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Sensual Spaces Through Material Abstraction

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Abstract and Figures

In an attempt to try to understand the notion "why we do interiors", this paper will draw to the forefront an alternative viewpoint of designing interior spaces. An architectural enclosure captures a volume of material matter within a spatial condition that is called an interior. This should not restrict the practice of interior design to just the tectonic construction of forms to occupy the interior of a building. The key factor in designing interior spaces is understanding the needs of the users and the application of designed entities to facilitate certain behaviour of these users. Despite user-centered design being crucial, a different tack is now needed and is emerging in practice. New materiality is an evolving source of fascination: intellectually, sensually, and emotionally; and, with this fascination by designers and clients, a paradigmatic shift is occurring in which materiality drives the end result of the spatial outcome. This paper will trace the relationship of the modern interior to the advent of new materiality. Modern interior spaces are a reflection of the ethos of the age in which a design outcome either supports conformity, or searches for change. This age-old battle of continuity versus innovation is clearly evident in recent approaches of designers to affect their user's behaviour with the specification of alternative materials. The process of selection is equally as interesting as the material itself. The ephemeral nature of interior spaces and the sensuality possible with new materials leads to the need to re-examine how we design interior spaces. The design methodology used by interior designers must now include the need to affect human behaviour through a direct consequence of materiality, particularly new materiality.
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Thinking Inside The Box 2007
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THINKING INSIDE THE BOX
INTERIORS FORUM SCOTLAND 1ST AND 2ND MARCH 2007
ABSTRACT
In an attempt to try to understand the notion “why we do interiors”, this paper
will draw to the forefront an alternative viewpoint of designing interior
spaces. An architectural enclosure captures a volume of material matter
within a spatial condition that is called an interior. This should not restrict the
practice of interior design to just the tectonic construction of forms to occupy
the interior of a building. The key factor in designing interior spaces is
understanding the needs of the users and the application of designed entities
to facilitate certain behaviour of these users. Despite user-centered design
being crucial, a different tack is now needed and is emerging in practice. New
materiality is an evolving source of fascination: intellectually, sensually, and
emotionally; and, with this fascination by designers and clients, a
paradigmatic shift is occurring in which materiality drives the end result of
the spatial outcome.
This paper will trace the relationship of the modern interior to the advent of
new materiality. Modern interior spaces are a reflection of the ethos of the
age in which a design outcome either supports conformity, or searches for
change. This age-old battle of continuity versus innovation is clearly evident
in recent approaches of designers to affect their user’s behaviour with the
specification of alternative materials. The process of selection is equally as
interesting as the material itself. The ephemeral nature of interior spaces and
the sensuality possible with new materials leads to the need to re-examine
how we design interior spaces. The design methodology used by interior
designers must now include the need to affect human behaviour through a
direct consequence of materiality, particularly new materiality.
New materials have a mutable and ephemeral sensuality that transcends the
normal bounds of enclosure. This sensuality is achieved in a simultaneously
paradoxical manner in which the phenomenological relationship of the
material to the user is considered together with a rational and scientific
approach of abstracted reality. This abstracted reality is demonstrated through
the advances in material science that are affecting the design of interior
spaces and creating a new sense of place. The paradox lies with working at
intangible sub-particle levels whilst also dealing with the industries that
produce tangible outcomes. Sensuality of space experienced by the user is
now created in the mind of the designer with collaboration with the material
scientist working at the nano level. Sensuality is now abstracted as
materiality now exists in the intangible world of nano particles.
Keywords: Sensuality, Materiality, Design Process
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SENSUAL SPACES THROUGH MATERIAL
ABSTRACTION
1 INTRODUCTION
An architectural enclosure captures a volume of material matter within a
spatial condition that is called an interior. This elegant yet simple description
of an interior space establishes a key issue that is useful for not only
reflecting on the path of design over the ages, but for offering a view towards
the realignment of methodologies towards solving future design problems.
Materiality, in reference to enclosed spaces, is an important concern and the
main emphasis of this paper. However, it is this new materiality that resides
in the realm of cutting-edge technology and sciences, resulting in
technological developments that adjust our notion of space and place. In
order to examine the role that these technological developments play on the
preservation of place I will focus the paper on its impact on the world of
interior design. This is highly appropriate as an interior space establishes a
sense of place within a material enclosure.
There has been much written about the sense of place in an architectural
framework over the last twenty years but there is limited discussion on
interior spaces, and even less on the relationship with materiality. Enclosed
space as an idea has a strong relationship to the metaphor of a container, and
interior spaces are often viewed as containers for human behaviour to occur.
Understanding the behaviour that occurs in these spaces and giving it value
allows these spaces to become places. Edward Casey uses the metaphor of
container when analysing Aristotle’s Physics in which he says that “… it
rests on the supposition that for Plato “matter and space are the same thing
(209b12) and thus that place is reducible to matter: inasmuch as “place is
thought to be the extension of the magnitude [of a physical thing occupying
that place], it is the matter (209b6-7).” 1 If place is matter, than new
materiality surly prescribes a sense of place in a new manner.
In an aim to establish a trajectory for the development of interior design’s
body of knowledge, the emphasis on the spatial and functional programming
needs to be reconsidered in light of the shift in design towards new
materiality. A wide variety of secondary sources, from philosophical to
pragmatic, will be used to frame this shift, and provide a conversation on the
inter-relationship of the establishment of place-making in terms new
materiality within interior spaces, and its connection to abstraction and
change.
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2 CONTINUITY AND CHANGE
In North America, the National Council for Interior Design Qualification
(NCIDQ) definition for Interior Design is discussed by Guerin and Martin in
their research into the Interior Design Body of Knowledge, “…improving the
quality of life, increasing productivity, protecting health, safety and welfare
of the public…2; in short, meeting pre-determined code requirements. All of
these concerns are extremely important for designers in their day-to-day
activities. These designers are all acting professionally designing spaces to
satisfy the needs of the clients. And, if we educate designers to follow this
part we will continue the good work of these people. However, regardless of
how appropriate the design solutions may be, is continuity the goal?
Heskett discusses the tension and conflicting demands of continuity and
change within the discipline of industrial design.3 Other authors looking at
the history of interior design have also echoed these same comments. It will
be argued here that the issues of continuity and change belong to a larger
debate involving the relationship of abstract thought to design. The
challenges that we face with technological developments reside in coming to
terms with the balance of these factors.
In addressing the paradigms of the age, modern interior spaces designed in
the early 1900’s were faced with a dichotomy that either had a focus on the
past or on one for the future. The design outcomes either supported
conformity, or searched for change. This battle of continuity versus
innovation is still active today in the design processes of planning, form-
making, and material selection concluding in the finished designed interior.
When discussing the polarity of approaches taken in the discipline at the turn
of the century, C. Ray Smith describes one direction of interior design as
being the age-old approach that looked at historical tradition as the datum
point in which gradual evolutionary processes would advance the discipline
through constant refinement and elaboration. 4 This led to a conservative
approach in which the emphasis was on colour, ornamentation, pattern,
texture, furnishing and accessories; an approach extended by the talents of
Elsie de Wolfe during that period, and by other decorators today. “The other
direction aimed to explore innovation and invention, the future and the new.”
5 It was with this direction that the term early modernism applies. The works
of Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, Pierre Chareau and
others explored materiality in both construction and structure; they
investigated new spatial organizations, shapes and forms, and the integrated
use of new materials and manufacturing processes.
Technological change is central to this discussion as it supports “…design to
go beyond mass production and into mass customization and so shifting
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design from a strong masculine sensibility based on rationality and efficiency
to a feminine one of individualism and sensorial beauty.” 6
It is clear that the use of new materiality in design today is a form of
technology that explores sensory beauty and is driving the design process.
One of the leaders in materiality research is Professor Toshiko Mori at the
Harvard Design School. When discussing the idea of “Phenomena” she
brings together the issues of sensory engagement and material innovation,
and in doing so she firmly rests the new materiality within the domain of
change: “We predict that the development of innovative materials must take
place in parallel with new approaches to engaging human senses.” 7 New
materials by themselves do not constitute change, or design innovation. It is
the application of these materials within a context that issues forth a new era
in design, and that new era must coincide with the implementation of new
materiality into the process of design and not solely as an aspect of the
outcome.
3 ABSTRACTION
The birth of modernism did not only see the investigation of new materials
but also the development of abstraction. This has helped to explain design as
both a process of producing an outcome, and the outcome itself. As
abstraction can be viewed as removal of all the clutter to get to the core idea,
and could also be considered as constructing anew one aspect of the problem,
it is clear that the inductive and deductive reasoning that occurs in the design
process is a form of abstraction. “Architects [and designers] must simplify
problems, reduce them to their essential elements. This is a process of
abstraction, the exposure of the underlying structure or pattern of a whole
system.” 8
Thomas Kuhn describes elementary transformations in the scientific world as
shifts in visual gestalt, “… during revolutions scientists see new and different
things when looking with familiar instruments in places they have looked
before.” 9 In order to look for change, we need to look at some familiar
places. This is precisely what designers do. They are masters of pattern
recognition and synthesis of information, which is the art of abstraction
seeing what is not seen in familiar places.
If abstraction is a “… primary human process, one that enables reality or
actuality to be codified in a manner independent of its particularity and
therefore aids the communication of concepts.”10 Conceptualising is
abstraction; and, addressing materiality in the conceptual phases of design
will allow for a clear sense of material abstraction to exist. However, there
exists two challenges: firstly, the untapped resource of interior designers
within the profession who are generally unreflective and view “abstraction”
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as something that does not concern themselves in the “real world”; and
secondly, new materials are often the outcome of scientific developments at
sub-particle levels, and their properties are understood through mathematical
formula and not through the senses. A new design methodology is needed to
breakdown these two challenges.
4 MATERIALITY AND MODERNISM
The world that we live in is a material world made of substances and forms
that have a materiality that we respond to through our senses. We construct
our world through the interplay of materials and we have “… the ability to
see more in a material object than merely its external form. Objects have
meaning, carry associations or be symbols of more abstract ideas.” 11
As part of the explosion in exploration of materiality in the early years of this
century, a Dutch exhibition called Materia® issued a catalogue of their event
inviting various critics to comment on materiality. Henk Döll discusses
materials in architecture as: “Architecture must touch the senses. Materials
stimulate sensory experiences”, 12 and, “… choosing the materials for a
design, we seek those that either strengthen the concept or add nuances to it.
Considering unconventional materials may have an inspiring effect to this
search as they help to push the boundaries of material options.” 13 This search
for the “new forms part of the modernist journey over the last 100 years.
Cecil Elliot describes the development of building materials and systems as:
On one hand, new and improved materials made it possible for buildings to satisfy needs that
were new to the period, such as larger spans and taller structures. On the other hand, for more
traditional functions it was possible to make these materials conform to the standards of
propriety and taste to which the bourgeois patronage aspired. This meant that architecture was
soon forced to contend with opposing forces: the material nature of the media in which it worked
and the visual expectations of the art, whether the latter were founded on historicism or cubistic
abstraction. 14
In terms of material technologies, change is an important strategy in the
search for new materials as it offers market differentiation that would lead to
potential financial revenue in sales, or distinctiveness in non-commercial
projects. Novelty, innovation and progress have all been factors in the
relentless shifts in technology, and each has had a sociological impact and
affected our sense of place. George Basalla clearly states that:
The diversity that characterizes the material objects of any culture is proof that novelty is to be
found wherever there are human beings. If this were not the case, strict imitation would be the
rule, and that every newly made thing would be an exact replica of some existing artifact. In such
a world technology would not evolve… 15
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The search for new technologies and discriminations of the reality of our
world allows us to extend it and find comfort in the changed context; these
changed contexts would then provide new meanings of place. During the
Industrial Revolution, new markets, new materials and methodologies that
shaped our world and issued new ideas and corresponding technologies
began to appear at a rapid pace, and technology became the driving force for
British industrial growth in the 1800’s.
As society grew during the industrial revolution, and succeeding ages, the
relationship of materials in spatial outcomes fluctuated between the concerns
of the inherent qualities of the material and the associated qualities. Malnar
and Vodvarka discuss Alberti’s reference to the dual nature of materials as
having “…qualities of strength and beauty; that is, that materials are needed
for the actualization of a structure and are, moreover, subject to aesthetic
valuation in the process.” 16 Johnson also quotes Alberti who seems far more
open to abstraction as he states: “It is quite possible to project whole forms in
the mind without any recourse to the material…” 17 Philosopher François
Dagognet eloquently states his views on conceptualising in Ezio Manzini
ground-breaking book on new materiality, “[o]ur imagination deserves to be
freed of its stereotypes, so that materiality can take free flight”. 18
This freedom of flight is aided by the constant development of scientific
concepts and corresponding technologies. When considering materiality in
this light, we are reminded of David Pyes abstract thought about the essence
of matter: “[a] single solid thing, after all is a merely a slice of space with a
few billion separate particles of this kind and that tottering about inside of it.”
19 Our reality is now no longer governed by just abstract explanations, “…but
with the widespread availability of a new sensory channel: a superview, a
remarkable new eye that reaches much further and deeper than the usual
range of experiences.” 20 Thomas Kuhn’s comments are echoed here again as
we are looking at a paradigm shift in the way designers will view the world.
New materials have been constantly shaping our environment and interior
spaces for centuries. In the modern interior, “[a] parade of new materials
came before the public during the 1930’s to point the way towards a cleaner,
more functionally efficient and healthier world of tomorrow.” 21 Thirty years
later in the 1960’s, gypsum-board panels revolutionized the construction
industry in economical and practical terms.22 Advances in paint, fabric and
polymer technologies have equally offered new products to be used in
interior spaces. However, Manzini points out:
The term ‘new materials’ does not merely mean a limited number of sophisticated materials
developed in a few advanced applicative areas. We are talking about the entire set of qualities
that, to varying degrees are appearing throughout the landscape of materials — including the
most traditional and venerable of them — shifting them with respect to manufacturing processes.
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The term, in short, expresses a new technical and cultural atmosphere, within which the
transformation of matter is taking place. 23
Interior designers are currently designing within an outdated paradigm of
selecting materials from those that are currently on the market, and they are
failing to grasp the abstract ideas embedded in new materiality and are
thereby relying on the process of specification. Materiality must become a
central theme to design. This shift in paradigm that shows that materiality
viewed in the 20th century considered the tangible bulk materials, and
proceeded by manipulating ways of altering its form, “…the 21st century will
be that of surfaces, mono-layers, even single molecules, and the new
functionality that these will allow”.24 Smart materials and nano-technology
clearly fit into this new way of material thought, as does new steel, ceramic
and wood technologies.
We will build intelligence into materials and liberate form from matter. Material has traditionally
been something to which design is applied. New methods in the field of nanotechnology have
rendered material as the object of design development. Instead of designing a thing, we design a
designing thing. In the process, we have created superhero materials and collapsed the age-old
boundary between the image and the object, rendering mutable the object itself. 25
Application of the new, the novel and the ultimately of the untested, requires
a degree of risk. Designers have to balance the cost of failure with the
likelihood to add value to the performance 26, and the opportunity to address
the character and meaning of the project in ways that existing materials fail to
achieve. Bernstein proclaims, “[t]he revolutionary idea that defines the
boundary between modern times and the past is the mastery of risk: the
notion that the future is more than the whim of the gods and that men and
women are not passive before nature”. 27
5 SENSUALITY THROUGH NEW MATERIALITY
As advanced technology is becoming more prevalent in society, designers are
becoming active protagonists in the exploration of sensuality through the use
of new materials in design. An exhaustive survey is beyond the scope of this
paper, but highlights of activities will establish the link between the core
aspect of interiors and new materiality presented in this paper.
To explore materiality as a conceptual framework for a design project could
prove challenging as the task of materiality is often driven by what exists. To
this end there are companies and organisations like Transmaterial®, Material
Connextion®, and Materia® that have developed huge databases for
designers of innovative materials. However, there are only a few designers
that look at working with material scientists and technologists in the
development of new materials. OMA has worked directly with Panelite® to
establish new materials and material assemblies for their Prada stores and for
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projects that range from private houses to embassies. Their polyester foamed
panels allow for spatial flexibility but also allude to a tactility that allows for
a greater sense of sensual place to be achieved. The work of Chris Van Juijn
at OMA also mirrors the passion in which Ron Arad has always approached
materiality in his work and the symbiotic relationship that he fosters between
material technology and the sensory perception. In critique of his Lo-rez-
dolares-tabula-rasa installation at the 2004 Venice Biennale, Lucy Bullivant
proclaims: “Sensuous man-made materials can now be harnessed to new
technologies and transformed into unique interfaces for communications”. 28
Arad’s unique use of small pieces of Corian® to create a screen that allows
the audience to be immersed into the projected images satisfies his desire to
create tactile and experiential designs.
As previously discussed, it is not always the new technologies but the new
approaches to old technologies that harness the new material or material
construction. The Canadian firm of Molo Design indicates that old can be
also new. In exploring flexible spaces for Japanese housing the firm sought to
deal with the realities of tight spaces but also improve the quality of life, and
the sensuousness of the space through light and materiality. Stephanie
Forsythe of Molo Design clearly indicates the firm’s relationship to materials
by noting: “[a]s designers we like to focus on one material and see all that it
can do, rather than impose ourselves on the material”. 29 Their paper softwall
re-invents a 100-year-old tradition of paper decorations, and clearly
demonstrates abstract thought manifested through new material investigation.
Figure 1 Softwall Fabrication. Credit: molo design
Ben van Berkel design of the Director’s Room NAi, in Amsterdam also
indicates that the design “…is not derived from the plan analysis or the
function analysis of the object but from its material potential”. 30 However
the firm IS Ar IWAMOTOSCOTT clearly announces the fusion of the
concepts of new materiality, place-making, and design process when they
comment on their methodology that “…aims to exploit particular properties
and intensities of space and matter by approaching the design process as an
ongoing exploration into questions of materiality and perception.” 31
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6 SENSE OF PLACE
The early modernist held a singular world-view, and in its effort to look at
abstraction, it favoured formalism in which universal forms, and honesty of
materials were sought. That modernist viewpoint has shifted to allow for a
pluralistic, and often, phenomenological approach to be established within
the framework of modern interior design, thereby allowing for the
development of a sense of place to occur within the modern interior.
Our preliminary discussion of the phenomena of place led to the conclusion that the structure of
place ought to be described in terms of ‘landscape’ and settlement’, and analyzed by means of
categories ‘space’ and ‘character’. Whereas ‘space’ denotes the three-dimensional organization
of the elements which make up place, ‘character’ denotes the general ‘atmosphere’ which is the
most comprehensive property of any place. 32
Place-making is the essence of interior design, as spatial juxtapositions and
material treatments are aligned with abstract conceptual ideas to expose a
desired reaction from the user. The reactions are emotional responses that can
be passive, through acceptance, or active through engagement. “‘Sense of
place’ is necessarily a function of people’s relationship with specific
locations, not a property of them, and for many people it may well have as
much to do with intangible memories, associations, scents or other
qualities…” 33 Designers present these place-making ideas to their clients
through the use of ‘mood boards’ or ‘sample boards’. These boards will
undoubtedly indicate materiality; and, as clients, for the most part want to
define a point of difference in the marketplace they look at designers as a key
to providing that difference. Ultimately, designers respond to this
professional request through material manipulation and allocation within a
spatial environment.
As the role of interior designers is to provide a sense of character to a spatial
condition, in short they aim to improve the quality of life for the users.
Quality is created by material manipulations to develop the character of the
space. “The character is determined by the material and formal constitution
of the place”. 34 As designers seek to achieve the desired results in their
projects, they do so by manipulating materials, either traditional or
innovative, to achieve the character and mood for the space. “The term
‘place’, as opposed to space, implies a strong emotional tie, temporary or
more long-lasting, between a person and a particular physical location”. 35
This bond between the user’s sensory needs and the place where those needs
are met are now clearly addressed by new materials.
As “…[h]istorians straddle the gulf between culture and reality, arguing that
culture structures, and is structured by, practice over time and that individuals
construct their understanding of the world on the basis of reality” 36, we are
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leading towards an appreciation of the symbiotic relationship between the
material and culture. Hubbard et al, describes Haraway views on material and
culture as changes that cannot be viewed strictly from the outside as the
‘view from nowhere’; and that “… science is a social and cultural process, so
that nature known through science is a cultural artefact, constituted through
both the practices and technologies of scientific research…” 37 In his essay
“Heidegger’s Thinking on Architecture”, Norbert-Shultz quotes Heidegger’s
essay ”Art and Space’ in which in he states “…[w]e must learn to understand
that the things themselves are the places and that they do not simply belong
to the place”. 38
7 CONCLUSION
Life is not an outcome it is a process, and as with all things the process, in
this case the design process, is essential. We often look at the outcomes of
design and forget that there is an action that needs to come first to achieve
that outcome. Now similarly in the design of interior spaces, we must stop
seeing material as just an outcome, a noun, and an object. We must start to
give it character, and consider materializing the space to make them places.
Just as material culture is an essential part of being human; we must make
material thinking an essential part of design. Enzio Manzini clearly catches
the essence of this new materiality:
…scientific and technical development — from its beginnings as a simple idea of reality made
up of existing and objective material, passive matter awaiting activity – has today attained such
complexity and depth in its capacity to manipulate what exists that I offers a vision of matter
(and of our relations with matter) that contradicts all our initial views. And the inadequacy of
those initial views has become evident even in everyday life. 39
This paper aimed at developing a conversation in the discipline so that it
could go beyond stylistic application of materials in spatial arrangements,
often selected through habit or necessity, and explore the potentiality of
materiality as a core approach to practice. A phenomenological approach to
design through the use of materials is needed, and has been addressed by
those trail blazers such as Rem Koolhaas and OMA, Herzog and deMeuron,
Diller and Scofidiio, and Yabu Pushelberg, to name a few. They will be
followed by a whole generation of designers who have a tacit understanding
materiality and practice it throughout the process.
George VERGHESE
University of Technology Sydney
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[38] Heidegger, M. Art and Space as cited by Norbert-Shultz, C., Heidegger’s
Thinking on Architecture. In Nesbitt, K. ed., Theorizing a New Agenda for
Architecture — An Anthology of Architectural Theory 1965 – 1995, p.435
(Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 1996).
[39] Manzini, E. The Material of Invention, p.48.
Corresponding Author Contact
Information
George VERGHESE
University of Technology Sydney,
Faculty of Design Architecture and
Building, P.O. Box 123 Broadway,
NSW, 2007 Australia
george.verghese@uts.edu.au
... This research focuses on the identity issues of the interior discipline in the Anglo-Saxon countries and Western Europe, its academic development and theoretical underpinnings. 2. For relevant publications on the theme of enclosed physical space and re-reading the existing see: Scott (2008), Klingenberg (2012), Plevoets (2014) and Brooker and Sally Stone (2018); for the theme of personalized and private space, see: Sanders (2002), Heynen and Baydar (2005), Rice (2007aRice ( , 2007b and Sparke (2010); for the experimental and sensory approach, see: Taylor (2003), Verghese (2007), Preston (2008), Ruth (2017) and Weinthal (2011); for the theme on social and ethical concerns, see: Smith, Lommerse, and Metcalfe (2011), McLane and Waxman (2014), Pable (2010Pable ( , 2013 and Pimlott (2016); for the theme on interiorization and the fluid interior, see O'Brien (2003), Roscoe (2007), Smith (2004Smith ( , 2005 and Attiwill (2013). 3. Translated from Dutch: "U zult merken [… ] dat wat hier gedaan wordt, afwijkt van wat men elders in hetzelfde onderwijs naar voor brengt. ...
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Today, interior education is characterized by many and variegated approaches and interpretations. Worldwide it is a field in rapid transformation and in search of identity based upon vivid explorations of its theoretical underpinnings. Triggered by the rich perspectives offered within academia, and at the same observing an increased distance towards the everyday, material interior and its basic elements, the Interior Master Program of the Faculty of Design Sciences (University of Antwerp—Belgium) set up a explorative pilot studio: the Morphology of Interior Space. This studio addresses ‘lost’ knowledge and practices of interior design, aiming to re-actualize its elemental premises and promises. It revolves around a profound and critical investigation, rediscovery and reassessment of the basic elements of the material, enclosed interior—the door, floor, wall, ceiling and window—put in relation to phenomenological approaches. This particular format, this studio maintains, holds the key to novel insights in the domain of interiors. This paper explains and explores the studio practices of Morphology of Interior Space, sharing its structure, methodology, educational and disciplinary aims as well as its outcome exemplified by works of students.
... It is the application of these materials within a context that issues forth a new era in design, and this new era must coincide with the implementation of new materiality into the process of design and not solely as an aspect of the outcome." [21] When materiality does become a central theme in interior design, the discipline will lift itself out of its currently outdated paradigm that it now finds itself. If the 20 th century was focused on tangible bulk materials and the manipulation of them into various forms, then the "…the 21st century will be that of surfaces, mono-layers, even single molecules, and the new functionality that these will allow." ...
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The design of interior space encompasses cognition of many factors such as site conditions, functional and behavioural relationships, structural form, symbolic meaning, and sensory responses. These factors influence materiality, and have been influenced by materials, forming a central principle in design. The narrative that we establish in the design of our spaces has to begin with material as a starting point of the story. Materiality within an interior sits within a nexus of the context and the body. The user who dominates the analysis of the program of use is not an abstract entity, but predominately a human being that relates to the concrete conditions of their world — a material world that is in constant flux and demands innovation. Designers are change agents, as we are charged with the task to encourage and direct change. Design deals with the responsibility of releasing or reducing tensions in the network of social practices. These social practices ultimately involve the user and their relationship with materials. Materiality becomes the driver for a user-centered view of innovation. This paper builds upon Ilkka Tuomi’s analysis of innovation, in which he comments on the systematic relationship of innovation to other elements of society and not just an outcome of a single business or individual. Using theoretical frameworks of innovation and materiality as a foundation, this paper will examine the material/space/form continuum as explored in an intensive studio experience. This experience was aimed at providing the design student with an alternative strategy to dealing with innovative idea generation in a user-centered social system in which material, form, and space all play vital roles. By using the increasingly varied and exciting new developments in new material technology, this educational experience reported here – in the form of a design studio and a masterclass, examined how the junction of materials could develop a strategy for form development. The students explored the various paradigms of joining as proposed by Warren Wake. Using this knowledge, further exploration was undertaken based on the work of Eskild Tjalve in a clear and systematic manner through a microanalysis of form, and was later extrapolated towards a generation of spatial experiences for the human body. These methodologies, usually associated with industrial design, but now transferred to the discipline of interior design will be outlined here. The amalgamation of these methods into a new approach to conceiving interior space will then be proposed. The mapping of this alternative method for innovative thought, supported by case studies from the studio experiences, will provide design students and designers with an alternative strategy to the usual spatial precedents, natural forms, and linguistic constructs that are commonly used as instigators for innovative design ideas. The exploration in this new model of a studio, an alternative understanding of the relationship of material and form to space and how they are all part of a design continuum. Future designers will now have a rich, varied, and versatile methodology for dealing with form-making.
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