04
THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT — integrating the quality of place
The quality, not just the efficiency, of place is now an important focus area among policymakers, especially in, but not limited to, the European Union. Every year, global elites convene in Davos, Switzerland, to discuss the most critical social, economic and political issues. In 2018, the built environment was the central focus, and the European Ministers of Culture adopted the Davos Declaration in response to the problems they saw in existing physical places. Based on this declaration, the Davos Baukultur Quality System (BQS) editorial team formulated a system to guide professionals to ensure that the quality of future places, including historical sites, is better than what we experience today.[23]
The European Union has now focused on building culture through the New European Bauhaus initiative that combines the focus on beautiful and sustainable spaces.[24] This section will present the principles of the BQS as well as other frameworks in the United States to inspire facility managers to create higher quality spaces and places by fostering a connected culture within a place and linking it to the surrounding community outside. Facility managers should also engage in critical discussions shaping future policy concerning the built environment and community development.
WHAT IS THE NEW EUROPEAN BAUHAUS?
The BQS places experience on par with form and function, and experience affects occupant behavior. Yet, most in the built environment have focused on the form and function to describe the places we live, work, play and learn. As we digitize our spaces, we hear the cry to “build back better” and focus on experience as the physical environment changes. Having an experience/ quality management system is critical as new phygital (physical and digital) experiences emerge and digital avatars, digital twins, AR/VR interfaces, voice-activated assets and more integrate into the built environment.
Baukultur is a German concept. In English, it means building culture. The idea builds upon ambitions expressed by Howard Davis in his 2006 book, “The Culture of Building,” in which he describes a “hope for a new century, as the quality of buildings and cities, is re-emerging as a central responsibility and challenge.”[25] The Davos Declaration codifies Baukultur, and the BQS describes eight criteria for defining and managing high-quality places, which are:
GOVERNANCEFUNCTIONALITY
ENVIRONMENTECONOMY
DIVERSITYCONTEXTBEAUTY
SENSEOFPLACE[26]
The Davos Declaration and the Baukultur Quality System promote a quality-built environment. They define the places that make up the built environment and what a quality place means.
Places are:
► For residential use, work, leisure and infrastructure (we add learning)
▶ Made up of spatial components with physical dimensions and geographic locators
▶ Built structures, as well as in-between spaces (e.g., stairways, hallways and pathways)
▶ Visible or invisible (e.g., archaeological sites below ground)
▶ Existing (historical or not) and projects in construction
▶ All types of scale, sizes and configurations of buildings, interiors, neighborhoods, districts, campuses, regions, countries, continents, oceans, landscapes, infrastructure and parks in urban, rural and suburban locations
▶ Created by human activities and experiences
The problem with many of today’s places is that they often are unsustainable and lack quality or could even be called ”placeless.” They are typically poorly fit for their functions, and the people who use them find them dull, ugly and lifeless. In addition, many buildings are unsafe or have unhealthy interiors. The BQS “stresses the central role of culture for the quality of the built environment.”
These quality places:
▶ Are well-designed and change in line with society's needs while preserving their historical characteristics
▶ Are fit for purpose, sustainable, safe, comfortable and healthy
▶ Focus on social needs and sustainable use of resources and economic value
▶ Promote overall quality of life, subjectivity and a sense of community
▶ Ensure attractive, diverse and inclusive cities, villages and open landscapes.[27]
Focusing on high-quality places is not only a European phenomenon; organizations in the United States have developed similar programs without governmental endorsement. These programs and the BQS can inspire facility managers with new frameworks for improving the quality of their spaces and places. For example, the New Urbanism movement focuses on high-quality urban design, the International Living Future Institute (ILFI) emphasizes creating sustainable places, and the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture (ANFA) concentrates on the interplay between buildings and human cognition and behavior.
New Urbanism in the United States created alternative building codes for adoption by local governments to help guide design decisions (i.e., Form-based Codes). This movement was started in 1991 to develop new standards for taking our cities back from an auto-centric view of city planning. The ILFI created the Living Building Challenge to promote sustainability measurement through certification.
ANFA fosters collaboration among architects and scientists from the Salk Institute and the University California San Diego (UCSD) in La Jolla, California, USA. Their work has increased our knowledge of the interplay between the built environment and human beings. Dr. Michael A. Arbib, an active participant in ANFA, wrote an influential book in 2021, “When Brains Meet Buildings.” He stated, “understanding 'how the brain works’ is a major motivation for this book and that buildings provide a key locus in which the intertwining of the social and physical offers fresh challenges for cognitive- and neuroscience.”[28] Key ANFA members have participated in two interesting international dialogues on potential frictions when integrating Baukultur and new technologies like cybernetics and artificial intelligence into the built environment. One such study was published in the 2019 issue of Intertwining; the other in The Plan Journal (TPJ) in 2021. Both studies deal with the concerns that arise in the intermingling of the arts and science. For example, one key challenge focuses on how we create community when digital technologies foster virtual communities over local ones and when urban and physical design reinforces these trends.
“The most important thing one can achieve in any building is to get people to communicate with each other. That is central to our lives. We are part of a community. The old villages did that, and then we destroyed all that in the 19th century when we started to build these vast expansions where there was no center and no community.”
– Kevin Roche, Architect
For example, developers often plunk down office buildings in neighborhoods with little or no effort to connect the community inside the organization to the surrounding area.
The focus on BQS and other frameworks promoting high-quality spaces demonstrates that the built environment consists of more components than just buildings. The term that best describes this is ”places.” Yet, urban planners have given this word a single connotation in the United States and other countries. According to U.S. urban planners, places refer only to ”public” areas. Therefore, ”placemaking” describes the process of creating more people-oriented streets, neighborhoods and public spaces.[29] Place should have a broader connotation, and facility managers should be at the forefront of redefining place and placemaking. Facility managers should, by implication, define place maintenance's role in upholding high-quality places.
Facility managers can foster a sense of community by enabling a connected culture within a place and linking it to the surrounding community outside. Facility management plays a crucial role in “maintaining and improving the existing qualities of a place.”[30] Therefore, facility managers must participate in the “continuous inclusive dialogue and professional and societal debate…for discussion on quality criteria and what constitutes them to achieve a common and established understanding among people (experts and non-experts) of what distinguishes high-quality Baukultur.”[31]
Sources/References
[22] T. Chang et al. (2019). ”Battle for the thermostat: gender and the effect of temperature on cognitive performance.” Plos One (May 22). https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0216362
[23] Swiss Federal Office of Culture (2021). The Davos Baukultur Quality System: Eight Criteria for high-quality Baukultur. Berne.
[24] European Commission (2021). New European Bauhaus. https://europa.eu/new-european-bauhaus/index_en
[25] H. Davis (2006). The Culture of Building.
[26] Swiss Federal Office of Culture (2021). The Davos Baukultur Quality System: Eight Criteria for high-quality Baukultur. Berne.
[27] Swiss Federal Office of Culture (2021). The Davos Baukultur Quality System: Eight Criteria for high-quality Baukultur. Berne.
[28] M. Arbib, (2021) When Brains Meet Buildings. Oxford University Press
[29] The definitions of place and placemaking have traditionally been based on the observations of Jane Jacobs and William Whyte in the 1960s. Later, Fred Kent took these concepts and created the Partners for Public Spaces (PPS), which advises on revitalizing downtowns and neighborhoods (the guidebook is “How to Turn a Place Around”).
[30] Swiss Federal Office of Culture (2021). The Davos Baukultur Quality System: Eight Criteria for high-quality Baukultur. Berne.
[31] Swiss Federal Office of Culture (2021). The Davos Baukultur Quality System: Eight Criteria for high-quality Baukultur. Berne.