As  I continue exploring Kolb’s work, here are a few interesting distinctions he makes (http://www.dkolb.org/sprawlingplaces/generalo/placethe.html):

1. distinguish an area, which is a stretch of space, from a place, which is one or more areas that are permeated with social norms or expectations for what “we” do there.
2. Places are areas of physical or virtual space permeated by social grammars, which prescribe divisions within the space and govern what is expected or appropriate to do and not to do there.

This notion of “social grammars” is very close to the notion of social designation that we defined with John Weeks (Fayard and Weeks, 2007) as an affordance for informal interactions.  Indeed our study of copier rooms in different organizations shows that ” settings such as photocopier rooms afford informal interaction to the extent that they bring people into contact with each other (propinquity), allow people to control the boundaries of their conversation (privacy), and provide legitimate rationalizations for people to stay and talk to each other (social designation).” It also reminded me of Alexander’s work and esp. a quote I posted on January 5th on the relationships between physical and social spaces. (more…)

As I was skipping through Alexander’s book today, I found this quote which is very relevant to the idea that material and social are always intertwined, “mutually entangled” (Orlikowski, 2007): 

“No building ever feels right to the people in it unless the physical space (defined by columns, walls and ceilings) are congruent with the social spaces (defined by activities and human groups)” (Alexander, 1977, p. 941).

Happy new year!

 I came back yesterday from the Chiapas in Mexico and would like to share with you some thoughts I had about public space and plazas (squares) during this trip.We spent several days in San Cristobal de las Casas, a small city at 2100 m above the sea level, with about 80, 000 inhabitants. Walking in this small city, I could not help thinking of Alexander’s book, the Pattern Language (see the post of November 12 for a few quotes) and his observations about the role of public spaces in cities.

“A town needs public squares; they are the largest, most public rooms, that the town has. But when they are too large, they look and feel deserted” (Alexander, 1977, p. 311)

Spending some time in San Cristobal made me aware of the social nature of public spaces: a public space is a space, where people meet, interact and socialize.

I have often thought of a city as having one central “plaza” - square - where people meet and chat in the tradition of the Greek agora. Indeed, when you arrive in San Cristobal, you often go to the “main” square in front of the cathedral, where a lot of the vendors are, and a lot of the tourists too - but also a lot of the inhabitants of the city. People stand, sit and / or chat. Children run around, play tag or soccer. Friends meet and chat. After one day, I noticed that this main plaza was “connected” (they are adjacent; only a street separate them) to a second plaza with a park, in front on the city hall. On this square, there is a kiosk (what Alexander calls a “public outdoor room”) with a coffee shop and a stage where groups can play.In fact, there is a third plaza, behind the city hall, somewhat enclosed by arches - making it more “private”, less noticeable. Here you see small groups (3-4 people max) sitting on the stairs or on benches. Although one can go through the plaza, and although some people do, less people go through it. It seems that people who come there are looking for some privacy and more calm.

After another day of wandering around the city, I realized that there were many other plazas, where people met and the streets were connectors between these central nodes. The city is built around the plazas and the streets take you from one square to another. Each of these squares have different atmospheres and are located to different “resources” - the cathedral, a church, a covered market, open restaurants.

 A visit to a traditional Maya village, San Juan Chumala, led me to . The village - which has a main square with a market, a kiosk and the church - is in fact the public place for the community of farmers living in the mountains in a region of 80 kilometers around “the village”. Although most of the people don’t live in the village, but are scattered in the mountains around, people feel part of the same village as they go and meet on the market, or go to participate to religious and other public ceremonies. The village and its main square has become the symbol of the community identity. 

 This raised once again my awareness of the importance of space, but also of how space can be invested and interpreted differently: connections of plazas or public spaces, or one village which becomes the public  space and symbol of their identity (inhabitants of the village) for a community of people living in isolated farms in the mountains.

Writing this post, I found interesting that Aileen and I have built the maze of our installation around a “central area”, a square where people can meet. Any thoughts?

Cheers,

 al 

I love this book by Alexander, “A Pattern Language”. Here are a few quotes that I found inspiring: ”In many modern building complexes the problem of disorientation is acute. People have no idea where they are, and they experience considerable mental stress.” (Alexander, 1977, p. 481)

•  I can’t prevent myself of thinking of criticisms about the web and how it has an impact on community, identity. Yet, there are also examples of great online communities (as great buildings). The question might be a question of design: both online and off-line. Alexander’s point is: we need to design buildings that “make sense” and afford social interactions. I guess any designers of websites and other online “applications” will agree.  

“The simple social intercourse created when people rub shoulders in public is one of the most essential kinds of social “glue” in society” (ibid, p. 489)

•  It’s back to our discussion about the need for co-location - either at the British library, Bryan Park, or a coffee shop. 
• When people feel like they are part of an online community, how do they enact the “shoulders’ rubbing”? by sharing information on themselves? by developing a certain style? by putting up photos, inventing nicknames?

“The setting gives you the right to be there” (ibid, p. 437) 

•  That’s the social part of it. It’s not enough to have the “perfect” physical space where you are likely to meet people but where you have enough privacy to chat. That’s what we found with John Weeks in our study of copier rooms. The location and the size of the room mattered but whether you had a “good reason” to be there and stay matter too. Hence, the type of resources you could find in a copier room (not only the copier machine, but also the supplies cabinet, bulletin board, or mail boxes) mattered as it gives you more reason to go. The nature of the copying activity also mattered: you had to be around but it did not require your attention.
• al