The subject of this diploma thesis was to elaborate an architectural study of sheltered workshops in Brno-Lesná city district. Part of the project was to design spaces of the Gemini high school for the disabled, create new functional units and increase the capacity of school facilities. The design is focused in the nearest proximity to the main building and uses its current state as much as possible. An essential part of the design was to design a new object with a mixed sports-therapeutic function, which is connected to the school by a bridge. On the other side, the former heat transfer station, used as screening hall, is also connected by a bridge. On the south side, a new dining room, kitchen and a restaurant under schools administration is being built, which serves to integrate pupils into society. The design consists of three buildings with separate functions. In the current school building aims on education and accommodation, the sports center serves as a swimming pool, gym and therapeutic areas, the heat transfer station serves as a screening hall.

Atmosphere is one of the critical aspects in dining spaces that influences the user choice and over all image of the space, and lighting plays an important role in creating this ‘atmosphere’. The aim of this research-design thesis is to study how lighting influences the atmosphere in family restaurants. The inspiration comes from an interest to explore how lighting design could improve the quality of these spaces, since dining out has become a regular activity. Literature review on atmosphere, and visual approach to lighting creates the base of this thesis. Case studies use the literature as a tool, and explore how lighting creates different atmospheres in three different family restaurants. User behavior is additionally analyzed since they are the primary stakeholders in hospitality spaces. Finally a conceptual design is developed for an Indian restaurant in Stockholm to further explore the connection between lighting and atmosphere through application of results from literature and cases. These results show significant contribution of lighting in creating a suitable and comfortable atmosphere in restaurants, which are elaborated as drivers for the design development.

The architecture on Drottningholmsmalmen is protected as it is essential in understanding the function of the castle from the 16th century onwards and must be preserved as much as possible. Most buildings from the 1950s until the 21st century carry high architectural quality and is a time document that provide an understanding of Swedish modernist architecture during the 20th century.A requirement for the maintenance of the high cultural-historical elements is the understanding of the value. In order for the buildings not to decay, there should be an exchange for the residents that is more than restrictions. When the area was built, the idea was to create a city-like structure with accommodations for the people working at the castle and the royal guests. Hedvig’s gallery, named after Queen Hedvig Eleonora, creates a new destination on Lovön and brings attention to the residential area. The building aims to bind the areas adjacent to the castle together and contains a gallery, a restaurant, chambré separée and a small shop. Its main structure consists of horizontal brick walls that are inspired by the grid-structure that the King first laid out for Drottningholmsmalmen.

Retrieving information regarding ambience is difficult since it’s often perceived at a physical location and cannot be easily mediated. This study aimed to explore how ambience at a restaurant or bar can be mediated via a smartphone app. The study was based on the conversation about the relationship of space and place in HCI and CSCW. Based on the research question “What means of mediation are best suited for mediating ambience at a restaurant via a smartphone app?”, a research through design approach was adopted to develop a mockup that favored browsing. The mockup was used as a way to test how different means of mediation mediated ambience. An evaluation was held where users were asked to think aloud when given tasks to perform, then complete an experience questionnaire. Finally, a semi structured debriefing was held. Photos and text-based reviews were the best means of mediation to mediate ambience at restaurants. / Att motta information om en känsla från en fysisk plats är svårt eftersom den inte på ett enkelt sätt kan bli förmedlad från den platsen. Den här studien syftade till att undersöka hur känslan på en restaurang eller bar kan bli förmedlad via en mobilapp. Den här studien grundar sig i diskussionen om relationen mellan fysiska platser och dess betydelse samt relationen till människa-datorinteraktion och CSCW. Utifrån forskningsfrågan ”Vilka sätt att förmedla känsla på är bäst lämpade för att förmedla känsla på en restaurang via en smartphoneapplikation?” togs en forskning genom design-ansats för att utveckla en prototyp. Prototypen användes som ett testmedel för att undersöka hur olika sätt att förmedla känsla kunde användas. En utvärdering hölls där användarna fick tänka högt när de utförde en rad uppgifter, för att sedan fylla i ett formulär och delta i en semistrukturerad intervju. Foton och textbaserade recensioner förmedlade känsla från restauranger och barer bäst.

In the hospitality industry, the role of the frontline employee is integral. These employees are the face of the organization and have a strong role in shaping and forming the opinions of consumers by way of their product and service delivery. Therefore, the decisions an employee makes during the product or service delivery is critical in maintaining the relationship with the customer. Employees may be faced with opportunities to better service a customer at the cost of breaking an organizational rule or procedure. When an employee is faced with this dilemma and decides to break the rule on the behalf of the customer knowing the risks involved, this is called prosocial rule breaking. One distinct difference between this concept and general rule breaking is that this is performed as a nonselfish gesture; the employee does not receive any personal benefit. To examine this further, this study investigated the overall propensity to participate in prosocial rule breaking and the impact of the Big Five personality dimensions on prosocial rule breaking. To gain a better understanding of these constructs, a review of literature related to ethical decision making, prosocial behavior, and the five factor theory of personality was conducted. To investigate the research objectives, a purposive sample of frontline employees from a nationally branded restaurant chain completed a four part self-administered questionnaire by answering questions on the five factor personality dimensions through the Big Five Inventory (BFI), a restaurant based scenario followed by Morrison's (2006) prosocial rule breaking scale, a section on demographic information, and an open ended section for qualitative comments. Overall, three-hundred and five (305) usable questionnaires were completed and interpreted. The results demonstrated that this sample of restaurant employees revealed a moderate propensity for prosocial rule breaking. Moreover, the results revealed that the Agreeableness dimension is the most common personality dimension for this group of restaurant employees, but the Conscientiousness domain was the best predictor of one's propensity not to participate in prosocial rule breaking. The implications for managers from this study indicate a need for managers to recognize and encourage prosocial behaviors from their employees. They also need to understand which personality domains contribute to prosocial behavior, which can ultimately have implications for hiring, selection, and training.

Today's mobile computing platforms provide new, convenient possibilities for location-based commercial activity. In particular, the global positioning system (GPS) provides location data for local advertising and retail activity. In this thesis, we take the next step and introduce the concept of micro check-in. Micro check-in is a simple framework that allows users to match their current location to specific objects or places at a resolution much finer than that allowed by GPS based check-in. We show that micro check-in enables customers to reveal their location at a fine level of granularity. By describing the concepts of points of service, service providers, users, and the enabling technology, we present a generalized, abstract, framework for designing, developing, and analyzing micro check-in based systems. We discuss several new applications that open up as a result of the combination of real-life and digital communication channel as a result of the micro check-in process. For example, micro check-in could prove quite useful to customers at a restaurant table, a gym equipment station, an exhibit at a museum and many more. This thesis studies micro check-in applied to the process of ordering food from a table at a restaurant and present the beneficial tradeoffs enabled by micro check-in. We find that the micro check-in framework has promising applications in several areas, but specifically utilize the restaurant application, OnTable, to prove the potential use of the micro check-in framework.

The major purpose of this study was to examine the relationship of strategy and environmental scanning to performance. Porter’s (1980) strategic typology was utilized to classify foodservice firms by strategic orientation; and, an analysis of variance was performed to determine the differences in their performance. Environmental scanning engaged in by the firms was measured utilizing a modified multimethod - multitrait scale developed by Hambrick (1979). A final analysis conducted in this study was the comparison of environmental sectors scanned by high and low performing firms of each strategic group to determine their relationship with the performance variables. The three performance variables used in this study were: (a) Return on Sales, (b) Return on Assets, and (c) Growth in Unit Sales. All foodservice firms surveyed were either independent corporations or strategic business units of larger corporations whose major source of revenue was the foodservice industry. The study was nationwide with 18 national, 32 regional, and 15 local foodservice companies participating. The data was collected from fiscal year 1982 through fiscal year 1986 from both private and public sources. Strategy and environmental scanning were found to have substantial influence on both Return on Sales and Return on Assets. High performing firms in both differentiation and low cost strategies were found to engage in significantly greater amounts of environmental scanning than low performing firms in those two strategic groups. Focus strategy underperformed all other strategic groups in all performance measures. / Ph. D.

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