Managing Sightlines
Most of us, happily, have well-functioning eyes that make it easy for us to look around us, but what are the best sightlines for us through a space? Having a sightline view of at...
Robert Downey Junior’s home
Here in The Space Doctors’ newsletter we often talk about how seeing curves (in 2-dimensions in patterns in wallpapers and upholstery and 3-dimensions in the gently rolled arms of a sofa or walls of...
Turf Houses – Biophilic Design on Steroids!
Goodness, I LOVE these! The BBC brings worldwide attention to the turf homes that have gotten people from Iceland through the winter for many generations. Their use of materials, placement in situ, and really...
Art and Real-life
Stone-Ferrier studied paintings depicting 17th-century Dutch neighborhoods and her findings highlight the cultural information that art can convey. A press release related to Stone-Ferrier’s work reports that “The importance of knowing what’s going on...
Sound Effects on Sights
Sounds have such a profound effect on us. Williams and teammates share that “Visual object recognition is not performed in isolation but depends on prior knowledge and context. Here, we found that auditory context...
Water experiences as a child – lifelong implications
Vitale and colleagues report that via “data from an 18-country sample (N = 15,743) the current work extended previous research by examining: a) blue spaces (coasts, rivers, lakes, etc.) in particular; b) associations between adults’ recalled...
Measuring Cognability
A research team based at the University of Michigan is making available, without charge, an easy-to-use tool that can be used to determine how well a particular area supports the cognitive health of aging...
Designing for Aging Individuals
A team from the University of Stirling has developed a tool that can be used to create environments that support aging individuals and those with dementia; it is available at a weblink in the...
Shape, Sensation Links
Juravle, Olari, and Spence report that “Rounded shapes, which have been shown to enhance sweetness, were compared to the perfectly symmetrical Platonic solids. . . . participants were presented with a rotating three-dimensional geometric...
Re-nesting – The Long Read
Even if as you read this it isn’t officially autumn yet, you know that summer is past and we are beginning to settle into another winter slog toward Spring and a return to indoor-outdoor...
Picking Colours
As the days grow shorter, your opportunities to paint whatever might need painting in your home fewer. So, the question of the moment becomes: what colours should you select for those walls, ceilings, doors,...
More on how colours influence how we think…
More on how colours influence how we think: Colours that are not too saturated but relatively light are relaxing for us to view while ones that are more saturated and darker are energizing to...
Picking Patterns
Just as the season for painting inside may be ending, so is the one for hanging wallpapers. Science can tell us a lot about which patterns are best on walls and what researchers have...
Artists’ Studios
The design of artists’ studios is currently getting a lot of attention. For example, Clare Dowdy of bbc.com (“Behind the Scenes: 10 Revealing Images of Artists’ Studios,” https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20220914-behind-the-scenes-10-artists-studios-through-the-centuries ) probes studios depicted in James...
Online IRL trials
Abrams writes about online trials; her work indicates factors that legal professionals feel are important in physical courtrooms. Courtrooms “tend to feel grand and formal, bedecked with wood panelling, an American flag, and security...
Two Circadian Lighting Studies
Two recent studies probed how circadian lighting influences the experiences of older individuals Grant and colleagues investigated falls in care homes by elderly (mean age 81 +/- 12 years old) residents: some test locations...
Different places different thoughts
Schertz and teammates report that they “measure[d] differences in thought content and affect throughout a one-hour environmental exploration of a nature conservatory and a large indoor mall. . . . while visiting the conservatory,...
Connecting to a Place
We build relationships with places just as we do with other people and those relationships can be good or not so great. Also, as with humans, there are advantages to positive relationships, the sorts...
What is Home-y?
Many a quest is underway to create a place where someone or other, or some group or other, will feel at home. Workplaces, restaurants, stores, healthcare facilities . . . you name it, even actual...
Designing for Bonding
Design can influence the bonds we form with other people, just as it can affect how attached we feel to a space. We’ll form more positive and lasting attachments to other people in certain...
The Most Common and Important Errors Design Professionals Seem to Make
None of us are perfect, even people who design for a living. Unfortunately, design professionals regularly do the following things, which are oh so very un-good for the people using what they’ve designed: Signalling...
Garden Rooms
Margaret Roach reports on “garden rooms” (“The Art of Making Garden Rooms,” https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/10/realestate/the-art-of-making-garden-rooms.html) in The New York Times. She focuses on the development of the Sakonnet Garden, “a private landscape in coastal Rhode Island”...
Ah the Trees of Paris…
Trees matter, a lot. Looking at them helps us revitalise our tired brains and they help keep temperatures, and stress levels in check just for starters. Writing about trees in Paris, Vivian Song (“Admiring...
Balcony Benefits…
Peters and Masoudinejad studied balconies’ roles in people’s lives. Their work indicates that balconies can be handy because they can be converted from one use to another, which is especially useful when, for whatever...
Nature and Nurture?
Koivisto and Grassini conclude “that humans may have an inherited hard-wired tendency to respond with positive affects [moods] to nature, whereas the affective responses to urban scenes are more influenced by individual factors. ....
Do we zoom creativity out of us?
Brucks and Levav investigated creativity during Zoom-type sessions. They found via a lab study (involving participants worldwide) and a field study that “videoconferencing inhibits the production of creative ideas. By contrast, when it comes...
Natural environments and positive effects
Koivisto and colleagues share that “Exposure to natural environments has positive psychological effects. These effects have been explained from an evolutionary perspective, emphasizing humans’ innate preference for natural stimuli. . . . The source...
Window views
Buying or building a home or planning to move? If you answered yes, you’ll be intrigued by Chamilothori and teammates’ findings about how the openings (windows) in a building’s façade influence in-structure experiences. Via...
Reduce stress – exercise outdoors!
Das and Gailey studied the implications of exercising in green spaces during the pandemic. They report that “Previous cross-sectional literature reports protective effects of outdoor exposure on mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. We...
Views outside help prevent us from getting lost…
New research confirms that being able to see outside as we travel through a building helps us keep from getting lost. Qi, Lu, and Chen report that “General hospitals in China always present significant...
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