Space Planning Basics

Mark Karlen, Rob Fleming

• Publisher: Wiley
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781118882009
• eBook ISBN: 9781118882597
• Edition: 4
• Topic: Architecture
• Subtopic: Interior Design

Conquer the complexity of interior design with a logical, methodical approach

Space Planning Basics is a definitive introduction and principle resource for thousands of designers. With step-by-step methodology based on the author's several decades of design experience, this authoritative guide has become the de facto reference for an entire generation of designers. This updated fourth edition includes digitized drawings, diagrams, and matrices throughout, and newly added supplemental photographs. The text has been revised to reflect the latest developments in sustainable and universal design, including coverage of daylighting, benchmarking, LEED system standards, and green code issues. The companion website provides AutoCAD files, intrustor videos and matrices to give you a deeper real-world understanding of the design process. This book is perfect preparation for the NCIDQ exam.

Proper space planning goes way beyond sketching a preliminary floor plan. Successful implementation includes a balanced integration of code compliance, system support, and adherence to the client's functional needs. Sustainability adds a new, important layer of complexity. This book shows you how to approach space planning in a way that ensures all considerations are met, and nothing gets lost in the process.

• Adopt an organized and comprehensive planning methodology
• Work effectively with dimensionally challenging spaces
• Consider building systems, codes, lighting, acoustics, and more
• Develop advanced skills and conquer new challenges

Space planning encompasses many components and processes, making a comprehensive reference necessary for mastery of the field. Space Planning Basics is a thorough, methodical resource that gets you started on the right track, with plenty of room for creativity.

1
Planning Methodology

Space planners are presented with their task in a great variety of ways. Most users or clients are inexperienced in working with planning professionals and present their space planning problems without significantly prepared data. It is not uncommon for a business owner or manager to come to an interior designer and say, in effect, “Our staff has grown by 60 percent over the past few years, and we are still growing at a very fast rate. Our space is terribly overcrowded; what should we do?” In cases of this kind, the designer must begin with the basic tasks of charting organizational structure; identifying personnel, their tasks, and necessary equipment; analyzing the operational process; identifying important sustainability factors; and gaining an understanding of the human and cultural qualities of the organization. In effect, the planning professional must take full responsibility for organizing, analyzing, and interpreting the problem at hand.

At the other extreme are clients with considerable experience in space planning, and who may also have an in-house facilities manager or staff. They may present the designer or architect with extensive data on the number and types of personnel (including their equipment and square footage needs), spatial adjacency studies, and the desired human and esthetic qualities of the completed project—in effect, a complete space planning program. In such cases, you are relieved of the responsibility of data gathering, organization, and analysis. Obviously, the designer must fully absorb and understand the design problem or program that is presented, and may need to perform some tasks of program interpretation. These issues are discussed later in this chapter.

There is a wide range of client or program situations between the two extremes presented above. Most clients have given some thoughtful consideration and analysis to their spatial needs before engaging professional services but do not have the in-house expertise to make a complete analysis of their problem and present it in terms easily translated into a planning solution. It is this middle ground into which most professionals step when presented with a space planning problem.

Regardless of a client’s experience with planning professionals, the issues of design sensitivity and insight play a major role in the discussion. Some space planning programs that are prepared by in-house facilities management personnel deal only with hard data and are of little use in understanding the subtleties of organizational dynamics or the detailed requirements of lighting or acoustics. What at first glance may appear to be a complete and professional program may still require a great deal of organization, analysis, and interpretation on the part of the designer. Conversely, some clients who are completely inexperienced in space planning matters will bring invaluable design sensitivity and insight to the project, despite their lack of categorized data.

It is very difficult to simulate a real client or program situation in the classroom. Typically, students are presented with a written program that defines all the detailed requirements of a project, along with floor plans (and possibly additional drawings) of a real or imagined space. A space planning solution is drawn from this data. Although useful as a learning tool for students, these exercises lack the dynamics of personal interchange with a client and also ignore such real problems as internal conflicts in the client’s organization, corporate mergers or takeovers, changes in management personnel, budget constraints, green rating systems, and dealings with building code administrators—all of which exist in professional situations. Bringing real or role-playing clients to classroom assignments can be helpful, just as using actual spaces that students can walk into and survey has value in making the space planning problem realistic. Even with these simulations, be aware that dealing with a broad variety of personalities, unusual time frames (from projects with tight deadlines to those that extend over years), and stringent budget requirements add unexpected and challenging elements to the space planning process when students move from the classroom to the professional setting.

DEFINING TERMS AND INTENT

The title of this chapter, “Planning Methodology,” is a phrase used throughout this text to describe the phase of the space planning process that begins when the planning problem is presented to you (with or without a program) and ends when physical planning commences, usually with bubble diagrams or block plans. In some professional circles, this is called the pre-design process—meaning all the necessary steps of data gathering, research, analysis, and interpretation before actual planning. For many in the design fields, “planning methodology” and “programming” are synonymous, although some would argue that the charting and diagramming described here as part of planning methodology fall outside the bounds of programming and are part of the design process.

A great deal has been written about the general area of planning methodology. Books and articles are available about the interview process, questionnaires, observation techniques, idea generation, spatial analysis and theory, programming, design methods, problem solving, graphic thinking, and so on. As noted in the introduction, no unified terminology is used universally or accepted by professionals in the field. Despite this lack, comprehensive reading in this subject area will reveal a body of knowledge that provides a broad variety of useful approaches to the pre-design process.

Very little has been written about space planning techniques, particularly from an instructional viewpoint. Space planning skills generally have been learned in a mentorship mode, at the drawing board or the workstation, in the studio classroom and/or the professional design firm. The primary intent of this book is to provide a written foundation for the space planning process. Although a planning methodology is described and recommended here, it is dealt with in a concise manner so as to give full attention to the more elusive planning and design-related parts of the process. This should not be construed as minimizing the value of the pre-design process; to the contrary, good space planning cannot be accomplished without the professionally thorough pre- design analysis generally defined here. The text presents a simple and workable method succinctly so as to move on quickly to the physical planning phase. You are strongly encouraged to read about and acquire skills in a broad range of pre-design techniques, both verbal and graphic, in order to gain many analytical tools to apply to the problem-solving challenges you will face as a professional. The Recommended Reading at the end of this chapter provides direction for expanding that knowledge and those skills.

Another brief note on terminology: Several steps in the space planning process described and recommended throughout the text are identified by words or phrases unique to the text, such as “criteria matrix” and “relationship diagram.” In each case, these words or phrases are defined thoroughly, and potential conflicts with other terminology common to the field are identified.

THE SYNTHESIS GAP

Among professionals working in the field, a generally accepted process or sequence of tasks occurs from the point at which the planner begins to work on a project to the point at which project analysis is complete and the physical planning process begins. Despite many variations in technique or terminology that planners may apply, the basic process of creating a design program consists of the next eight steps, presented here in an extremely abbreviated form, using a typical corporate or institutional setting for this instance.

1. Interview
   1. Executive level (organizational overview)
   2. Managerial level (departmental function)
   3. Operations level (process and equipment detail)
2. Observe (existing or similar facilities)
   1. Assisted observation
   2. Unobtrusive observation
   3. Inventory of existing furniture and equipment (when it is to be reused)
3. Establish architectural parameters
   1. Acquire complete base plan data (including mechanical and electrical services)
   2. Compile contextual data (architectural, historical, social)
   3. Research environmental and code constraints
   4. Complete basic site inventory (sun angles, breeze directions, and rainfall amounts)
4. Organize collected data (the first-phase program)
   1. Place data in sequential format most useful for planning
   2. Summarize confirmed quantitative factors (square footage, FF+E (furniture, fixtures and equipment) count, equipment sizes, etc.)
   3. Record first thoughts on conceptual planning approach
5. Research the unknowns
   1. Gather detailed information on process and equipment
   2. Gather case study...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1: Planning Methodology
• 2: The First Planning Steps: Bubble Diagrams and Block Plans
• 3: Small and Dimensionally Demanding Spaces
• 4: The Building Shell and Major Systems
• 5: Important Influencing Factors
• 6: Developing a Rough Floor Plan
• 7: Refining the Solution
• 8: Developing Skills beyond the Basic Level
• 9: Stair Design Basics
• Appendix A: Stair Terminology
• Appendix B: Design Programs and Building Shells
• Index
• Eula