Reduce, Reuse, Recycle or (Upcycle) 2

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle 2

For our Sustainability project, which is the follow on from the smaller book making and power point brief, we have been asked to renovate and use our “upcycling” knowledge within a current building. The distressed building can be found situated on Seafield Road in Dundee and is the “supposed” living space of our real life client who will work and live in this newly remodeled home. As a book conservator she requires enough space for both her living space and studio within and since meeting her and discussing what she wants the space to obtain is proving to be a challenge.

The main purpose to this brief is for us designers to become aware when designing, that the need to be more environmentally friendly is of great demand. From researching into “Green Design” for the previous brief you begin to understand that the little ways of going about “Reducing, Reusing and Recycling” can be of great benefit in the future.

We have had several power points and lectures based on sustainability. Ranging from the technical side of things down to new and up and coming materials. Richard Atkins who is an environmental architect was a guest speaker a few weeks ago and he spoke about the company he works for and their past and previous projects.

This links in well with the Eco-build conference, that took place on Tuesday 2^nd of March down in Earls court in London. A group of us Interior Designers took this long trip down to attend this four-day event that was of great use to this project. The event consisted of many companies advertising their products and designs that were sustainable or eco friendly. From listening to speakers at the event the main problem to do with this is that the many displays were promoting their eco friendliness, when in fact their products weren’t good for the environment as they give out toxins.

Coming away from this event I have realized that it does take a lot of time, energy and money to achieve an eco way of designing. So by keeping this in mind I will try my best when doing the same for this project, to try and work with what you have and going about it the right way.

Pick 'N' Mix

A while back, at the start of the semester us Interior Designers organized a Fundraiser night out at a local club to raise money for our fourth year degree show.

Throughout this year us second years have had to come up with quick and easy ways to raise as much money as we could for this coming June. Small events such as numerous bake sales, pub-crawls have all helped contribute to the increase in our money raised. The designing of a logo and web page are also other little things that help get recognition for our course.

A while back, a few people considered putting together a night out to celebrate our achievements but also to continue the fund raising until we meet our target.They came up with the idea of a night out, themed “Pick ‘N’ Mix”, where you could pick any song you want, request it or even mix it with another. To continue this theme, multiple bowls of sweets would be found around the club. The first 50 tickets sold would also get a handmade bag of sweets, to demonstrate what was to come. Lucky for us this was a big success both in terms of money raised and the amount of fun everyone had.

So another one is currently underway. “Pick ’N’ Mix” this time presents: Allsorts End of Year Party! We still wanted to promote “Pick ’N’ Mix” but let outsiders know that it’s slightly different, i.e. change in the venue. We also got two brand new Dj’s to help our supporters, bust their moves.

Fingers crossed this will be as big a success as the one before and we manage to achieve our target. If it wasn’t for the class support and the hard work from Miss Matthew and Mr Macdonald then we wouldn’t have done half as well as we have.

Interviewing

For this assignment I decided to use one of the questions given to us, as I felt it was of some relevance.

“How have students dress sense changed since they left home?”

Taking this question and keeping it in mind, I expanded on it. While doing so I realized that what I was suggesting related a lot to the research I have already done. This would hopefully help me link the two together.

Leaving home myself I could relate a lot to this question as I feel my own style has developed over the two years of being at university. I guess from being in the company of many individuals around the same age, you become a lot more aware of how you look and come across to people. This for me was due to the need for good first impressions, and so you want people to remember you for good reasons, one being our outer appearance.

When I first started this brainstorming session, I made a mind map demonstrating the breakdown of each heading and my initial thoughts about the topic. By doing this it allowed me to broaden my thought process. As you can see I tried to quickly achieve a random selection of explanations to suit my question, this hopefully influencing my chose. The why, the constraints and the influences of this change were the most obvious categories to separate the information into. From this I thought that the most obvious people to interview were students and teachers, especially art students, who tend to be more expressive and daring when it comes to their clothing. What I wanted to achieve from this was?? I deliberated for a while on what type of questions would I ask and what would come from each as a result.

The first person I interviewed was an architecture student and still classified as a older “teenager” so from this I would be able to target the two areas at once. I asked each person the same number of questions so I had a good selection of questions among the interviewees. I tried not to ask the direct question but base them on ones that could relate in some way. I found at first, when I asked questions the conversation took a while to flow. The basic answers resulting in no or yes. This may have been due to the way in which I asked my questions or the questions I asked might not have been in-depth enough to give a detailed response. The interviewee might have been nervous and so took a while to expand on her answers. From listening and then collating the information the overall response was more to do with the surrounding environment and how since leaving home and living at university she doesn’t feel intimidated by others and the way others perceive her. University for her is an environment where she can just be herself. She believes a lot of people who’s clothing does change or adapt are usually insecure and try and fit in with others. When I asked if she thinks that a person’s course has a lot to do with it, her reply was yes. She justified this by comparing days where she may be busy or stressed to others and she really doesn’t

The second person I then interviewed was still at school, in her second last year. She was a “sweet sixteen” so her views would be different compared to the older teen. I then used the results from my first interview to decide the order in which the second lot of questions would be asked. The idea of the environment creating different outcomes was quite interesting for me since my full topic relates to surrounding environments. So I felt the issue to do with not living at home and having more independence would hopefully give me answers that would address the question. I highlighted the fact that this could be because the parents overlooked on what they were doing and so had less freedom of choice. “Do you think this has something to do with the parents?” This was the way in which I phrased the question, getting straight to the point. “Sometimes, if they were to dress for example slutty then their parents would disapprove and so would ask them to change.” I then developed it further and asked what she felt was her main influence, thus hopefully targeting the main cause of change within an outward appearance. She opened up a lot more from this and continued to expand on the questions without my need to encourage the conversation. Magazines, adverts, since she is tall she also compares her physic to that of others her type and looks at how they use this to their advantage. Key similarities that I noticed between most of my interviewees was how they believe that people dress, is mainly down to their inner confidence and that most people don’t have this and so copy others, thus creating “trends”. They look at how others are going to perceive them and so are constantly aware of what others will think. I know myself that this is one of the reasons why I doubt some pieces of clothing and debate whether to buy them or not. Again this relates to the outside environment and the pressure that comes with “fitting in”.

The last person I interviewed was another older teen. This interviewee has travelled a lot in her lifetime and experienced a lot of different cultures so it was interesting to see how she would react to this. From being exposed to different cultures I wanted to know if she was at all influenced by this or from leaving home and coming to university and if it affected her style. I asked her if she thought her style had changed and if she could explain. “ Nope its not changed but its developed” This I thought was a very honest answer and is true for a lot of people, because as you get older what you thought looked good before may not suite your style now. She then went on to explain how when she was at home she had to wear uniform to school everyday so wasn’t allowed to wear normal clothes during weekdays like she can now what with being at university. She then explained how she is has become more experimental with her clothing because she has to consider what to wear everyday.

From this I also asked whether this brought with it, its own pressure to dress as well as others, but her response was no again. She believed that she felt it a lot less pressure here than she did at back home in Shanghai, which I thought was interesting. She feels more accepted here because everyone is from different cultures, races and ages. One question that I didn’t ask the others was whether she like to shop on her own or as the typical image within a group.” Definitely with people need some advice and second opinions” Although this person seems very comfortable with what she wears and doesn’t feel the pressure to fit in, the answer given makes her sound rather insecure when buying clothing and although she says she doesn’t do it to fit in, she subconsciously does. Getting back to the question itself she doesn’t believe this is true as it has made no difference to her style.

Overall from doing this interview process, its been interesting to see how the answers do not all agree. They were all aware that certain environments do have some influence on your outwards appearance. From looking at others your own age and magazines and adverts can subconsciously influence your taste and just like my last interviewee, everyone at some points wants to dress to fit in. If I was to use this method in the future I would to expand on my area and interview more people to broaden my results. I would maybe also discuss my questions before hand to see how I could achieve the results I want.

Assignment 3 - London Underground

For this assignment we were to take part in our own observations to see for ourselves the way people react in different places, situations or to certain rules. This is to help us in the future solve many problems that may arise and can be solved through this form of research. I decided that my trip to London gave me great research material and as I was experiencing the use of the underground for myself, the basis of the research would be strong.

The London underground is a well-known and used means of transporting busy workers, locals, tourists from one place to another. This quick and so-called “easy” experience is one that can be quite daunting at first what with all the mannerisms and etiquettes that you have to follow to succeed on the underground, but once they have been cracked the process becomes second nature, as I know from experiencing this myself on a class trip to London.

The full process from start to finish is a journey in itself really the purchasing to the elevators to jumping on and off platforms. This can all be a bit much to take in but through the use of rules set out to follow, it works extremely well. From looking into these I can then study the way people behave and react to them.

On entering the tube there was usually a large gathering of people that would obstruct others from entering. This was most likely tourists, travelling in large groups all huddled together. From our groups own personal experience we were normally pushed for time trying to get to and from events and so the time it would have taken to stand and wait around for the queues to shorten, would have gotten us nowhere. So what we thought would have been the best place to stand reading "Ticket and Advice" actually wasn't. From observing the way "Locals" carried out this process helped our group of 20 and so we learned to follow them. Down the left hand sidewall of the station there were 6 or 7 self-serve machines. This was the key to purchasing your daily ticket in a quick and easy manner. One of the first rules learnt was to be approach the machines with your card or cash already in hand and know what zone you were using for that day. This, if not done caused a hold up and created a bit of a fuss, from the people behind who obviously knew what they were doing. In our group we seemed to rely on the older person to help us out if we needed advice, suppose going by the saying “older is wiser”.

Although this method worked to our time advantage it was still a daunting process that took a while to work out. The lack of encouragement from the locals also didn't help, but over the several days we were there, our groups finally got the hang of the self serve machines and managed for a short time to fit in with the underground users.

The next “barrier” was the ticket barriers themselves. Keeping your ticket out at all times you then pushed the ticket through the slot in the barrier, making sure it was up the right way up, then they would open to allow you to pass through. From my own experience this was not always the case, as a result from a dud card. You then had to move fast, and try and grab the first elevator that approached the platform. Although no one really knew why everyone tried to squeeze in so tight since there was usually another one a couple of minutes later. However the wise decision to make the lift a one-way system allowed people to enter and leave in an orderly manner, thus taking away the hustle and bustle of the situation. From being closely packed into the elevator one of the main mannerism I noticed was that people tried to avoid eye contact with one another. What with being so close to a complete stranger people had the tendency to stand facing the exit and look intensely at the doors and so when they opened, it was back to the fast moving pace of the underground.

From leaving the lift you then walked along the tunnel usually down some stairs and on to the platform where you would stand for a couple of minutes then hop on a train. Even in this short space of time this was probably thee most or one of the important things you will learn about travelling this way. This rule was however visible in the form of signs pinned up on the walls and was drawn to your attention. The rule was to “keep to the right hand side” when using the escalator stairs, thus creating a structured system where busy people who had no time to stop, could charge up the left hand side and others who were not so time conscious could rest for a few minutes. The importance of this rule was clear not just from the signs but as a result from getting in their way. Your timing has to be precise especially in large groups of people. Most of the time when you escaped from the elevator, you could hear a train slowing approaching the platform. When this happened most people reacted as if it was their last train home and so quickly picked up the pace to an almost fast walk/run. Now you can imagine what with a large group of people this was a difficult task and making sure everyone made it in time for the train seemed almost impossible. The one thing that was apparent though when we were in our groups was the instinctive reaction to split up and enter through separate doors. Once they were open you had to move fast to squeeze in before they closed, some people would even risk getting crushed between the doors to make it on that one train. There was a real sense of panic between the new comers as this was obvious to all. No one wanted to be left behind on the soon to be deserted platform.

Ok so a lot happens from the time it takes you to decide what zone, purchase a ticket, use the elevator, walk along tunnels and keep to the right hand side of the stairs before we actually get to the train itself. If you have managed to get this far then you have near enough experienced the full underground trek and so its just a matter of repeating and fitting in. When you do finally make it onto the train it’s more of the same situation as the elevator. The awkward glances, the weird closeness you’re forced to have with people, the unsociable music listeners. The usual scene normally consists of young groups of people taking really loudly causing people to stare, the tourists who stand looking at the map, confirming their route to take, the locals who travel back and forth and so carry around a newspaper, the strangers that end up striking up a conversation and the very few who sit and stare into space. From my short time down in London I was about to differentiate people into these different categories quite easily and found that everyone seemed to take a certain role to recapture some of their own personal space.

While travelling on the train, I would usually take in the surroundings, as I was still not accustomed to this way of travelling. What I noticed and from observing was the flow between passengers getting on the train and others getting off. The transition was really quick; normally more people would jump on than off. There were a limited number of seats so most people would try and grab one, as soon they were available. This was usually businessmen and woman who were regular tube users and were not hesitant to dive on in there first. Others would stand huddled together at the opening to the train, usually the ones last to arrive or the tourists gathered in large groups. You got the few who would keep an eye on seats, then change before the train would stop. Standing was definitely trickier what with the harsh movements so you did find yourself swaying back and forth into random people. You never really found people standing in-between the area where others were sitting down, as there wasn’t a lot of support, most people who were getting off would have to barge past them and there is always the risk of falling on someone’s lap, which I did see for myself. The one thing that stood out for me was the age difference. Since most working people use this form of transport to get to their work this explained the majority of people this age, however there was never really people younger than us, using this. Between certain times there were more young than old and vice versa.

From taking this time while down in London to stop and observe the ways in which people react to the set out rules and regulations and going about their daily business, its interesting to see the similarities in behaviour between people. It demonstrates a whole range of techniques from how quickly people adapt to their new surroundings to the ways in which people when comfortable behave different to one’s that don’t. I’ve learnt a lot from taking part in this observation the most important probably being that while doing this it can help solve many of the design problems out there and could also be of use to me in the future. From watching peoples mannerisms you can see the ways in which designs work better or can create problems.