5.2 Legibility, Orientation And Wayfinding For Children?
3.5.2 Legibility, Orientation and Wayfinding for Children:
People and animals use their senses and acute abilities to organize their environments and thus find their way around them. This is a fundamental aspect to human life and the need to recognize and document our surroundings has a practical importance to all individuals. An ordered environment can serve as a form of reference to people, providing the material for symbolism and the collective meanings of a place (Plate 3.17). Cities are the powerful symbols of people and diverse societies and their designs can have strong meanings, becoming extensions of the vividness of the world that we live in. Kevin Lynch (1960) stated that if a city environment is visibly organized and sharply defined, then a person can inform it with meanings and connections. He postulates that paths, edges, nodes and landmarks are the building blocks to forming a defined urban …show more content…
Architectural features such as archways can be used to define spaces, transition zones or pathways (Fig 3.7). Designing destination zones in buildings can be useful for orienting people, retracing a path or providing shelter from the rain. These can be food courts, atriums or cafeterias. The overall layout of the building should in itself be easy to understand and navigate and not be a confusing maze of corridors and rooms. Symmetrical buildings can prove to be confusing unless the facades have been articulated coherently. Colour and lighting are both equally useful for wayfinding, but should never be used as the primary source of wayfinding information. There are various aspects to consider when adopting wayfinding principles into the design of buildings, especially for children. Colour, lighting, textural elements and audible elements are all extremely important and should be carefully considered to create a coherent atmosphere and environment which is easy to
People and animals use their senses and acute abilities to organize their environments and thus find their way around them. This is a fundamental aspect to human life and the need to recognize and document our surroundings has a practical importance to all individuals. An ordered environment can serve as a form of reference to people, providing the material for symbolism and the collective meanings of a place (Plate 3.17). Cities are the powerful symbols of people and diverse societies and their designs can have strong meanings, becoming extensions of the vividness of the world that we live in. Kevin Lynch (1960) stated that if a city environment is visibly organized and sharply defined, then a person can inform it with meanings and connections. He postulates that paths, edges, nodes and landmarks are the building blocks to forming a defined urban …show more content…
Architectural features such as archways can be used to define spaces, transition zones or pathways (Fig 3.7). Designing destination zones in buildings can be useful for orienting people, retracing a path or providing shelter from the rain. These can be food courts, atriums or cafeterias. The overall layout of the building should in itself be easy to understand and navigate and not be a confusing maze of corridors and rooms. Symmetrical buildings can prove to be confusing unless the facades have been articulated coherently. Colour and lighting are both equally useful for wayfinding, but should never be used as the primary source of wayfinding information. There are various aspects to consider when adopting wayfinding principles into the design of buildings, especially for children. Colour, lighting, textural elements and audible elements are all extremely important and should be carefully considered to create a coherent atmosphere and environment which is easy to