The Big Picture

Economic need dictates that we deliver building projects with a sense of urgency.  Indeed why would we delay improving the delivery of public services to our communities. As always, this means pursuing the right design solutions in a timely and well managed manner. 

But there is one crucial question we all need to ask whenever we are tempted to default to the least troublesome route to our individual project delivery: will this help Scotland deliver more for less across the public sector? 

These days, we are all responsible for ‘the big picture’. 

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Legacy

The Olympics finished yesterday, and today the talk is all about ‘legacy’. Reminds me of the question typically asked the day after a new building gets opened: “Well that was good – now what difference is it going to make?”

Shiny photographs of new architecture without people only serve to underline the focus on project completion. Job done. Well done. And we should never take that achievement for granted.  But the purpose of buildings is not to be built, but to create  . . . a legacy.

So, perhaps the real test for any new school bulding is: what happens next?

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Offices

What can the design of school environments learn from the design of office environments? As someone who strongly believes that ‘informed plagiarism’ is the most effective way to approach most problems, my answer would be – a lot. 

However, it is striking just how much the commercial sector has learnt from the innovative spaces being created within the education sector. Yes, the brief for any company workplace strives for efficiency – but it will also prioritise creativity, innovation, and collaboration as essential elements of the modern , successful business. Sound familiar?

When we compare schools to offices let’s remember that both are about outcomes and both are about people. 

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Qualities

We may know what we want to do in a school building and how we want it to feel – but the way in which we respond to these within a perfect storm of constraints is where design really matters.

Much of what we typically call a brief is a contractual specification setting out not only the requirements but often the detailed characteristics of the preferred answer. An authentic expression of the building qualities we most value in any unique context gives us the most relevant framework to make decisions and rise to the right challenges.

The first question of any design becomes – is this an answer with the qualities we are looking for? If our initial constraints seem to make this impossible then we need to look again at why we are doing what we are doing, or use the power of design to redefine the art of the possible.

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Fuel

Campbeltown pupils imagining modern alternatives to the traditional classroom. Edinburgh pupils exploring innovative settings for personal learning.

It’s tempting to focus on the excellent creative outputs from these unfettered imaginations. But the real joy, the revelation for designers at all levels, is the power of the conversation itself. There is a raw power in the words and images pupils employ in articulating their insights and creativity. In my experience this provides the best fuel in the world for designers.

Good ideas are hard to come by. We should be thankful that in the design of schools our emerging clients have such ideas in abundance.

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Defaults

Just because a particular choice is ubiquitous doesn’t mean it’s not the right choice. The important thing is to make each and every choice with the same amount of care rather than letting them become defaults.

‘Default: A particular setting or value for a variable that is assigned automatically by an operating system and remains in effect unless cancelled or overridden by the opertator.’

Design is always about careful decision making and never about unthinking defaults.

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Clearings

Walking in a forest is often defined by the chance happening upon a clearing or a glimpse of spaces beyond. In other words, the enjoyment of the forest is heightened by the presence of contrasts.

The same applies to an oasis in the desert, a walled garden in the city, or a rest in music. In trying to create remarkable places we need to resist the temptation to relentlessly repeat the same ideas – as if our experiences could be endlessly cloned. We need to provide respite and contrast, a sense of discovery and exploration, and a sense of uniqueness in the midst of similarity.

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