A diversity brings together different cultures, religions, languages, races, genders, ages, and education. Diversified architecture has more creative thinking with groups of people from different cultures, generations, and genders. Architectural environments that support diversity are always more productive than architectural environments that are closed to diversity. This situation returns to the development of architecture as high performance. Studies show that the performance of architectural environments that support diversity is 36% better than the exact opposite environment. Diversity offers high performance as well as an architectural environment where people can freely express their ideas. This situation opens the way for innovation in architecture. When it comes to architecture, diversity abstracts its fundamental meaning and appears as a design principle. Inspired by change and contrast, this design principle emphasizes architectural design elements such as different forms, shapes, sizes, proportions. Thus, the architectural designer makes his work more effective and is fed by the multi-layered architectural culture. For all these reasons, it is clear that supporting diversity is a significant advantage for architecture. The main topic of today is what can be done to increase diversity in addition to the existing diversity in architecture. From this point of view, in this article, architectural diversity is evaluated with the titles of globalization in the workplace, user participation in the architectural design process, approaches to architectural design, architectural design education, and tools for architectural representation.
Globalization in the Workplace
Architecture becomes global with many different cultures, languages, and beliefs in the workplace. As a result of this, many positive results occur. For example, many people improve their creativity, productivity, and cultural insights thanks to increasing global diversity. Thus, people present an efficient architectural environment with a broad range of skills. It also makes people more passionate about design as it increases the efficiency of the work done. The increase in diversity is directly proportional to the increase in the workforce, too. Architects have the opportunity to think more about design with the diversity of the workforce. In addition to this, global diversity brings together different talents who all work for a common purpose using various skills consequently. Each individual with diverse talents manifests their way of thinking, working and problem-solving, and decision making that causes people to expand their horizons. Thus people get many solutions to design problems thanks to globalization.
User Participation in the Architectural Design Process
By the architectural design process focuses on different users and moves with it, spatial diversification comes to the fore. Thus, architecture opens a cultural space for itself throughout the process in which the user is involved. Many successful projects, examples of which we see today, are projects where the user plays an active role in the design process. A broad culture and design policy prevail in these projects, where the chain of users and architecture are closely connected. Thus, the architecture, which benefits from various local experiences and practices, appeals to large audiences with its polyphonic structure. From this point, the user’s spatial behavior has a relationship to the organization of the space. As a result of this relationship, architecture reaches a broad information network and diversifies with user’s environmental behavior studies.
Approaches to Architectural Design
[The architectural design process customizes the design by going through many different processes from the urban scale to the private area scale. These processes reach the final product with the differentiation of the form and structural features of the elements that make up the architecture. The architectural designer gets the opportunity to question until he reaches the final product. The architectural designer evaluates the design as a whole or in parts with his ability to issue and creates a meaningful framework that allows for different constructs to be brought together with the principle of diversity in design. Architects enable the process of constructing the space with different formal tendencies to be legible thanks to the rich background offered by the principle of diversity. Thus, diversity and inclusiveness are reflected in architecture as creativity with various design approaches. For example, the concept of flexibility, which is today’s contemporary theory, is a product of diversity. Flexibility, a design approach that includes spatial and structural strategies that enable the building to meet the changes in the face of possible changes in the process, offers and diversifies a wider framework for architecture with different types of spaces.
Architectural Design Education
Architectural design education supervises the student’s design periodically, and thus it enables students to bring different approaches to their design. These places where design is learned by experimenting make architectural design studios significant. At this point, course contents contribute to diversifying the architectural design environment. The faculty members, who are the main actors of the design studio, push the limits of their students with different design problems and topics and motivate their creativity by adding physical and social environment experiences to them. Thus, architects emphasize revealing the multiple characters of the design by leaving aside the classical studio approach. The design, examined with new perspectives, gains a multidimensional meaning by supporting it with different disciplines. This meaning gives architecture a more productive and efficient framework.
Tools For Architectural Representation
Since the Renaissance, architectural representation tools have been the significant expression of the architectural profession. Representation tools have diversified throughout history, and today, with the developing technology, it leaves its place to digitalization. The concept of representation concretely presents the spatial relationships in the design phase as an expression of the architectural design product. In addition to the programs created by digitalization, the models, which are the fundamental expression of the architecture from the past to the present, appeal to both our senses of sight and touch. The prevalence of representation tools in architecture depends on diversifying relations with different disciplines. Thus, while the emergence of architectural products accelerates, it is ensured that architects participate more in the design. The point to be considered here is to prevent using architectural representation tools as a design tool.
Reference List
- Online sources
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- Images
[Image 1] Architectural Work Environment. Available at: https://www.istockphoto.com/tr/foto%C4%9Fraf/architects-working-on-project-gm505968354-83966699 [Accessed 3 Sept. 2021].
[Image 2] Globalization in the Workplace. Available at: https://www.istockphoto.com/tr/foto%C4%9Fraf/harika-bir-tak%C4%B1m-varsa-zor-kolay-hale-geldi-gm695909424-128718607 [Accessed 3 Sept. 2021].
[Image 3] User Participation in the Architectural Design Process. Available at: https://www.istockphoto.com/tr/foto%C4%9Fraf/team-of-architects-reviewing-architectural-model-in-the-office-gm487569554-73513685 [Accessed 3 Sept. 2021].
[Image 4] Approaches to Architectural Design. Available at: https://www.istockphoto.com/tr/foto%C4%9Fraf/architects-and-engineers-planning-on-a-new-project-gm489257392-74618745 [Accessed 3 Sept. 2021].
[Image 5] Architectural Design Education. Available at: https://www.arch2o.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Arch2O-10-lessons-i-learned-after-architecture-school-4.jpg [Accessed 3 Sept. 2021].
[Image 6] Tools For Architectural Representation. Available at: https://www.arch2o.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Arch2O-a-short-visit-to-6-prominent-architecture-firms-8.jpg [Accessed 3 Sept. 2021].
