The Idea
Summary of Concept
I believe all our buildings must be designed to last as long as possible and guarantee their functional usefulness for as long as they last physically. I call this approach Double-Design. By identifying the physical compatibilities among the spatial needs of different activities we can base our designs upon the highest common factors arising from this analysis. The implementation of Double-Design will affect the way design and building are undertaken in the future. Extending the life and usefulness of buildings requires a new approach to architectural design, construction, and education, and each new building would be required to respond to changes within its initial use and accommodate different future uses.
Having thought about the ideas contributing to Double-Design over several years, I felt that the different elements fit together too well and that the future of architecture cannot be that simple. Starting with the following bullet points, the reader is invited to share or challenge Double-Design. Double-Design proposes that buildings should:
- last as long as physically possible using intrinsically long-lasting materials for the supporting infrastructure
- be designed with adaptability and flexibility to be useful for as long as they last physically
- allow for a succession of different uses
- use possibly short-life and/or recyclable materials for fit-outs as uses change
- allow for growth and change
- allow for uncertainty
- allow for the best information and advice to support each successive change of use
- encourage the engagement of custodians and users in the management of their environment
- allow for each successive use to express its occupancy
By designing from the start for future changes of use, fewer resources will be consumed over the life of the building, and there will be less material waste. Transformations of use in response to changing needs will be achieved efficiently and without wasting time. Architecture would be designed to accommodate unknown future uses, and the custodians and users of buildings would be empowered and enabled to play their full part in ensuring the usefulness of buildings for as long as they last physically.
| ARCHITECTURAL RESPONSIBILITY | ALLOWANCE FOR GROWTH AND CHANGE | REUSE, ADAPTABILITY AND FLEXIBILITY | USER CHOICE AND CONTROL | ENVIRONMENTAL GOALS |
| Architecture serves human needs but architectural responsibility needs to be balanced with that of custodians and users | Making design provision for uncertainty | The widespread reuse of buildings is helped by the incorporation of adaptability and flexibility | Enabling custodians and users to be as responsible as possible for their environmental arrangements | Establishing how design can serve ethically-based environmental criteria |
Origin of Concept
I retired from day-to-day architecture after more than sixty years as an architect, planner and project manager: I began to review some of the unresolved issues encountered in my career. My consideration of these ideas turned into a dissertation for my PhD at the University of Plymouth, awarded in 2023 and titled “SPATIAL ROBUSTNESS: Double-Design and the Democratisation of Space”. The initial reaction to the ideas developed in the thesis was encouraging and further development into a book was suggested. This gave me an opportunity to include important factors omitted from the thesis. When I started thinking about the scope of the book, I wanted to ensure that whatever emerged from the development of architectural philosophy must be of value to the practising architect. Against a cultural background informed by art and architecture critics whose values seemed very far from the grounded and practical, I struggled to understand the usefulness of much that passed for architectural theory. Architecture needs to reestablish its role in providing a public service while distancing itself from the more superficial aspects of style and fashion.
The ease with which some older, more generously proportioned buildings are easy to reuse provides an obvious clue to how design needs to change. Some traditional forms of construction, stone, for example, long considered too expensive, may also facilitate long life and return to serious consideration. Within the framework of Double-Design, sustainable or recyclable materials can be deployed for fit-out and reused when functional obsolescence kicks in. Double-Design thus combines long-life infrastructure with shorter-life fit-out. This book is informed by five areas of experience.
Implementation
In searching for fresh approaches to design that could overcome current problems with architecture, I had hoped that these five areas of experience alone would generate the necessary criteria. But these personal experiences must themselves be filtered through the experiences of the world as we find it now. The principal filters are temporality (the dangers of short-term thinking and the potential advantages of altruism for the future), truth (correspondence versus coherence, sponsored and politicised truth), and world-view (holism and wild-systems theory as an optimistic context for action).
Double-Design is the practical idea that emerges from the exploration of this analysis and is offered as a hypothesis to be developed and tested.
Pros and Cons
There are obvious advantages to be achieved by the adoption of Double-Design as a strategic policy for construction. Resource conservation and waste avoidance are the most direct but the full engagement of custodians and users in the use of their buildings throughout their life will also make a positive contribution to society.
The implementing of Double-Design may be difficult because it challenges the use of a “free-market” to allocate priorities. Double-Design guidance will need to be added to the legislative health and safety factors that are designed to protect everyone and implementation will probably require a redefinition of the “public interest” if it is to succeed.