Service Design - Newton Dorm by samuilbo

Politecnico di Milano / Scuola del Design Product Service System Design Environment and Experience Design Studio

Luisa Collina, Peter di Sabatino with Ilaria Bollati, Tina Fazeli, Claudia Mastrantoni e Vanessa Monna

A project by: Giulia Balboni Samuil Botev Marianna Carbone Anrui Xu

INDEX INTRODUCTION

Group 7 ............................. 10

RESEARCH

Hospitality ....................... 14 Newton Dorm ................. 16 First visit ........................... 18 Co-Working session ... 20 Insights .............................. 24 Field research ................ 26 Identikit ............................. 30

BELONGING NEWTON

Definition .......................... 34 Cases study .................... 38

INNOVATIVE SERVICE

Team Newton ................ 46 Welcoming ............... 50 Crews .......................... 54 Internal services ........ 58 Share a meal .......... 62 Book a studio ........ 68 Have a class ........... 72 Have an event ....... 76 The dorms cup ............ 80 Final event ............... 86 Partners .................... 88

System representation The system .............. 92 Service map ............ 94

COMMUNICATION CHANNEL Navigation tree ..... 102

ENVIRONMENTAL SOLUTION ENVIRONMENTAL SOLUTION inspirations ............. 108 Areas of intervention .. 114 Meeting Point ........ 116 Sudios .......................... 124

ENVIRONMENTAL COMMUNICATION Wayfinding ................ 130

INTRODUCTION As a group of international and off-site students, we were very involved by the topic of this project. Having the possibility to shape a Politecnico's dormitory was almost a rematch for us, to all the old and expensive renting rooms and empty dirty dorms. A month ago no one of us would have ever believed how far we could arrive.

GIULIA BALBONI

SAMUIL BOTEV

Product Designer Italy

Interior Designer Bulgary

MARIANNA CARBONE

ANRUI XU

Product Designer Italy

Communication Designer China

GROUP 7 Group 7 consists of 4 irreplaceable elements: Anrui, Giulia, Marianna and Samuil. The contribution of each element of the group has made us reach the design level that you can now see and that is enclosed in this book. We hope that you will enjoy the journey through our project.

RESEARCH To immerse ourself in the project we wanted to start the research phase from the theme of hospitality, to understand what it is and how to reach it. Then we dived into the study of the environment, that is, the dormitory Newton. Field research has had several phases, with different actors, the first being collective as a class, with common visits and coworking sessions. The second phase being grouped and more focused on a certain concept. At the end of the research phase we created a sort of identikit of students and some of their features.

Hospitality is an atmosphere

HOSPITALITY The concept of hospitality is very ancient, but this means not that there is a standardized method of welcoming and making others, guests or foreigners, feel at home. If in a shared place we aim to hospitality, balance and effects become even more delicate and unpredictable. To be able to offer everyone the same experience, and the same feeling is impossible. Especially because the perception of hospitality varies not only from country to country, but also from region to region or even home to home! J a c q u e s D e r r i d a , a F re n c h p h i lo s o p h e r, offers a model to understand hospitality that divides unconditional hospitality from conditional hospitality. This division raises a n o t h e r p ro b le m : c a n yo u n o t fee l t h a t hospitality is conditioned in places like hotels, restaurants or dormitories? How to convey a real sense of welcome in the guests? Some people have an innate ability to meet them at ease, and that's what they've been pointing at "Ostello Bello" for example, by hiring people who send you a real sense of warmth and familiarity, and who seems to be really interested in you and to offer you the best. But to be able to reach this goal you need to plan it in every single detail.

In front of the dorm there is a large garden that is used both by students and by neighborhood to gather. Despite the fact that in the space right now there are only few benches.

09/2016 Newtonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s reopening

268

politecnico students

NEWTON DORM Isaac Newton Politecnico's residence has been recently renewed to fit better the needs of students. This dormitory gather together 268 students from all over the world. Despite it's location decentralized, the building is next to the metro station of San Leonardo, on the red line. Inside the building there are lot of facilities available for students: gym, study areas, play areas and a library.

FIRST VISIT T h e f i r s t v i s i t t o t h e N ew t o n d o r m i t o r y was carried out with the accompaniment o f t h e a rc h i t ec t o f t h e s t r u c t u re M a r i a Teresa Gullace, who provided us with initial important details about the history and organization of the residence. Of course her was only one of the many points of view which we heard during the project.

CO-WORKING To be sure to hear the voices and opinions of most dormitory residents we as a design studio, have organized a co-working session with the aim of receiving cues from staff, neighborhood and especially students living within the dormitory of the Politecnico.

The co-working session took place on two different days and at different times of the day, trying to involve as many people as possible in our activities. These ranged from shadowing, to find out how students moved inside the building, to direct interviews, to the demand of drawing problems and solutions, to understand how students would visualize them and the dormitory. The focus of coworking activity was the conclusive aperitif which, given the young age of the residents and their desire to socialize, has attracted them and actively participates in the activity we have proposed. During the aperitif we offered short activities and a final reward to try and get the most d i re c t a n d h o n e s t a dv i c e a n d a n s we r s possible. The activities in question were: speed date, hot pot, treasure hunt and match the words. However, we did not want the students to perceive the aperitif as a trap to interrogate t h e m , a n d f o r t h i s rea s o n , b e s i d e s t h e research we have also provided fun moments such as pizza time, group dances and the final concert.

mix countries

ideas in the box

more social events

language barrier building feels empty and character less

signage and directions 22

INSIGHTS Collecting all the coworking activity data we found out that the aperitif participants were 110, the structured interviews 37 and the neighbors interviewed 23, the staff members who issued an interview were 3, including the vice-director of the dormitory. The insights of this research were many because both students and staff were eager to talk to someone who wanted to solve their problems and doubts about the dormitory. Many students have underlined the lack of character that their dormitory proves, both from the inside and from the outside. Students are generally satisfied with the services inside, but agree that every useful s e r v i c e ( g y m , l a u n d r y o r g a m e ro o m ) corresponds to a thousand inefficiencies and rules in Italian, which limit its usability. The barrier of language and culture is also a recurring theme: both in terms of room allocation and staff-student relationship, which often can not be based on non-verbal communication.

XINMIAO, 20 BACHELOR IN PRODUCT DESIGN CHINA

FIELD RESEARCH After the initial coworking session, we came back to Newton dormitory to conduct interviews with more focused questions about the topics we were particularly concerned about. Those topics that were: sense of belonging, re s p e c t , s e c o n d h o m e a n d p r i d e . T h i s b e c a u s e d u r i n g t h e c owo r k i n g s e s s i o n students highlighted concrete problems with everyday life, but before we wanted to investigate the general sentiment of students inside the building. I n p a r t i c u la r, we wa n t ed t o u n d e r s t a n d why students had chosen to live inside a residence, and most of all why they chose to live at Newton's. This was to understand what kind of expectations the students had at the time of their arrival to the dorm, and if their expectations were met or disappointed. Then if they were able to build a "relationship" with the other inhabitants of the dorm, the staff and the neighborhood. We i n t e r v i ewed 4 re s i d e n t s : Y l e n i a a n d Giuseppe, from Italy, Xinmiao from China and Sushant from India. We asked them the same questions:

YLENIA, 27 MASTER OF ARCHITECTURE ITALY

Why you chose to live at Newton? Have you ever lived in a dormitory before? Do you feel comfortable inviting visitors? Are you proud of living here? Which room/space you are more proud of? There is a room that you are ashamed of? Do you feel that your personal needs are respected in living at Newton? There is something that makes you feel not respected? Would you say you belong to Newton dorm? Then, after the general inteview we also asked them specific questions about rooms and spaces inside the building, specifically play room and study spaces: Do you use study spaces here at Newton? Do you think they are well structured? Do you use shelves in those spaces? / Do you perceive the play room and living room as 1 space? Do you often go there? Would you wish to have other equipment? What do you mean by playing?

ITALIAN STUDENTS - FROM 20 TO 33 Y.O. - 70 STUDENTS - MOST OF THEM LIVES AT NEWTON BECAUSE THEY HAVE A SCHOLARSHIP - THEIR GROUP OF FRIENDS INSIDE THE CAMPUS IS COMPOSED BY ITALIANS

INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS - FROM 20 TO 35 Y.O. - 198 STUDENTS - MOST OF THEM LIVES AT NEWTON BECAUSE THEY WANTED TO MAKE NEW FRIENDS - THEIR GROUP OF FRIENDS INSIDE THE CAMPUS IS MULTICULTURAL

IDENTIKIT Analyizing the results of our interviews we realized that the average age of studets is wider than we tought: from 20 to 35 years old. All the students at Newton are 268, and more than a half of them is international (198) and just 70 are italians. Generally italian and international students are living at Newton for different reasons. Italians are here mainly because they have the scolarship, but they would have preferred to live in a more centralized dorm, such as Leonardo da Vinci. This drives them not to be proud of living at Newton. The group of friends that students create inside the dorm is different depending on nationalities: italians prefere to stay together, while international students are more open to eterogeneous mates. F o re i g n s t u d e n t s h ave a l s o a h i g h e r c o n s i d e ra t i o n o f t h e d o r m : X i n m i a o fo r example told us that she felt blessed to live at Newton because in China is very common to live in a dormitory, but here in Italy she felt "elected" because her name was on a list.

BELONGING NEWTON

To d e v e l o p s u c h a b i g p ro j e c t , i t w a s necessary to create a key concept that could combine every single aspect of the work, a "fil rouge" visible in all the details and as a final goal . But words weren't enough to keep the fous of the concept, so we visualized in a picture our concept, that could inspire us in all our work.

WHEELGIANT PUZZLES, ETSY

KEY CONCEPT Our key concept is Belonging Newton and it derives from our will to create a sense of belonging in students towards the building and the inner community. Belonging means "being part / member of something" and we want this something to be the inside community in the dormitory. Since belonging, among other things, means to be proud of the group to which we belong, we have settled to identify students who reside at Newton as Team Newton. We have decided to focus on the development of a feeling of belonging to dormitory students because, in our opinion, when stimulating such a feeling, the care and attention towards the group or context that we are dear increases. E ve n i f b e l o n g i n g m ea n s t o b e p a r t o f something, it's important that every part of the community keeps it's individuality. As it is in the key image the two penguins combining t o g e t h e r c re a t e s o m e t h i n g n e w, a n e w meaning to the whole picture, but they don't loose their own identity. Another important bullet point for us, is the importance of the possibility of express the personality of every student inside the building. This because in common spaces,

like dormitories or offices, it's difficult to express our tastes and create a spot that we can call "our own". The picture here is to show that we don't have to be ashamed to express ourself in a community, rather we have to be aware that the general picture of the community takes life from the combination of individuals.

IDENTITY

Dorimitory of Technical University Sofia 2014

CASES STUDY Spaces and objects are not alive but they are part of our life this is why the identity has very important part in giving a soul and personality to everything around us. The identity is the language of spaces, it tells us who they are and what they are meant to be. In this case The Technical University of Sofia based their identity on the great Albert Einstein, aiming to s t i m u la t e s t u d e n t s t o d e s i re a n d g e t over their limits every day more and more. They have drawn a la rg e i m a g e o f h i s m o s t m e m o ra b le f a c i a l i m p re s s i o n on the most visible from the street side as well as motivating quotes and formulas c o n n ec t ed t o Einstein’s work. They have used also some “scale” motifs to push the idea of the everyday improvement.

COMMUNITY

Airbnb office, 2016 Singapore Design: FARM Photos: Beton Brut

Airbnb brand positioning is very strong: Belong Together. This concept links together the service of the company with a new sense of involvement for the community. The idea of belonging is mirrored in every single detail of the company, starting from the logo. The icon, nicknamed “The Bélo” is an abstraction of four principles — People, Places, Love, and Airbnb — that have been blended into this single “A” shape. The same idea is represented in the spaces and offices that the company created, thanks to FARM design studio, also in Singapore. The space that we considered the maximum ex p re s s i o n o f t h i s - b e lo n g i n g - ove ra l l c o n c e p t i s t h e o n e re p re s e n t e d i n t h e biggest picture: a small circular arena, where employees can have fast meetings or just chill together. Even smarter in this space is the use of the small niches created by the steps for one or two people, to create a more privatized area. Small and large meeting points are spread all over the office. As Ken Hoskin, Airbnb's head of APAC talent, explains: "The space truly embodies what we value as a company: creativity, community engagement, and thoughtful design,” explains Ken Hoskin.

Pi Kappa Phi Fraternity Washington

ATTACHMENT

Harry Potter houses: Gryffindor Ravenclaw Slytherin Hufflepuff

Since belonging means "being part of something" then we tried to understand what this - something - could be. To do this we searched examples of communities that have a great impact on the daily life of the members. The first example is something that is very common in the USA: in campuses students are divided in confraternities which have their own building, name and traditions. To became a member of this confraternities you have to pass a sort of exam, before becoming an actual part of it and then the whole life in university changes. Rituals and pride in this context are very important. T h e o t h e r e xa m p l e t h a t we t o o k a s a n inspiration is the concept of houses in Harry Potter story: in the same school, students are divided in 4 different houses depending on their personalities and ambitions. Each of the houses has a private personal space and specific brand identity that gather all the students. During the academic year, the four houses compete on different aspects and gain point thanks to the achievements of students. At the end to the house that gained the largest amount of point wins a cup.

INNOVATIVE SERVICE To create the sense of belonging and enhance the partecipation of campus life in the dorm, we developed an internal community called Team Newton. Moreover we introduced some internal services to empower the system. At the same time to motivate everyone to partecipate and enlarge the community we founded a competition between all Politecnico dorms, the Dorms Cup.

TEAM NEWTON Since we strongly believe that "belonging" to something means being part of a community, we created Team Newton. Team N ew to n i s th e i n tern a l c o m mu n i ty inside Newton Dorm which is composed by all residents. The aim of the community is to involve people in active participation in campus life.

A s s eed s a re t h e symbol of new life, our Newton Team wants to be the emblem of our innovation: together f o r t h e c re a t i o n o f students future.

48 46

In order to make everyone feel part of the c o m m u n i t y a n d t o avo i d d i f f e re n t leve l of involvement we wanted to establish a community-based residence. The idea is that everybody who joins the dorm automatically starts belonging to the Team from the very first moment. For us is very important to create since the very beginning a strong relation among students, which will make them satisfied to live in Newton and proud of it. To visually represent our idea and connect it with the important name of the dorm, we used the apple, always associated to Newton's discovery of the gravity. At the same time the apple represents our concept: the apple without seeds inside is something that is going to die but with them the fruit gains the possibility to regenerate. If we consider the apple as our dorm and seeds as the community inside the building, it is automatically clear how our community is important inside the residence. That is the reason why our logo represents an apple with seeds inside. We developed this visual formula for our logo to demonstrate the interdependence between tose two elements which together intensify their meanings.

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WELCOMING For enhance the sense of belonging from the very first time it is important to structure a detaioled path for incoming students. We d e v e l o p p e d a c u s t o m e r j o u r n e y t o describe the welcoming process for new residents starting from the initial acceptance to the first Team Newton meeting. In the map you can discover the system with all the touchpoints and the related spaces.

Using graphichs and motivating words we modified the entrance space to make it more welcoming and relat it to our new brand identity.

SOCCER

PHOTOGRAPHY

MUSIC

DRAWING

GARDENING

VOLEYBALL

TRAVEL

CINEMA

BOARD GAMES

Students are asked t o ex p re s s t h e i r interests in the online platform. Here they w i l l f i n d p re s e t t ed buttons but they can also add new ones.

CREWS Even if we want to create a community that gathers people we do not want them to lose their own identity. That is why we developed a system that through an online platform allows them to express their passions. The system then will match their interests and it will connect them through the creation of some crews. T h o s e c re w s h a v e the possibility to meet in Studios, ro o m s o f f e red b y the dormitory. The i d e a i s t o p ro v i d e equipped spaces where they can share their interests, insights and work together for a final event, which will take place at the end of the accademic year. In the final exhibition crews will show their path of the year to the Politecnico community.

FIRST WEEK

SECOND WEE friday at 18:30

DRAWING

newton website Do you want to meet other students with your same interest in DRAWING? JOIN THEM AT STUDIO 3 FRI AT 18:30!

FOUNDED?

YES

DRAWING

Try with another crew!

DRAWING

When do you prefer?

YES NO NOT THAT DAY

+ 10 pt fo your TEA

1st 2nd SEM.

WEEK

FINAL EVENT

Try with another crew!

ED? Practise

Share work

Book a studio

Set the final exhibition

YES

+ 10 pt for your TEAM

Have a class

+ 10 pt for your TEAM

Dorms cup Exhibition

INTERNAL SERVICES To connect students inside the dorm we developed some services. Those services have been designed with the intention of making the students share their cultures, interests and knowlegde, also with the focus of gathering. That it is how "Share a meal", "Book a Studio", "Have a class", "Have an event" are born.

OFFERING MAP

BOOK STUDI

ONLINE PLATFORM

ADMINISTER dormcup be updated subscribe to services customize personal profile

MANAGE

DISCOVER facilities

BOOK A STUDIO

HAVE A CLASS propose attend request

EXCHANGE SHARE A MEAL receive

GATHER

HAVE AN EVENT

HAVE A MEETING

ASSOCIATE

propose

propose a crew

vote

join a crew

SHARE A MEAL A s we k n ow s h a r i n g m e a l s i s a g re a t opportunity to break ice and start knowing a person. "Share a meal" is a service that is born with the intent of joining people by sharing food and cultures. Through the onine platform, it is possible to propose or accept invitations to share a meal with the only commitment to return it back to the kind person who offered it to you.

RECEIVE Log-in

ACTIONS

She want to discover a typical dish from another country

Enter the platform

TOUCH POINTS

online platform

SUPPORT CHARACTER

online platform

BOOK A STUDIO She wants to book a studio to work with her drawing crew

ACTIONS

Enter the platform

TOUCH POINTS

online platform

SUPPORT CHARACTER

HAVE A CLASS ACTIONS

Log-in

She wants to book a studio to work with her drawing crew

Enter the platform

TOUCH POINTS

online platform

SUPPORT CHARACTER

online platform

HAVE AN EVENT ACTIONS

Log-in

She wants to book a studio to work with her drawing crew

Enter the platform

TOUCH POINTS

online platform

SUPPORT CHARACTER

online platform

DORMS CUP To keep an high participation in campus l i f e o f s t u d e n t s we h ave e s t a b l i s h e d a competition between the dormitories of the Politecnico: the Dorms Cup. The aim of the competition is to motivate each student to participate in daily activities that allow his dormitorAy to get points. At the end of the year the first dormitory in the ranking will win a monetary prize.

TEAM DA VINCI

TEAM GAUSS

TEAM GALILEO

TEAM DATEO

The competition Dorms Cup happens only among Politecnico Residences so Newton, Dateo, Da Vinci, Galilei and Gauss.

The competition is structured around four main themes: compete, share, socialize and help others. Let's see in detail what they concern: Compete: Includes all the sport competitions (which already exist between dormitories- soccer, volleyball, basketball, ping pong) and the academic awards. Share: a section that evaluates how much the community within the dormitory is inclined to share knowledge, food, and crew foundation. Socialize: evaluates the associative willingness of students to gather in events and meetings. Help others: section that takes into account the participation of students in volunteering activities and participation in neighborhood associations. In addition, a nice and easy test is planned at the end of the academic year to evaluate students' knowledge and participation in the dormitory. In Newton's specific case, the test is called NewTest. The dorm winner of the test will benefit of a big advantage in the ranking and it will only be revealed during the final prizegiving.

COMPETE

SOCIALIZE

HELP OTHERS

Moreover, despite the fact that the Dorms Cup is won by one residence, we wanted to reward all the dorms for their commitment and participation in the competition. For this reason, we added also some medals for the four topics of the competition. Those will be won by the dormitory that scores more points in that section, even if it is not the first residence in the ranking.

COMPETE

PARTECIPANT/ +1pt

CLASS/ +10pt

MATCH WIN/ +5pt

PARTICIPANT/ +1pt

TEAM WINNER/ +20pt; +10pt; +5pt

MEAL SHARED/ +5pt

+ 100 pt NewTest

HELP OTHERS

SOCIALIZE

EVENT CREATION/ +20pt

VOLUNTEERING/ +10pt

PARTICIPANT/ +1pt

HELP NEIGHBORHOOD/ +20pt

SPECIAL PIZES/ +50pt 81

FINAL EVENT At the end of the academic year there will be a final event in Piazza Leonardo Da Vinci to reward the winner of the Dorms Cup. There it will be decree the winner of the final test and the name of the big winner will be announced. Moreovere in this occasion crews of each dormitory will be invited to share and show the work they have done throughout the year.

Adidas

Vodafone

Samsung Italia

Quvi, italian Design hologram projector

PARTNERS I n o rd e r t o f i n a n c e t h e D o r m s C u p w e need some partners which can contribute monetaryly to support activities throughout the year, the realization of the final event and the redesign of spaces in the residence. To do this we thought of some companies that might be interested in sponsorship like Adidas, Vodafone, Samsung and Quvi. We t h o u g h t t o A d i d a s a n d Vo d a f o n e sponsorships because we believe that both companies can reach lot of new users through the final event. At the same time they are already partners of Politecnico di Milano for sponsorship of events such as PoliMi Run. F u r t h e r m o re w e c h o s e d S a m s u n g a n d Quvi, the emerging Italian company in the realization of photorealistic holograms, because we believe that both companies can benefit from the application of their technology in our spaces: using Newton d o r m i t o r y s p a c e s a s s h owc a s e fo r t h e y philosophies could be a great opportunity for advertise their products. For those reasons we thought that these two sponsors will help us in monetary support for the development of our environments.

SYSTEM REPRESENTATION Our system involves students both in an internal community in the building both in a bigger one, which includes all Politecnico dorms. Below you can find some maps and schemes that clarify our concept.

THE SYSTEM

INDIVIDUALS _________ HELP OTHERS

CREWS _________ SHARE

TEAM NEWTON _________ SOCIALIZE

DORM CUP _________ COMPETE

SERVICE SYSTEM MAP

COMMUNICATION CHANNEL

How to show our multiple services, in order to make them easy-to-use for students was our main goal for our communication channel. Moreover we felt that in the actual way of communication of facilities and services there were big failings, especially on the website. That's why we decided to create an online platform dedicated just to Newton and its services, so that everything is at students' fingerprints.

NEWTON PLATFORM We developed a brand new platform just for Newton's dorm because we strongly believe that every Politecnico'r dorm needs their own. On this platform there is a preview of the building, facilities and compus life for incoming students, but also a private section for every student. In the public part of the website, everyone can have a preview of rooms and activities

inside the campus, so that students are more engaged and willing to come at Newton to live. Thanks to the private area students will be able to manage all the services (Have a class, Have an event, Share a meal and Book a studio). Moreover in this private part will be possible to find news about what's happening inside the campus and control in real time the Dorms Cup ranking. But creating a new online platform without considering what was already existing Politecnico di Milano website - wasn't ebough f o r u s . S o we d ec i d ed t o red e s i g n a l s o Politecnico's residences website, to make it more friendly and easy to understand. Here, since is the first website that students s ea rc h i n g f o r a d o r m w i l l f i n d , we a l s o wanted to "show off" the new and improved campus life of students. To do this we added the "Dorms Cup" section, where stories and images about the competition can be found. We also created a new way to visualize all the campus of Politecnico, trough a map of Milan. Then by clicking on the dorms you are more interested in, you will open the link to the dedicated website.

WELCOME PAGE

GALLERY CONTACTS

FACILITIES

COMMON AREA

COMMON SERV

ROOM SERVICES

PROFILE NOTIFICATIONS NEWS THOUGHTS

PERSONAL ACCO DORMS CUP

DORM SERVICES

NAVIGATION TREE

N AREAS

N SERVICES

ERVICES

ATIONS

L ACCOUNT

SET YOUR PROFILE

RULES

RVICES

SHARE A MEAL

RANKING OFFER A MEAL RECEIVE A MEAL

HAVE A CLASS

REQUEST A CLASS PROPOSE A CLASS ATTEND A CLASS

HAVE AN EVENT

PROPOSE AN EVENT VOTE AN EVENT

BOOK A STUDIO NEWTEST 99

Personal profile: h e re yo u c a n personalize your Newton-self and define your interests fo r th e c rea ti o n o f crews.

Service page: On the services page you can select among: book a studio, have a event, have a class, share a meal.

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Share a meal: When you select on a service, "Share a meal" for example you can choose between OFFER and write a short description of the dish you want to cook...

Otherwise if you click on RECEIVE you can scroll trough all the offers of the others students.

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ENVIRONMENTAL SOLUTION

Our aim for spaces was to reflect our main idea of community and our online services. That is why we focused on spaces to gather people together at different scales. First we tought about a meeting point for the entire Team Newton community, second we created smaller meeting spaces for crews and group work.

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INSPIRATIONS Since our environments are born to reflect our purpose of bringing together the Newton community, we tried to understand what the "meeting" sites were, with their features and settings. Immediately in our minds it popped the ritual of gathering around a fire. This in the past, was a time of family gathering and sharing,

105

The Hub (Coventry University), 2011 Location: Coventry, UK Design: Hawkins\ Brown

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a moment in which everyone could express himself and share his day with the others members of the community. That was also the atmosphere that we wanted to reach with our environment. A gathering space where everyone could seat and immediately feel part of something bigger. A place that was somehow waiting for people to join. We were particularly interested in the role of the fire in this ritual, because it's characteristic and the position of it could completely change the setting of a room. We wanted to give to students their personal "fire" in the middle of the space. In our mind this virtual fire could express the power of Neton's community, and how active it was in that moment. In addition, we investigated the circular disposition of people. We knew that is a method often used in many circumstances ( m e e t i n g s , c o n f e re n c e s , p s y c h o l o g i c a l sessions) to make people feel comfortable and involved. Since this was also our goal we wanted to recreate a circular environment, t h a t c o u l d re u n i t e eve r yo n e i n s i d e t h e b u i l d i n g . H a w k i n s \ B ro w n f o r Co v e n t r y University built a huge "donut" full of giabt pillows were students could go to relax and talk together. The cozyness of such a space

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can convince every student, also the most shy to gather inside that place. Last but not the least, we wanted our spaces t o h ave a d o u b le f u n c t i o n : f i r s t a la rg e meeting point, second a big spac were chill out and have information about the trend of the community. Aiming for this space we found inspiration in the Disney Headquarters, where employees can configurate spaces depending on what they need. In the side picture we can see that soft colorful blocks can be benches for every workker and then easily build a wall around the meeting point to give privacy to that space.

Disney Headquarters, 2007 Location: Pasadena, California Design: Clive Wilkinson Architects Photo: Benny Chan, Fotoworks

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GROUND FLOOR

FIRST FLOOR

SECOND FLOOR

THIRD FLOOR

FOURTH FLOOR

FIFTH FLOOR

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AREAS OF INTERVENTION Co n s i d e r i n g o u r k e y c o n c e p t a n d o u r services, we decided to create spaces where students could really feel part of something. That's why we decided to create a Meeting Point for every member of the Team Newton, where the belonging was perceivable in every detail. The Meeting Point for the community, at the first floor is both a space where the Team can have large reunion to talk about strategy and future, but also a space where they can chill out all together. Currently the access to this space is a bit constrained, so we decided that we wanted to create a better connection between the Meeting Point that is on a raised level from the ground and the ground. This new kind of access to this space could give new breath to that area, and make feel students more involved in the community life. With th is a im we wan ted to g i ve a l s o to crews the possibility to gather together and find a place suitable for every activity of our services. That's why we decided to use study rooms at the second and third floor , to create this new studios for groups of students.

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MEETING POINT The Meeting Point at the first floor is the heart of our Environmental Solution. This because we developed it to be a physical rapresentation of our theme, Belonging Newton, and our services. This because we created it aiming at building a space for all the Team Newton community. This room had to be the visual representation of gathering.

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To do this we decided to build big steps to enter in this space. A space where you have to enter without shoes, to not ruin its integrity. Also because steps are soft and it's possible to lay down also on those. Once you are in the real Meeting Point you can perceive that is a room that changes with the community: furniture is movable

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depending on students needs, and when is used to have a community meeting the setting of every module becomes circular. At the center of this space there is the symbol of the living community: an ologram that when is not used for presentations, looks like a tree. This tree, that is symbollically planted at the beginning of every year, during the 10 months of student's stay will grow depending

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on the strenght of the community. This will be managed through the online platform, that monitors the interactions among students. If the community is not active the tree will s t a r t w i t h e r, t o e n c o u ra g e t h e s t u d e n t s interact more. This hologram will be donated by QUVI, the partner that we mentioned before. Students will use the hologram also to "project" presentations and pictures during their meetings. On the opposite side of the space, to remind s t u d e n t s o f a l l t h e s e r v i c e s t h a t we a re offering them, there will be a interactive dashboard. All the screens will be provided by the sponsorhips with Samsung. Through this instrument, students will see what's happening inside the building, check the ava i la b i l i t y o f s t u d i o s a n d m o n i t o r t h e ranking of the Dorms Cup. To h a v e a l w a y s a r e m i n d e r o f t h e i r accomplishments, next to the dashboard, students will find the "Wall of Fame". Here every medal or cup coming from the Dorms Cup competition will be exposed to enhance the sense of pride and belonging to the community.

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STUDIOS As we tought for the Meeting Point, also for Studios we wanted different configuration of the space, so that they could be used for different purposes. Since studios are born to be a support space for our crews, we gave them spaces where they can do meetigs and have classes, and spaces where they can work all together and share their knowledge. First the first type of studio we setted a

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space similar to the large Meeting Point, with movable furniture and small tables. This is tought for classes and crew's meetings. The second studio is created for students that have to work together, so we used a big round table at the center of the rooms that reminds the setting of the Meeting Point at the first floor. In both those studios on the wall we have dashboards available for students.

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ENVIRONMENTAL COMMUNICATION

T h e e n i v ro n m e n t a l c o m m u n c a t i o n i s something almost missing in the actual state of the dorm, that's why we wanted to give it a great importance in our project- Most of all we wanted that our communication language to be clearly related to our spaces and general style.

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AUDITORIUM

BEDROOM

GYM

KITCHEN

LAUNDRY

LIBRARY

MEETING POINT

SILENT ROOM

RELAX ROOM

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RECEPTION

STUDIO

WAYFINDING A p ro b le m t h a t m a n y s t u d e n t s c la i m ed to be one of the biggest is that they have difficulties in understanding communication, especially because rules and staff are in italian. That's why we decided not to use words in our environmental communication, so that everyone inside the building is at the same level. Than, to give a coherent aspect to the the building's wayfinding we decided to use the same style we used also for the creation of Team Newton's logo. That is to create every symbol and numer starting from a simple, rounded line. The line, as in the logo, doesen't connect, but it remains open.

Annother way to communicate spaces in our project are to use colors. In fact common spaces, such as studios, are highlighted with a colorful frame that cover all the door. This effect is particularly effective in corridors, that had the problem to be very long and a s e p t i c . T h a t's w h y i c o n s f o r c o m m o n spaces have an associated color, because that tint will be used on the walls or at the entrance. To create another correlation both in the environmental spaces and in the environmental communication, the font chosen and symbols are rounded.

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FLOORS NUMBERS

ROOM'S NUMBER

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The idea of an open outline that creates the symbol is used also in numbers, both for the numbers on the floor, that are meant to be big on the corridors' walls and for bedrooms' number on doors. Signage of bedrooms was antoher of the biggest problem in corridors, because before the number was very little and to students it felt temporary.

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Wayfinding of the entire building in the entrance.

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To give a general overview of the building and services inside of it, we decided to put a big signage also at the entrance of Newton. With this the color division of rooms is visible since the ground floor. In this way, it is easier for students to locate the bedrooms, both their own and their friends.

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Wayfinding inside the elevator and on every floor

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To be sure that students always know where they are inside the building, we also tought a solution for the elevators. We took the idea of the open outline that we used everywhere else and created a very simple drawing on the floor of the elevator, that, when doors open, connects with another line on the floor's ground that creates the respective number.

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