The PDF below is an example of how the Suite Interface will function. It is minimal to allow for maximum usability.

Suite Application

http://www.qupage.com/index.html

On May 13 Headspace submitted thier design proposal and after a presentation and a meeting dedicded that we will produce the first outcome in the proposal, detailed below:

The first outcome proposed is a broadsheet that documents an industry creative  space. This broadsheet will be produced a number of times a year each time profiling a different space. It is intended that it becomes part of a magazine publication that is accessible to designers. The broadsheet will be designed as reflection of the creative space it is showcasing, therefore the folding method and layout will be considered carefully. Each broadsheet will provide an overview of that particular creative space and some thoughts from the designer/artist that work within it. The intention of this is to create awareness of effective use of creative space and how it can benefit the team morale and overall creative output.

A link to the entire proposal is detailed below.

HEADSPACE PROPOSAL BRIEF

ABSTRACT

The stereotypical image of the creative person brought to us in film or literature
shows the artist working in a studio, a study or garret. Even as we look around
our own environment, we notice a similar trend – organisations and individuals
involved in the creative arts by and large occupy a dedicated workspace.
Although this phenomenon appears to surround us, the available documentation
on the subject is limited.

Our project, Headspace aims to explore this through observation, case studies
and a survey and ultimately aspires to raise awareness of environment – both
physical and psychological.

Headspace found evidence of collective effort combined with individuality among
organisations but more emphasis on personal space where people are working
alone. Headspace looks at creative space and how individuals and groups can
be encouraged to approach the creation of their space in the same way they do
their work.

This article was in America’s ID: It´s a really broad look at studios, including a fantastic range of different ways of promoting creativity. It’s very interesting to note how different they all are and how many promote customisation of individuals creative spaces, especially Pixar. There are also offices that have very little customisation, they usually prefer to go for the communal space idea where everyone is involved, like Poke for example, where employees swap places with each other every month and customisation is kept to an absolute minimum.

Link to the pdf is below… It’s quite a big file so if you have a 28k modem I wouldn’t reccomend it.

THE ID TOP 40

This is a post on another blog documenting a range of interesting office interiors, mainly for creative compaines and studios:

10 annoyingly brilliant office interiors

In an ideal world all company directors would invest in their workforce to the point where the office didn’t resemble a huge ice cube filled with back-breaking plastic chairs, mdf tables and computers less powerful than my old commodore plus-4. the sad fact is, for the majority of the world’s office-dwelling workers at least, company offices are some of the most inhospitable places on earth.

Paul Newcombe is a Melbourne based artist whose work shows an interest in Abstract Expressionism. He has a distinguished career in Visual Arts; starting it in set designing for several shows that toured internationally.

J: Maybe we should look into this childrens thing “every child is an artist, the problem is to remain one when he grows up” 

D: A childs space also seems way more complex. those little guys minds are like sponges…they soak in anything. The only thing i can think of is maybe looking at the childs space in comparison to the designers space. Is it much different? It seems that children base their thoughts and visions on simple shapes and colours…They have a broader imagination. they see things an adult may not…or even a designer? or are we simular. The child vs the designer. as jack quoted “every child is an artist, the problem is to remain one when he grows up.”

C: Maybe the childrens space differs the most because they are concentrating on learning (like a sponge), so that is soaking in the information around them and then their creative output is a natural result of that, where as an adult designer (a grown up) is trying to force this process. Maybe that is why designers like to refer to part of the process as ‘play’ because the natural accumulation that occurs when someone is relaxed and ‘playful’ like a child is the only natural way to come up with a creative output.

We are possibly thinking something to do with the 5 senses….things that stimulate creative thought.

last year there was a focus group thing for the facebook group. They asked participants to respond to things in a creative way, a diffrent question for each of your senses it was cool. we could ask participants to look at some images and tell us how they make them feel (or if they think they stimulate creative thought) We could do the same for smells, and sound, taste and touch might be a bit harder, i guess you could apply the same principal.

This could all be very hard to get solid results from, but maybe the feedback from the questions would be an interesting insight.

word/picture assosciation, so flash a series of images and they say a word after each card, and then flash a blank one, maybe several times, and see what they say….most likely they will say “there is nothing there” or “empty”, “white” “blank”….so the lack of “something” destroys their train of thought.
which is effectively why we have visual stimuli…

these are some we thought of: white space, plants, sky, coffee, metal, wood, plastic glass, people, lighting, dark/light, our logo.
We have included some materials cause we were trying to think of getting people to organise them into categories and we were thinking of all the senses (feel, smell, sight, sound, taste).

Do we have time to add this to the list? We would have to have these printed off by the end of the weekend to do the experiments next week.

Hi Daria,

As a brief outline we are currently conducting research studies in the field ‘Social Patterns.’ As a group we are looking into creative space both physically and psychologically. We are interested in the consequences of creative space specifically in a working environment and how it may inhibit/encourage creative thought.

At the moment we are in the process of observing creative spaces that leading creative’s work in, by assessing the physical environment and how people interact with it. We are also in the process of doing case studies, image/thought relationship tests and have just collected the results to a survey which i have attached to this email, which may help you better understand our focus.

When reading your article we thought of some questions we would like to ask you.

In your paper you state that ‘As organizational settings, collaborative workspaces should be designed to enable people to experiment, contribute, change, design and use the spaces.’ What workplaces that you know of demonstrate a good example of this or do you have any suggestions as to how this may be achieved successfully?

In your article you also talk about ‘interventions’ as ways to help stimulate creative thought but that interventions have to be profound enough to overcome negative feedback. Another article we read about creative environments mentions Mother in London, which uses this method by moving the workstations of its employees each month. Do you think examples such as these are effective methods to encourage creative thought? Does the quality of the intervention effect the results more than the quantity? And do you know of any other ‘intervention’ methods that might be practical for workplace use?

The playful triggers mentioned in your article are activities, which activate the ‘receptive modes of engagement.’ As a way to demonstrate this you use a workshops with a number of creative and non-creative people, which was very successful. Do you know of any methods in which playful triggers can be of use to someone working on their own? Or any methods/examples of achieving something similar on a smaller scale?

The customisation of a workplace and ‘the sense of individuals having greater influence over both choice and utilization’ of their space is obviously important. Do you think there any physical or psychological features that are absolutely integral to any creative space or do you think each individual’s idea of a creative space entirely unique?

Your help in our research is really appreciated.
The questions are long but would be really interested to hear any answers to that you can spare the time for.

Regards,
Carla, Jack & Dan

Headspace Case Study and Observation Form 

The link above will take you to the form we are using for our case studies and observations of workplaces.

Studios we will be looking at are:
IN MELBOURNE
Sweet
Uno
Sprocket
Clear
Alex Tyres 

IN BARCELONA
Mariscal 

HEADSPACE SURVEY

This survey (view results above), was constructed and administered by
Jackson Mussett, Daniel Evans and Carla McKee. It was released online
on the 11.04.2008 and closed on the 21.04.2008, available for 10 days
and completedby 100 people.

All people contacted to complete the survey were visual creative students
or academics involved in higher education in Melbourne. 51 of these the
participants were studying Communication Design.

The survey asks questions in regards to the participants ‘creative space’
which for the purposes of the survey is ‘the space/s in which the participant
feels they are most creative. The survey aimed to collect information
on what are the most common factors in the physical aspects of these
creative spaces.

The results of the survey showed that more than 3/4 of participants were
often creative in more than one space but more than half claimed that their
creative space was either their bedroom or study, with only 11 participants
claiming work as a creative space. This suggests that it is possible for
many different kinds of spaces to be ‘creative spaces’.

83 participants claimed to have visual stimulus in their creative space
but also 94 also said they listen to music. Only 21 participants said they
exercise in their creative space, revealing an opportunity in investigate
if and why kinesthetic stimuli may affect the ability to think creatively.

68 participants said they sleep and 81 said they eat in their creative
space suggesting that creative spaces are also often used as places
of relaxation. 80 participants said that they usually feel relaxed in their
creative space and it is more common for spaces to be quiet and light
during the day. Although despite this more than half of the participants
said they were usually most creative in the night time or during the early
hours of the morning.

58 participants said that their creative space is a medium size but when
participants were asked what they would do if they could change their
space 35 said they wanted more space and more organisation. Only 15
participants said that their creative space was tidy.

77 participants said that they look for creative thoughts when in their
space, suggesting that their space is somewhere they intend to be
productive rather than a space where they ‘just are’ and have creative
thought come to them.

And finally 26 people thought that there was nothing unique about their
creative space which is surprising as no two spaces could ever be the
same making each unique in it’s own way.