fail to impart such knowledge intuitively. The challenge of providing implicit orientation is not confined to complex buildings. Even ‘boxes’ can be lacking in this respect, resorting to compass points or alphanumeric coordinates on signs that advise users of their location on a floor plate. Evoking a sense of direction as people approach buildings and when they are inside is more than courtesy. It promotes comfort, security and safety.”

The text goes on to explain that it is possible to make space legible through architectural consideration of factors such as,

“…the use of voids, form, rhythmic repetition, reflective glazing, colour and lighting.”

North Greenwich underground station is cited as an example of this being achieved to good effect.

On page 142, an aide mémoire is given for producing buildings, in the form of a questionnaire. The following were of particular relevance to my work:

Q3. Is there a role for this building to harness form in helping to make, or remake, a place?

Q4. Does the project offer potential as a link in social memory, whilst providing for contemporary functionality with contemporary design?

Q8. Does articulation have a role in making this building more than a box?

Q11. Does the design exploit the possibilities for a dynamic experience of the building – through people’s engagement with its component spaces and with one another, and in the interplay of space, light and the building’s finishes?

Q15. Is there scope on this project for an integral artistic contribution that will add to people’s experience of the space in a continuously engaging way, and without prescribing and dominating their use of the space with ‘one single big idea’?