Thesis (M.S.)--The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, 2010. / Directed by Thomas Lambeth; submitted to the Dept. of Interior Architecture. Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Jul. 9, 2010). Includes bibliographical references (p. 96-102, 121, 131).

By breaking design down from a whole composed of individual parts, I work to create user experiences derived from spaces and the objects within them. These spaces and objects are brought together in their relationship with the human presence. By translating an experience into a physical environment, I, as a designer, am afforded the opportunity to introduce my own perception into the minds of others who enter the space. In working with the idea of creating an experience as visual form, I wanted to create a space that evoked an experience we don't get in our everyday lives, a feeling of ascending into flight. Human designed environments have the ability to transport us from our current surroundings and into a unique environment that can affect us not just visually, but emotionally and physically through multiple senses of perception.

The rapid development of furniture design has changed people's lifestyle. Nowadays, customers have multiple choices of choosing products in the market. To immediately attract viewers' attention becomes the increasing challenge among designers and manufacturers. Making “fun” design is one of the strategies that could appeal customers. The topic of this thesis is to discuss the importance of combining “fun” characters to furniture design to create a strong first impression to customers. Nowadays, Human centered design (HCD) has become a trendy concept to designers. Based on this concept, I researched and designed a set of furniture, including a chair, a coat rack, two stackable stools and a coffee table. The thesis is mainly analyzing this furniture series that the way the “fun” elements are combined in its design. This set furniture is made of Bamboo plywood and Nylon rope, which are environmentally friendly materials. Moreover, Computer Numerical Control (CNC) technology, ergonomic and 3D printing technology are utilized to produce these products. Each piece of furniture includes a unique “fun” character, which can reinforce customers' first impression when they see these designs. The furniture series is designed based on functional and aesthetic aspects. I will also illustrate the way to achieve these two aspects by utilizing different material, form, and ergonomics.

Today’s society tends to value productivity and long working hours, where taking breaks and needing rest when at work can be perceived as signs of weakness or sickness rather than a necessity for wellbeing. According to The Swedish Work Environment Authority you must provide a resting room in workplaces with more than 50 employees. Job-related stress and burnout are growing problems, so I see the resting room as an important space with great potential to work preventively with this problem. Sensory Space focuses on resting rooms and explores ways to deal with stress and exhaustion through interior architecture and design and how it can promote rest and recovery. The aim is to integrate rest as a more natural part of the workplace by making resting rooms more attractive, inviting and restorative. I have been visiting and analyzing existing resting rooms, making field studies to other spaces for rest and contemplation, reading studies and research on the subject of restorative environments and interviewing a designer who works with creating health promoting environments based on neuro science. The project explores how atmosphere, material associations and a variety of sensory impressions can create a feeling of connection to nature. The result is an inviting resting room with objects that can be placed freely throughout the room for you to interact with materials which can enhance the experience of resting and make it more pleasant.

Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Mus supanti aplinka, joje esantys daiktai, baldai ir kiti objektai, daro didžiulę įtaką kiekvieno žmogaus gyvenimo procesams. O kiekvienas žmogaus atliekamas procesas turi atitinkamas priežastis. Lygiai taip pat yra ir su aplinka, kuri supa kiekvieną iš mūsų. Daiktas nėra tik paprastas objektas/aplinkos sudedamoji dalis. Kiekvieno iš jų atsiradimo priežastis pasąmoningai paaiškinamos noru, o pastarąjį formuoja atitinkamas poreikis. Poreikis – pats savaime yra vidinio psichologinio ar socialinio trūkumo jausmas. Tuomet, kai žmogus įsisavina/supranta ko jam trūksta, jis ima ieškoti atitinkamo būdo kaip šį „alkį” nuslopinti ar patenkinti. 1943 m. amerikiečių psichologas Abraham Harold Maslow plačiajai visuomenei pristatė struktūrizuotą žmogaus poreikių piramidę, kurios viršūnėje atsidūrė individo poreikis saviraiškai/savęs aktualizavimui. Nepaisant to, kad tik pasirodžiusi A. H. Maslow teorija susilaukė begalės griežtos kritikos už nelankstumą bei schematiškumą, šis žmonių neabejingumas jai, tik dar labiau pagrindė jos sudedamųjų dalių svarbą kiekvieno individo gyvenime. Žmogaus poreikių tema, o ypač kūrybiškumo/individualumo aktualumas šiame postmoderniajame amžiuje įgauna didžiulį pagreitį. Sniego gniūžtė pradėjo ridėti nuo kalno viršūnės ir išvystė didžiulį greitį. Tačiau ar gali būti taip, kad šiandien individas vis dar suvokiamas tik kaip sociali būtybė, kurios pasirinkimus koordinuoja galingi socialinio gyvenimo mechanizmai? O galbūt, jau visas pramonės šakas apėmusioje... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The surrounding environment, it contains, furniture and other objects that make a huge impact on every person's life processes. And every human process to have the appropriate reason. Just as it is with the environment that surrounds each of us. A thing is not just a simple object / environmental component. Each of these causes subconsciously explained voluntarily, and the last form the corresponding demand. Need - itself an internal psychological or social lack of feeling. Then, when the man caught up / understand what he is missing, he begins to look for an appropriate way to the "hunger" to suppress or meet. In 1943. American psychologist Abraham Maslow Harold general public, the structured pyramid of human needs, which ended up on top of the individual need for self-expression / self-actualization. Despite the fact that only featured AH Maslow's theory has received dozens of heavily criticized for inflexibility and sketchiness, the human-indifference to her, even more substantiated the importance of the components of each individual's life. The human needs of the subject, and especially creativity / individuality relevance in the postmodern era is gaining tremendous momentum. Snowball started dd on a hilltop and has developed a tremendous speed.

Reason for writing. The space of confusion and possibility where the practices of art and design collide seems to be in a constant amoebic state. This place of shared influence and growth seems to pervade not only the intersection of these two disciplines, but within interior design, the intersection of people and space. How can the boundaries between an interior space and it’s inhabitants be as richly embedded with tension and opportunity as the edges where art and design meet? Like art and design, how can a space and it’s visitors interact to affect one another? Problem + Methodology: This project explores these questions in a context mindful of their origin: The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. The design proposal of inserting a fashion wing into the VMFA’s existing context evolves from research and process work across art, design, and architecture, from the scale of the building to the scale of a seat. Results + Implications: The challenge of creating public space that can be just as responsive to and influential over it’s inhabitants as private space seems resolved through the navigation of movement and moment. Finding value in an unscripted discovery of a space and the ownership of private experiences, offers a way to feel engaged with and connected to a space that doesn’t rely on object ownership or territorial comfort. This solution does rely, however, on inhabitants capable of being present and responsive to their environment, allowing other visitor’s interactions with the space and their individual path through the exhibits to affect their perceptions of and connectedness with the design.

O setor de produção de móveis residenciais em madeira e derivados remodelou-se ao longo das duas últimas décadas, na década de 90 através da ampliação do comércio mundial de móveis e componentes, e a partir de 2000 pela ampliação do mercado interno. O presente trabalho pretendeu traçar um panorama atual desta produção no Brasil, voltada ao mercado interno, identificando sua base produtiva, fornecimento de insumos, produção e comercialização. Buscou-se reconhecer a dinâmica setorial e localizar no processo produtivo o desenvolvimento e apropriação de inovações. As investigações identificaram o paradigma produtivo atual (que tem como base o uso de painéis de madeira reconstituída, principalmente MDF e MDP), os critérios de diferenciação de produtos (por estratos sociais) e a interação entre os agentes. Procurou-se relacionar estas características à formação histórica do setor. / The branch of industry for the production of residential furniture made out of wood and derivatives was restructured on the last two decades, in the 90\'s through the widening of international trade, and from 2000 on, through the growth of the internal market. The purpose of this work is to present an overview of this production in Brazil, nowadays targeted to the internal market, and identify its productive basis, the supply of inputs and raw materials, production itself and sale. An attempt was made to follow the branch\'s dynamics, and to seek and localize the development and appropriation of innovative practices along the whole process. The investigations revealed: the current productive paradigm based on the generalized use of reconstituted wood (mainly medium density fiberboard - MDF, and medium density particleboard - MDP); the criteria for product differentiation according to social strata and the interaction between the agents involved in the productive process. There was also a concern in locating historically these recent changes undergone in the branch.

In recent years substantial investment has been made to replace or refurbish state schools in England and Wales and, although research has unsuccessfully sought to prove its contribution, the discipline of Design continues to be identified as a facilitator of educational transformation. Results to date, however, are mixed and there is an evident failing at the design briefing stage to understand how children interact with their educational settings and, notably, an avoidance of direct challenge to the primary school classroom and its practice. In response, this thesis asks how the social and cultural study of children’s relationships with their physical school can suggest a meaningful approach to primary school architecture and furniture design. A model of well-being is developed to clarify misused terminology and to present a realistic expectation of design in which the contradictory goals of inclusion and the development of the individual are appraised. Sitting within a diverse grounded methodology, the concept of belonging is then explored as a basis for evaluating the contribution of different aspects of the physical school to children’s well-being. The primary school environments studied were found to limit the possibilities of a child’s well-being. School architecture through to classroom wall displays were complicit in restricting physical and social expression in favour of school organisation and, furthermore, the central child-teacher relationship was found to be unnecessarily devalued by behavioural concerns derived from the setting. By ethically interpreting the rich variety of children’s voices, priorities for what is coined here as child-teacher centred design are established and a clear relationship between architecture and furniture is offered. The thesis recommends that architecture continues to perform a protective classroom role to support objectives of inclusion whilst school furniture supports more affective, individualistic goals through less prescriptive and more varied settings for learning.

The primary aim of this thesis has been to describe the complex influences governing the production of fashionable furniture in C18th England and France in order to reassess the connection between material practices, the cultures in which they reside and the philosophical ideas from which they emerge. This has been achieved by detailing the factors influencing the design and production of late C18th furniture in England and France and developing a comparative model developed around the Harewood Library Table by Thomas Chippendale and The Wallace Collection F302 Secrétaire á abattant by Riesener, in order to isolate, identify and interpret differences between them. This innovative case study sits at the heart of this thesis and describes in detail how these pieces were designed and constructed and how they relate to the wider cultures from which they emerged. The result of this is apparent in a number of outcomes. Firstly, the thesis offers a definitive summary of the key characteristics of Chippendale’s and Riesener’s work which will better enable practitioners (conservators, curators, collectors, etc.) to identify pieces made by these makers, analyze their condition and help conserve these important pieces of furniture: furniture history currently is over‐dependent on much more subjective approaches to this process of identification. Secondly, the thesis examines different aspects of furniture making in England and France (literature on the workshops, information on economic conditions, evidence relating to tools and materials etc.) and integrates them in such a way as to provide an authoritative account of the complex processes involved in the commissioning of such fashionable furniture. The thesis not only helps us better understand furniture making in England and France at a structural level during this key period of transition but also provides an original and systematic approach to writing a history around such material cultures, demonstrating how important it is to the full(est) comprehension of history that such fashionable objects be understood. Where other frequently more privileged objects (written documents, paintings and sculptures etc.) have been seen to provide valuable historical insights, this thesis argues that fashionable furniture can now be seen to provide its own unique perspectives on the time and on the society in which it was created.