PF

PORTFOLIO

linkedin.com/li/robinlambertlambertdsgn@gmail.comCONTACT919.438.39621 www.issuu.com/robinpatr

The idea, the experience, the interaction. In the tensions between architecture’s bounding of space and light and the imperatives of interior design to enhance and push against those boundaries lie three questions central to good design. Well, three of particular interest to me: Do the ideas have value? interest? appeal? Do the spatial experiences gratify the body? intrigue the mind? bolster the spirit? Do the interactions with and in the space promote well-being for the individual? beween individuals? among groups?

ii | iii Robin Lambert

My questions led me to design school to educate my lifelong practice of making spaces. But I had recognized them earlier in many, varied communities where I worked alongside residents imagining and creating better lives, and doing it together—practicing design thinking and building bonds of respect and enjoyment at the same time. It was in those experiences that I saw most clearly that space shapes human possibility and that the best design—and its making—embodies some delight. And sparks some fun.

REPRESENTATION

The individuals whose photos appear in this portfolio were directly involved in a community-based project featured here. Some of the people shared work and project leadership extensively for years, others intensively for months; some participants took part in smaller pieces of a project in public places or at the invitation of someone else. Many more people than can be imaged contributed insight, imagination, ideas, feedback that shaped good work and taught me values, processes, pleasures, and potential of democratic community.

iii | vi

NEWtheActivatingCONCEPTSIn-Between 44 DesignBRAZIL|BuildAbroad 34 40 CommunityOriginalPROSPECTFurnitureHANDDesignProcessSpace 1 CONTENTSMAKINGPARTI:DESIGN ABOUT PLACE PART I1: DESIGN THINKING

Prospect is an original participation and design process that activates collective imagination among communities and designers to co-create meaningful, inclusive, happy community and public spaces that support individual and community well-being.

PROSPECT: PARTICIPATION AND DESIGN 1

Thriving Participatory Community

PROSPECTProspectwaspilotedinHarlan, Kentucky.

NEED: Early Meaningful Participation For Better Spaces

PLACE

By the time many input forums for public spaces are held, substantive decisions and directions have already been set. If opportunities happen, they are often brief, individualized, exclusive, channeled toward predetermined ends, based on assumptions, or focused on minor matters. As a result communities and designers are robbed of insight and ideas for great place-specific design that supports community life.

PROSPECT ABOUT

RESPONSE: Collective Imagination, Place-Specific Design

Prospect aims to improve the quality, inclusiveness, and design of community spaces through an original process that strengthens early broad-based creative engagement to identify deeply-held shared hopes and strategies for reaching them. Grounded in their own imaginative energies, Prospect participants recognize strengths in each other, reframe challenges, discover values held in common, generate and transform ideas together, and enhance and understand design process and solutions.

PROSPECT:PARTICIPATION AND DESIGN 2 | 3

It was fun … We made each others’ ideas better … It helped us figure out what we really want … We want to help lead this across the county.

PROSPECT OVERVIEW

PROCESS INTENTS

Enhance designer understanding of participant objectives

—Robin Lambert

Activate community’s collective creativity

Design place-specific spaces for community well-being

Discover deep goals; generate new directions and energy Inform design with early meaningful inclusive participation

AN ORIGINAL…

Prospect is an original process, inspired by my prior collaborations in over 100 communites. I created Prospect to tap the wells of good will, knowledge and creativity of residents through the design of place-specific public and community spaces. Participants use their own imaginations to dig deep for hopes and possibilities, generating ideas and insight together and forging new takes on old challenges. Prospect begins before plans are made so that discoveries and ideas can inform design. The pilot in Harlan, Kentucky involved more than 30 people and produced two design proposals, unbuilt.

—Prospect Harlan Participants “

ABOUT PLACE

Process for New Outcomes

PROSPECT:PARTICIPATION AND DESIGN 4 | 5 HARLAN PROMPTS What makes Harlan… Harlan? What must we keep… what can we let go? Things that work… because of weight? Things we want more of… that are free? What have we learned… about the spaces we want? More conversation, socializing Help each other make money Child-friendly but for adults Variety in spaces, inviting to all Outdoors in town Shows pride in Harlan HARLAN GOALS PROSPECT PROCESSCONNECTSTEPS ideas and people; past, present, future RESPOND first to others’ objects; spark and grow ideas CREATE explore and play; make object responses to prompts ITERATE through all prompts. © Robin Lambert. All rights reserved. GOALS DESIGN REFLECT maketogethermeaning Then goals and action.

ACTIVATE CREATIVITY

Pilot: 8 Gatherings • 30+ Particiants

Some 30 people participated in Prospect Harlan, inspiring design direction with creative insight, clear goals, and good information.

Participants make creative responses to prompts, helping to release habitual thinking, then they respond to each others’ objects.

MAKE. RESPOND TO OTHERS’ OBJECTS. REFLECT TOGETHER.

PROSPECT PROCESS Collective Imagination ABOUT PLACE

Reveal hopes and make meaning together

SWOTs—Strengthes Weaknesses Opportunities

Nor a visioning exercise. Charettes fine tune.

Threats—analyze. Visioning leans utopian. All useful. Yet communities need creative contribution, respect, better ways to disentrench conflict, and agreement on action steps for shared goals.

NOT A CHARETTE. AND NOT A SWOT.

PROSPECT:PARTICIPATION AND DESIGN 6 | 7

Fresh ideas and perspectives spring from acts of creativity, which seed more ideas. Prospect leverages the community’s own creativity to generate new ideas and discover shared values and aspirations. Participants strengthen skills to work together as they translate the experiences they want into goals, actions, and insights for the design of place-specific, goal-supportive public and community spaces. Designer participates in Prospect, learning with residents, raising questions, and floating ideas.

More than 30 local residents participated directly in the Prospect pilot or in interviews about their hopes for Harlan and its future.

PROSPECT PILOT: HARLAN, KENTUCKY

Prospect was piloted in Harlan, a Kentucky coal county with rich history and culture, a long struggle with high levels of poverty, and severe economic dislocation as coal has declined.

ABOUT PLACE

HARLAN VACANTCOURTHOUSELOT MODERNBUILDINGELECTRIC PROSPECT PROCESS Place-Specific ECONOMICS Harlan Co. U.S. Per Capita Income: $15,224 $ 27,334 Retail Sales: $ 6,793 $ 12,990 Median Housing: $53,500 $188,400 HARLAN COUNTY KENTUCKY LOUISVILLELEXINGTON

PROSPECT:PARTICIPATION AND DESIGN 8 | 9 Downtown : good architectural bones, a pleasing mix of crooked streets, urban verticality, and Deco details – in a lovely natural setting. “Modern Electric ” is long-vacant. A vacant lot frames the city’s longest vista. MODERN ELECTRIC: FOR SALE VACANT LOT: FOR SALEPROSPECT DESIGN PROPOSAL SITES:

and future threatened by vacancy Realistic. A community space proposal provides a future-oriented use for a large important downtown building. Uses local skills and resources; meets an urgent need; supports economic, social and cultural activity. CURRENT CONDITIONS: Vacant, Raw, Low Natural Light, 6,000 SF apx. “Modern Electric,” a former department store. Italianate, 1920s.

PROSPECTmettleDESIGNCommunitySpace

ABOUT PLACE

Past

PROSPECT HARLAN PARTICIPANT GOALS: “ENCOURAGE CONVERSATION” ASSET AT RISK

AN

Focal Lighting/Ceiling and Wall: Locally constructed.

Rubber Mats: Define space, reduce noise.

Food Kiosks: Shared between local vendors.

Local Art Work: On display, rotated; art sales; art boards.

Chicken-or-Egg Solution. Residents want more eating-out options, more social and cultural activities. But risk for restaurants is high. Prospect solution: small kiosks shared by multiple local vendors. mettle offers flexible space for inviting away-from-home interaction.

PROSPECT:PARTICIPATION AND DESIGN 10 | 11 “PLACES TO HANG OUT, EAT” “WE CAN DO IT OURSELVES” “HELP MAKE MONEY” “INVITING TO EVERYONE”

ACHIEVABLE — QUICKLY — WITH LOCAL RESOURCES

Aesthetic: Versatility, Welcome. Comfortable, flexible furnishings, variety in function, unvarnished aesthetic communicates welcome and comfort. responseParticipantto a Prospect Prompt: food bag/kiosk

Stools/Work Tables: Closed mine offices and commissaries; former office furnishings; safe, servicable donations.

B Stage for evening performances and events. Kiosks double as concessions. Flexible furniture.

ABOUT PLACE

WHEN IN TIME Harlan is at a critical junction as coal can no longer generate significant employment. Many young residents want to stay and work in the county. Prospect participant’s observation, “we have to make our own,” drives the mettle design: space for small-scale activities to seed possibilities.

mettle

A From main entry. Two kiosks and a small “cafe,” near the back. Soft yellow paint and window-like lighting brighten the dark space.

Features: lighting creates architecture and zoning, two kiosks, work tables, individual and small group spaces, performance and display area.

PROSPECT:COMMUNITY SPACE DESIGN 12 | 13 ENTRYMAINEXITEMER. ENTRYSIDEELEV.KIOSKS/RESTROOMSKITCHENSMALL (int.)WALLARTALCOVE A B PLAN N UP

PROSPECT DESIGN Public Space Inspirational. A public space proposal to showcase Harlan assets and please residents. HARLAN DOWNTOWN PARK “OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES IN TOWN” “CASUAL INTERACTION”HARLAN PROSPECT PARTICIPANT GOALS: Maximize rare assets in mountainous terrain. Create a community “lawn” that feels safe and inviting. FLAT SITE SOUTHERN EXPOSUREPROSPECTIVE VIEW ABOUT PLACE

PROSPECT:PUBLIC SPACE DESIGN 14 | 15 PLAN: Destinations 1 PORCH 2 SHELTER 3 ARBOR 4 GARDEN 5 DECK 6 STAGE 7 SWINGS Harlan’s moniker – a new take: Blood – Needed • Rich • Life • Connects all • Mystery • True • Old • Bankable. With a clay brain: heart and mind PLAN N 1 2 3 67 5 4 toParticipantresponsePrompt 3: a ofre-frame“BloodyHarlan” “COMMUNITY ARTS & PERFORMANCES” “CHILD-FRIENDLY BUT FOR ADULTS” “SHOWS PRIDE IN HARLAN COUNTY”

HARLAN DOWNTOWN PARKCA9 PROSPECT DESIGN Public Space Inviting. Varieties of experience and sensory richness welcome all to a community lawn. HARLAN DOWNTOWN PARK ABOUT PLACE

CLOCKWISE: Arbor Cafe. Kettlebottoms, dangerous to miners, at the entrance. Nature and industry focal wall.

Participants insisted on facing difficult aspects of the county’s circumstances and history: “you have to take the good with the bad.” Later, a conversation about the controversial moniker, “Bloody Harlan,” arose. A young man’s creative response rallied a unifying Prospect concept: Bloody Harlan: Blood – Needed, Rich, Life, Connects All, Mystery, True, Old, Bankable. These ideas carry throughout the park.

“THE GOOD WITH THE BAD”

Proposed park site, viewed from Ivy Hill.

PROSPECT:PUBLIC SPACE DESIGN 16 | 17

Where On Earth. The stage parallels the linearity of Pine Mountain; the arbor cafe echoes the tumble of Black Mountain. Interlocking paths conjure Clover Fork, Martin’s Fork, and Poor Fork – which converge in Harlan to form the Cumberland River.

Nature | Industry. Materiality and curvilinear and rectilinear elements reflect nature and mining. Recycled mine equipment, kettlebottoms— spheroid mineral deposits, gardens, and circular swings.

PROSPECT DESIGN Public Space

ABOUT PLACE

WHERE ON EARTH Harlan Downtown Park’s proposed site is Harlan’s longest vista. The axial plan protects the town’s sightlines and preserves a wide flat center “lawn” for larger gatherings and events.

Full of Pride. A place-specific celebration of Harlan and its many possibilities.

HARLAN DOWNTOWN PARK

experience. Small focal

offer interest and meaning. CAB Circular ArborCommunitySwingsGardensCafeSunning|ViewingDeckModularStage,disassembledFocalWall:IndustryandNatureDEF PROSPECT HARLAN PARK

the park’s focal point. Varied gathering and get-away spots

downtown. Stage seating creates an elevated gathering space. D B9 B9 B9 A9 E99F C9 Bluff at natural bed of Clover Fork, a tributary of the Cumberland River N PROSPECT:PUBLIC SPACE DESIGN 18 | 19 Axial

ABOVE: View toward plan preserves Harlan’s as expand points

longest vista

ABOUT PLACE

CONVERSATION AND PERSPECTIVE

Showcasing assets that have been present all along. Harlan is a beautiful spot on earth. Participants in Prospect showcased beauty in its spirit as well. Their largeness of heart and mind, imagination, and willingness to throw in together demonstrated what community is all about and what it can produce.

The psychological value of a long perspective. Freedom and imagination in the here and the there. The beauty of our place; its connection to yours.

The long arc of history, the wide arc of earth. The right spot: what a place wants to be.

HARLAN DOWNTOWN PARK

PROSPECT:PUBLIC SPACE DESIGN 20 | 21

ABOUT PLACE

Destination Dining Fulton Market, Chicago 4th Year Studio btw: DESTINATION DINING 22 | 23

Destination Dining, Fulton Market, Chicago btw: DESTINATION DINING 24 | 25

ABOUT A century-old food transportation district; 1900s-era brick warehouse. Fulton Market, Chicago …across the world, across the city, across the plate.

RESTAURANT GOALS AND EXPRESSION

ABOUT PLACE

Without a nearby L stop, Fulton Market is a bit out of the way and can require a car to reach. A sample group of district patrons reported making a night in the district, often at one establishment. btw offers experiential and social variety in a single destination. Design unifies organic and graphic elements with visual texture. The chef’s daily-find menu is, by-the-way, fully gluten-free.

PREVIOUS: Dining and Lounge; ABOVE LEFT (A): Bar Dining; RIGHT (B): Interior Bar. BOTTOM: Fulton Market, view from the site.

Dining zones flank the central bar 4,324 SF interior btw: DESTINATION DINING 26 | 27ABIDEATIONMeet— Span— A B

ABOVE: The site, a

former warehouse in Fulton Market. Canopy bridges interior and exterior and preserves historic features. EXERIORCANOPYELEVATION ENTRY INDOOR | OUTDOOR Support al fresco dining. Bring nature indoors with bridging elements. …across the world, across the city, across the plate. ABOUT PLACE

btw: DESTINATION DINING 28 | 29 Canopy delineates an interior dining space connecting to sidewalk cafe. ZONING PLAN VARIETY: CONVIVIAL & INTIMATE CANOPY DINING GROUPLOUNGEDININGPATRONS BARBAR DINING | CHEF STAFFDINING KITCHEN RESTROOMSSERVICERECEPTION N ENTRY INTERIOR CANOPY INTERIOR ELEVATION

across the

CENTER: Chef’s Dining Room, focused on chef-style evening dining and high-quality memorable business lunches.

…across the

SEATING L to R: Haworth Round Arm sofa; Herman Miller Sofia chair; Philippe Starck Passion chair; Herman Miller She-Said chair. world, city, plate.

across the

FURNISHINGS | MATERIALITY Clean lines, organic elements, wood floors remain; add wool carpet. ABOUT PLACE

btw: DESTINATION DINING 30 | 31 BAR SEATING: Herman Miller Magis Lyra Stool, Ahrend Clipline chairs, Haworth Bong Side Table. LIGHTING: West Elm, Staggered; CP Lighting, New Growth 2. 1 RECEPTION 2 LOUNGE 3 BAR 4 CANOPY DINING 5 GROUP DINING 6 CHEF/LUNCH | 7 CHEF TABLE 8 BAR DINING 9 EXTERIOR DINING SERVER STATIONS* PLAN: CONVIVIALITY • INTIMACY • FUNCTION RESTROOMSN KITCHEN SERVICESERVICE 2 8 * 14 657 3 9 * 7

ABOUT PLACE

INTERIORS QUICK TAKES re-imaginedMotion MAKING

The hotel meeting room is the bane of many traveling professionals. This space, typical of a large hotel conference center, is characterized by: bad lighting —inadequate lumens with a queasy color temperature mix, heavy ceiling, oppressive palette, advancing verticals, poor seating

Hotel Meeting Space

re-imagined The Project Propose a re-design for an existing space Response to an invitation from Kia Weatherspoon, President, Determined By Design for her blog, What Would You Design? ABOUT PLACE

ABOVE: Current hotel meeting space. CENTER: Re-design.

Design Problems:

How to address design problems within existing dimensions?

ABOVE: Re-designed Hotel Meeting Space.

Design Solutions: Replace and program lighting. Add dimension, especially around the power point screen. Enliven the palette. Furnish with well-designed seating.

FFE. Seating: Herman Miller, Dressed First Chair, Maharam, Divina Melange 931. Carpet: Mannington Carpet Planks, With the Grain Loop, Etched.

RE-IMAGINED: HOTEL MEETING SPACE 32 | 33

Accent Lighting: impact! n.r.2oob, alumnium.

narrow

worn

Local Retail + MOTIONWine The Project 2nd Year Studio: Alternative re-use for a former bank, Carlisle, Kentucky. Fightmaster Building, circa 1898. Project Proposal: MOTION A retail space offering sandwiches and baked goods, wine, coffee and local items.

Challenges: drop ceiling, bad carpet, space, difficult original curved tin ceiling, wood floors, exterior architectural

detail LEFT: Current Conditions. ABOUT PLACE

circulation Features:

Incorporate historic features: tin ceiling, wood floors, mini-safe (shown in back corner), bank vault and its Classical door

Circulate cafe patrons past rotating stock of local goods

Custom centerpiece inspired by concept and architectural detail.

MOTION: SMALL RETAIL 34 | 35

The project concept, Perpetual Motion, inspired a custom centerpiece influenced by exterior architectural detail, especially in the tower, and the mini-vault, seen in back corner.

Design Strategies for Motion

Natural light and deep sills: cafe seating to enjoy great morning light

MAKING

BRAZILSTUDY•DESIGN•BUILD

MAKING

BRAZIL DESIGN • BUILD 36 | 37

Sao Paulo THIS PAGE: FAF Farm, rural Sao Paulo BRAZILstateSTUDY•DESIGN•BUILDThisStudyAbroaddesign-buildstudioincluded

PREVIOUS Robin Lambert, study in urbana and rural Sao Paulo. A project re-designed a work space at Fazenda Ambiental Fortaleza/FAF, a sustainable coffee center near Igaria, Mococo, Sao Paulo state. Casa de Chicone, above, now serves as a work and social space for international visitors to FAF.

SPREAD: Photos,

MAKING

BRAZIL DESIGN • BUILD 38 | 39 STUDY Lectures and visits to urban and rural cultural sites in Sao Paulo state. FAF DESIGN • BUILD FAF is an organic coffee farm that supports agricultural cooperatives and hosts visitors interested in sustainability and fair trade. The studio designed and installed a new interior for Casa de Chicone, a former worker’s house, to serve as project work space for visitors. SIGNAGE • LIGHTING With KwiatkowskiCaitlynCuller

CASA DE CHICONE, Interior Renovation,

Casa de Chicone, shown here, is a former worker’s house at FAF. The design-build project converted the house into a space where visiting workers can complete indoor planning projects and socialize during off hours.

Casa de Chicone’s transformation also reduces wear on other historic FAF structures.

BRAZILIn-ProgressSTUDY•DESIGN•BUILD AvailableSIGNAGESalvageLIGHTINGyardmaterialsfarmwood Project Photo, Caitlyn Kwiatkowski Culler and Robin Lambert 1 1 2 2 MAKING

BRAZIL DESIGN • BUILD 40 | 41 DINING KITCHEN WORK LIVINGENTRYCASASTORAGEDECHICONE Lighting Design 1 Work/Living 2 Lantern 3 Kitchen 4 Entry 1 1 3 3 4 4

FURNITUREwalnut. The

CENTER: Lathe work, hand-rubbed finish.

This bed was designed to demonstrate skill in all aspects of cabinet construction. Built from a truck load of rough-sawn black Project Culminating Southeastcabinetmakingproject,class,CommunityandTechnicalCollege.

RIGHT: Elevation, exploring joinery.

MAKING

HAND 42 | 43

SHADOW PLAY

MAKING

The Project 2nd Year Studio Interactions between a screen and its shadow. Horizontal and vertical pattern repeats. Laser-cut Tyvek® Three-dimensional translation. The screen was drawn by hand, with pattern repeats refined. It was then re-created in AutoCad and cut on an 18" x 24" laser bed. Three-dimensional lighting installation is created with layers of linen and scrim. CENTER: Screen. RIGHT: Lighting element based on screen.

flight

FLIGHT 44 | 45

DESIGN THINKING

ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN A Conceptual Framework for Campus Design and Planning ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN : INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 46 | 47

OVERLAP

THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY

STOPOVER

ACTIVATING Spatial Typology for Campus Design

DESIGN THINKING Design Thinking: Concrete to Abstract, Ideas and Connections, New Solutions

and Planning UK 2050: LEARN • WORK • LIVEA CAMPUS DESIGN CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

Activating the In-Between is a way to think conceptually about a campus and its discrete spaces based on user experience. These six spatial types frame design characteristics toward researchindicated user opportunities, behaviors and frames of mind associated with UK’s Learn • Work • Live goals.

Senior Research Studio UK 2050: Learn • Work • Live ABOVE: University of Kentucky (UK) representational campus. ABOVE RIGHT: abstracted campus.

INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 48 | 49

THE

ACTIVATING IN-BETWEEN: These six space types can be designed into new and existing structures and interstitial spaces. A practical and expansive framework for campus design and planning, the typology considers how incremental improvements – at varied scales and investment levels – can be designed into existing and new structures to benefit current as well as future users. The types are based on Values and Outcomes of Learn • Work • Live goals and on Affordance Theory of spatial characteristics.

GO-TO IMPROMPTU HAPPEN-UPON SIGNIFIER CREATIVITY • INNOVATION • PRODUCTIVITY • EXCELLENCE • COMMUNITY • PLACE

UK 2050: LEARN • WORK • LIVEA CAMPUS DESIGN CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK DESIGN THINKING

Learn • Work • Live: Overlaps increase exposure to new perspectives and experiences—the essence of learning, creativity and innovation. They help deepen awareness, foster relationships across difference, and enhance insight and experimentation.

Where & Why: Parts of two or more active spaces, designated or not, Overlaps entice a range of interactions, including unlikely ones, which stimulates conversation, exchange of information and ideas, unusual collaborations, and new ways of thinking.

Examples: Studios, labs, co-work spaces, performance areas, lively lobbies.

Connection • Collaboration • Activity High-value shared Overlaps encourage formal and informal interaction among user groups and across academic disciplines.

OVERLAP This landing in the central stairway of UK’s Pharmacy Building is a hot spot of informal interaction.

Value: Possibility Desired Outcomes: Innovation • Community Affordances: Exposure • Connection • Collaboration

Respite • Conviviality • Observation

Open and distinct, interior or outdoors, Stopovers carve out temporary personal space wherever the action is most likely to happen.

STOPOVER ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 50 | 51 CREATIVITY • INNOVATION • PRODUCTIVITY • EXCELLENCE • COMMUNITY • PLACE

A sitting room on the Pharmacy Building’s main hall is sunny and well-used. A display of antique pharmaceuticals is a small place-specific Signifier.

Value: Respect Desired Outcomes: Productivity • Place Affordances: Respite • Conviviality • Observation

Learn • Work • Live: For individual or group, work or social, Stopovers make space for a change of pace and scenery. They help clear the mind for fresh perspective, new insight, pleasant social interaction, and creative productivity.

Where & Why: Adjacent to or within active areas, Stopovers are small public landing spots for individuals or groups. Comfortable and flexible, they offer informal personal work sites and support quick collaborations and meet-ups, people-watching, and relaxation.

Examples: Flexible seating, niches, open shelters, perches, benches, tables, porches and patios.

This parking lot is the largest dry-ground open space in central campus. Easily accessible, it could be adapted for impromptu activities.

Where & Why: Adjacent to active areas, Impromptus suggest possibility and invite creative expression and celebration across user groups.

Value: Freedom Outcomes: Creativity • Community Affordances: Imagination • Gathering • Celebration Imagination • Gathering • Celebration

Examples: Flexible lobbies, plazas, available warehouses, quads, play yards, shared work boards, interactive physical and digital models.

UK 2050: LEARN • WORK • LIVEA CAMPUS DESIGN CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK DESIGN THINKING

Large or small, inside or out, Impromptus can become almost anything temporarily.

Learn • Work • Live: Impromptus are places anyone and everyone can be. Adaptable, inviting, and public, they encourage casual interaction, arts and cultural activities, and experimentation. They support identification with place, social cohesiveness, sense of community across user groups, and shared ownership of public space and its activities.

IMPROMPTU

Value: Inclusion Outcomes: Productivity • Excellence Affordances: Comfort • Stillness • Reflection

Comfortably lit and semi-private, these carrels for one to four users in the library basement are especially popular late at night.

Comfort • Stillness • Possibility

Small, private, and accessible, Go-Tos are temporary getaways for personal use. Fully or semiprivate, safe, adaptable, and comfortable, they offer small short-term oases for individuals.

Where & Why: Nested in active areas or situated near them, Go-Tos provide security and psychological remove for individual users. They demonstrate care and attention to personal needs and differences that help foster individual well-being and communicate inclusive values.

Learn • Work • Live: Go-Tos offer essential private space on busy noisy campuses where many users have nowhere to go to escape the demands, attentions and distractions of other people. Go-Tos offer clean, quiet, humane space.

GO-TO CREATIVITY • INNOVATION • PRODUCTIVITY • EXCELLENCE • COMMUNITY • PLACE

ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 52 | 53

Examples: Nursing stations; call booths; safe spaces for meditation, napping, personal re-grouping.

Happen-Upons are small “fields-of-care” Tuan and highly valued by people who know about them.

Learn • Work • Live: Happen-Upons are the happy leisurely getaway or the moment of delight in a hurried routine. They build attachment and care for place and help relax and refresh the mind for creativity and productivity.

This flower garden behind the former President’s Mansion is open to the public. Its entry is on a lightly traveled sidewalk.

Value: Imagination Desired Outcomes: Place • Creativity Delight

• Pleasure • Discovery UK 2050: LEARN • WORK • LIVEA CAMPUS DESIGN CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK DESIGN THINKING

Partially-hidden space gems, Happen-Upons offer rich – often unanticipated – sensory experiences that please and re-center the body and mind in space and time.

Where & Why: Off the beaten path or tucked away in plain sight, Happen-Upons help de-focus the mind for creative insight and, alternatively, wake up the mind from distracted or stuck thought patterns.

HAPPEN-UPON

Delight • Pleasure • `Discovery

Examples: Hidden gardens, nooks and crannies, surprise vistas, secluded seating, quiet paths.

Affordances:

Significance • Inclusion • Continuity

ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 54 | 55 SIGNIFIER CREATIVITY • INNOVATION • PRODUCTIVITY • EXCELLENCE • COMMUNITY • PLACE

Where & Why: Located in highly visible spaces, Signifiers suggest continuity and contribute to a shared and lasting sense of place. Signifiers have physical essence and cultural significance. Their images may be used to represent place and incorporated into branding.

One-of-a kind and symbolic, Signifiers communicate locale. Highly recognizable, they can signal character and promote identitification with – or alienation from – place.

Value: Meaning Desired Outcomes: Place • Community Affordances: Inclusion • Continuity • Identity

Examples: Geographic features, singular architecture, distinctive art and design, monuments.

Significant objects can announce place and identity. Light fixtures, left, designed by UK’s Joe Rey-Barreau, will be re-installed in the new Student Center.

Learn • Work • Live: Signifiers are the markers of place that claim it as unique and important. When inclusive, beautiful and iconic, Signifiers suggest belongingness and communicate that this place and all of its constituents matter.

DESIGN THINKING

UK OBSERVATIONS

COHERENCIES: Research & Observation Ideas and information distilled from research, theory, and campus observation were noted on cards and sketches, then grouped and re-grouped with new ideas to find coherencies. Concepts, themes, and values core to Learn • Live • Work goals were identified. Spatial qualities that encourage user behaviors, experiences and states of mind associated with goal-driven outcomes were mapped onto campus spaces and personal and spatial. adaptations. This process revealed potential to apply affordance theory to design spatial characteristics into both new and existing structures, at varied investment levels and scales, to support all campus users and strengthen UK’s efforts to reach mid-century goals.

ABOVE. Work board, sample sketches: finding coherencies and possibilities.

User Adaptations of Behaviors and Spaces

UK’s campus is lovely and green. However, adaptive physical burdens fall unevenly on women, mothers, people with disabilities or medical concerns, commuter students, and non-faculty staff. Spaces for collaboration, privacy, and spontaneous group activity are rare.

UK 2050: LEARN • WORK • LIVEA CAMPUS DESIGN CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK DESIGN THINKING

Lecture halls and fixed furnishings cause passivity. Students and faculty struggle to collaborate within spatial limitations. IMAGINE INCLUDE

EXPLOREDISCOVERYFREEDOMBREATHPOSSIBILITYEXPERIMENTPLAYVOIDDELIGHTTOGETHERDELIGHT STILLNESS SECLUDE

SHELTER GO-TO OVERLAP VOID HAPPENUPON ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 56 | 57 ABSTRACT THE PROBLEM to Essential Questions

hold enormous potential toward goal-supportive re-design. RIGHT: Sketches: abstraction and relationships. •What spatial characteristics support, encourage, and enhance Learn • Work • Live experiences? •Where do these conditions exist on UK campus? Where can they be activated? •Where and how can supportive conditions be created across campus? CREATIVITY • INNOVATION • PRODUCTIVITY • EXCELLENCE • COMMUNITY • PLACE

PASS-BY UK’s campus

preconceived

Girls day-sleep mostly in this restroom lounge; boys day-sleep everywhere. Many informal gathering spots are adjacent to busy restrooms. Spaces for spontaneous group activity are small or far from central campus. Encoding in UK’s most iconic structure has raised essential

Interstital and liminal spaces across

discover unexpected

and possibilities.

Abstraction

Zoom out to essentials in order to visualize and think conceptually. can help de-couple ideas and experiences to connections

questions.

Abercrombie, Stanley. A Philosophy of Interior Design. New York: Harper & Row, 1990. aTillich quote (above): p 166.

Baugh, Bruch. “Body” in The Deleuze Dictionary, revised edition, Ed. Parr, Adrian. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005, pp 89-90.

Block, Peter. Community: The Structure of Belonging. San Francisco: BerrettKoehler Publishers, Inc., 2009. Caicco, Gregory, ed. Architecture, Ethics and the Personhood of Place. Lebanon, NH: University Press of New England, 2007. Carson, Shelley. Your Creative Brain: Seven Steps to Maximize Imagination, Productivity, and Innovation in Your Life. Boston, MA: Harvard Health Publications, 2010. Cross, Nigel. Design Thinking. NY: Berg, 2011. Deakin, Mark, and Sam Allwinkle. “Urban Regeneration and Sustainable Communities: The Role of Networks, Innovation, and Creativity in Building Successful Partnerships,” Journal of Urban Technology 14 (June 2007), 77-91. Heidegger, Martin. “Building, Dwelling, Thinking,” in Phenomonology: Critical Concepts in Philosophy. Ed., Moran, Dermot, and Embree, Lester. London: Routledge, 2004, pp 100-109. Marleau-Ponty, Maurice. “The theory of the body is already a theory of perception,” in Phenomonology of Perception. London: Routledge, 2012, pp 203-217.

Bennett, Scott. “Learning Behaviors and Learning Spaces, “ in Libraries and the Academy. Vol. 2, No. 3, (2011), pp 765-785.

Selected Bibliography (All photos Robin Lambert unless cited below)

For in the proximate, the daily, the apparently small, there is hidden… the metaphysical; the here-and-now is the place where meaning is disclosed, where our existence must find interpretation, if it can find interpretation at all. That is what dwelling, or the space of dwelling is: something proximate, daily, apparently small over against great things. —Paul Tillich, 1933a a an interior design conceptual thesis project

Agrest, Diana I. “Architecture from Without: Body, Logc, and Sex” in Gender Space Architecture: An Interdisciplinary Introduction. Ed., Rendell, Jane, Penner, Barbara, and Borden, Iain. London: Routledge, 2003, pp 29-41.

ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY

DESIGN THINKING

Toker, Zeynep. “Recent trends in community design: the eminence of participation,” Design Studies 28 (2007), 309-323. Tuan, Yi-Fu. “Space and Place: Humanistic Perspective,” in Human Geography: An Essential Anthology, ed. Agnew, J, Livingston, D.N., & Rogers, Alisdair. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 1996, pp 444-457.

Semetsky, Inna. “Experience.” The Deleuze Dictionary, revised edition. Ed. Parr, Adrian. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005, pp 89-90. Taylor, Mark and Preston, Julieanna. Intimus: Interior Design Theory Reader. Chichester, England: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2008. Thompson, Catharine Ward and Penny Travlou, eds. Open Space: People Space. London: Taylor & Francis, 2007.

. (Image: Luminaire, p 59). Sam Farrar Williams. University of Kentucky. [Pinterest post]. Retrieved from https://www.pinterest.com/pin/633387421608337.

ACTIVATING THE IN-BETWEEN: INTERSTICE AS POSSIBILITY 58 | 59

(Image: Memorial Hall, p 51).

University of Kentucky Images. Campus Map, p iv, 51. Retrieved from maps.uky.edu/printablemaps/CampusMap_Basemap_BW_11x17.pdf.https:// Funkhouser Bldg, p 48. Chellgren Center homepage. Retrieved from https://www.uky.edu/chellgren/sites/www.uky.edu.chellgren/files/funk.jpg.

Urhahn Urban Design. The Spontaneous City. BIS Publishers, 2012. Weisman, Leslie Kanes. “The Spatial Caste System: Design for Social Inequality,” in Discrimination by Design: A Feminist Critique of the Man-Made Environment. Champagne-Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994, pp 9-34.

Massey, Doreen. Space, Place and Gender. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994. ron_quixote. (2015, May 21). Empty university. [Instagram post]. Retrieved from http://www.instagram.com/p/29eSITzBGh/?taken-by+ron_quixote

DESIGN THINKING AT WORK

Violence in U.S. K - 12 Schools, 1974-2012: Patterns in Deadly Incidents and Mass Threat, Robin Lambert, Rural School and Community Trust Presented to the U.S. House of Representatives, School Safety Caucus, 2016 Top Ten Panel presentation, Education Writers Association, 2016 Schools are among the safest places for American youth. Yet, American students are more likely to die at school than students in other countries.

VISUALIZATIONS,ANALYSIS,NARRATIVE DESIGN THINKING AT WORK

Effective solutions improve school climate and overall outcomes. Surveillance and school policing are counter-productive.often Full report available at Usedissuu.com/robinpatrwithpermission.

FINDINGSMAJOR

Definitions: Mass events: three or more people died or were injured; or, multiple victims were targeted resulting in at least one injury. Single events: incidents in which one or two people died.

This 50-page report was prepared in 2013 in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting. Information was sparse and often inaccurate. Then, as now, many people reached for school-based solutions that had little proven benefit but evidence of portential harm. The Rural Trust wanted a deeper understanding of actual events in order to highlight transformative solutions.

ABOUT THE REPORT

RESEARCH,

Primary sources. We found the most useful information in newspaper accounts. 700 well-documented events are included in this report. Four big takeaways. 1) Single events outnumber mass events and claim many more lives. 2) Male students are the majority of perpetrators in middle and high schools. 3) Guns are involved in the vast majority of deaths and were in most accounts easily available to those who used them. 4) The most effective school-based preventions ensure all students can be known, appreciated, make contributions, and see possibilities for their own future.

The report is best understood as a journalistic exploration rather than a statistical analysis. Single events and older ones are especially underrepresented. This said, findings have held up with subsequent academic reports and tracked with ongoing events in America’s schools.

A report of the Rural School and Community Trust Revised 2016 w Mass violence events claim more attention, but single events claim far more lives. Perpetrators in middle and high schools are overwhelmingly students. Guns are involved in the vast majority of deaths in both single and mass events. Deadly violence occurs in all locales and in charter, private, public, and religious schools.

NEW FRAMEWORKS 62 | 63

RELEVANCE

DESIGN THINKING AT WORK

report of the Rural School and Community Trust Revised 2016 w

A

The Distance Between, p 7 Isolation, despair, humiliation, rage or loss combined with easy access to a weapon appear to be the most common denominators in events in the report.

Alienation, anger, easy access to weapons. Male students are the majority of perpetrators and guns the usual weapon in deadly school violence; other commonalities are less obvious. Some perpetrators were known to have social or behavioral challenges or made public their intentions; some were reported to be captivated by violent influences. But many displayed no outward risk factors. Reports suggest feelings of isolation or despair may drive violence and may be higher in schools that fail to prioritize opportunities for all students, tolerate bullying, or endorse high-stakes rankings as sufficient measures of student capability or potential. In most accounts, a young person seemed to have simply gotten angry or suffered a loss they perceived as devastating and then ound a deadly weapon close at hand. Less obvious patterns. Violence appears to spread like a contagion, often with odd similarities or copy-catting that suggest seeding of violent ideation. There were regional clusters and schools with multiple events. A prior event or one in a nearby school appeared to increase the risk. “It appears that kids’ impulses—rage, pride, jealousy, a real or perceived insult, a desire for self-assertion, revenge—were pretty much the same regardless of the weapon they used. … In many accounts it appeared that without a deadly weapon at hand the adolescent moment of rage or despair would have passed without serious injury.”

IN EVENT PATTERNS

NEW FRAMEWORKS 64 | 65

Structures to ensure every student is known and can make positive contributions to school, classmates, and/or Consequentialcommunity. work that requires cooperation over high-stakes competition. Discipline practices to reward kindness, stop bullying; and require students to make amends for harm they have Suspensioncaused. and expulsion apply only to egregious violations; the criminal justice system is involved only for actual crimes. Full report available at Usedissuu.com/robinpatrwithpermission.

A report of the Rural School and Community Trust Revised 2016 w

BEST PRACTICESSCHOOL

DESIGN THINKING AT WORK

POLICY & COMMUNITY-BASED RESPONSES.

“For many young people, there was too little to slow down violent impulses or offer alternatives—too little support, too few meaningful relationships, too few structures for talking out feelings or resolving conflict, too little sense of a future worth living into…” 2016 Update, p i-ii School policies and practices that build positive relationships and contributions help prevent violence and improve overall student outcomes.

Basic school safety measures matter. Self-locking doors and visitor check-ins are useful, especially at the elementary level. Conditions that help students support each other, or when needed seek help – not punishment – for someone else make a difference. Some responses that are reassuring to many adults can be counter-productive. For example, harsh punishments, surveillance, and in-school police officers have been shown to increase resentment and can make violence more likely. Moreover, research confirms such measures and related consequences are unfairly and disproportionately applied to students of color and those with disabilities. School climate and support matters more. Schools have little to ability to reduce access to weapons, but they can protect students by fostering experiences in which everyone understands themselves and others as valued and valuable. Schools that reward kindness, teach skills for resolving conflict, require students to repair harm they have caused, balance cooperation and competition, and provide all students opportunities to express and do things they and others appreciate equip students with a path for reaching a positive future. Such practices help prevent violence and improve other outcomes.

.-responsibility.spect,ing.

The quality of relationships is a core issue. Students and teachers are known Everyone has valued and valuable work to do. Student voice notresponsibility.behaviorciplineframeanding.spect,basedSchoolcorrectly.doorslatchesandcollainclusiKindnemattersssonborationarerewardedSafetyisasharedresponsibility.Allandworkwn.rs.ss,on,bo-rationareed.bi-cultureisontrust,reandbelongFlexibilitypersonalizationpractice.DispromotesgoodandpersonalRestitutionpunishment,isfostered

RELATIONSHIPSQUALITYPOSITIVESCHOOLCLIMATE

SCHOOLSSAFE SUCCESSFUL CONNECTIONS CLIMATE RELATIONSHIPS

WHAT MAKES ALSO MAKES THEM

No school can be 100% safe from violence or armed intruders. But communities and schools can reduce the likelihood of violence from within.

CONNECTIONSCOMMUNITY

Images: Schools That Change Communities, Bob Gliner, 2013. For more information, visit www.ruraledu.org/video.php?id=142. For more info, see “Violence in U.S. K-12 Schools, 1974-2013” at www.ruraledu.org. © Rural School and Community Trust, 2013.

Students do academic work that makes meaningful contributions to the community. Health services are offered students and families. Creative expression is taught and encouraged. ,

NEW FRAMEWORKS 66 | 67

DESIGN THINKING

DESIGN THINKING QUICK TAKES NewNewPossibilitiesFutures MAKING

Beautiful, beloved, fragile, historic, multi-building facility— and a huge constituency with divergent values and goals.

Despite unspeakable pressures local residents responded with mixed and nuanced opinions and very little rancor toward me.

Catastrophic Threat. New Beginnings. When three companies filed a permit application for a large mountaintop removal coal mine adjacent to PMSS, the Board instructed me to follow federal law to protect the School.

National Historic Landmark, Harlan County, Kentucky 18 Buildings • 800 Acres • 22 Staff • 3,000 Annual Visitors “Lands Unsuitable”: 2,364 acres protected • Nation’s first viewshed protections for mining • Spark for new developments on Pine Mountain’s fragile north side: Kentucky Nature Preserves, Kentucky Natural Lands Trust, Little Shepherd Trail State Park.

After review and a public campaign, 2,364 acres were declared “Unsuitable for Mining,” protecting PMSS buildings and environs. See beauty and its sources. Honor history and today’s realities. Respect constituents and supporters. Do it all with truthfulness. Maintaining the beauty of the most beautiful of the southern mountain settlements is a no small feat. Designed by Mary Rockwell Hook, one of America’s first women architects, the18-building main campus is a remarkable example of a gorgeous built environment that directs the human eye toward the natural environment. Preserving its beauty requires tact, ingenuity, and efforts to help its many admirers see the sources of its beauty.

NEW BEAUTYPOSSIBILITIES&BALANCE DESIGN THINKING | CREATIVE TENSIONS

DESIGN THINKING AT WORK

ABOVE: Laurel House Dining Hall, one of 18 buildings on the main campus;

PINE MOUNTAIN SETTLEMENT SCHOOL

NEW POSSIBILITIES 68 | 69 googleearth.com Pine Mountain Settlement School Harlan County, Kentucky Executive Director L to R: Aerial view of main campus; Symposium on Settlements in the Southern Mountains; Cultural events. Main Campus 18 Buildings

SITES80+40+PROJECT TYPES 38PROJECT TYPES22PROJECTTYPES 93SITESSITES891TYPESPROJECT6 76SITES 1TAXESPROJECT2 44SITES 1 PROJECT 5 ~$50KSITESBegin TOTALReachCUMULATIVE>$5M SCALING UP ProjectandVarietyReach DESIGN THINKING AT WORK

Rural Alabama communities face many current challenges and historical legacies that diminish well-being for individuals and communities. They also have valuable strengths and resources.

This groundbreaking work drew power from its reliance on local imagination and its collaboration across barriers, which fueled meaningful new quality-of-life projects and achieved over $5 million in grants, national attention, and policy results. A Statewide Initiative. From Scratch See possibility where it has not been recognized. Build reciprocal collaborative structures that support the design of new, ingenious, apt responses to long-standing challenges. Scale up reach, resources, and impact. Do it all with respect, trust, courage. And love.

Creative resource use and collaboration across communities to address needs and improve quality of life and opportunity.

NEW COMMUNITYFUTURESLIFE & WORK DESIGN THINKING | IMAGINATION & INSIGHT

Program for Rural Services and Research University of Alabama Assistant Director NEW FUTURES 70 | 71 QUALITY OF LIFEARTS & CULTURE ECONOMICSSPACE & PLACE POLICY PROCESS OVERVIEW OBSERVELISTEN &EXPERIMENTCREATE REFINE,DEEPEN,EXTEND &SUSTAINSHARE Connect to Larger Issues and Policies Build SupportsNew COLLABORATIONSTRUCTURE See HearStrengths,Needs Leverage Strengths to Address Needs POSSIBILITYIMAGINE Try EmergentOut Ideas Within & CommunitiesAcross EDUCATION 85 Music and Arts Events, Newspapers, Literary Journals 33 Playgrounds, Gardens, Parks, Passive Solar Houses 26 Health and Entrepreneurship Sites 24 Site Community Innovation Collaborative >$5 M in New Grants $50M Leveraged Toward New National Non-Profit

lambertdsgn@gmail.comCONTACT9 1 linkedin.com/li/robinlambert9.438.39621 www.issuu.com/robinpatr

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