The Office

A PLACE OF WORK

The office is really just a modern day version of a factory - a cacophony of clattering keys & swishing of mice, with rows of workers busily churning out endless digital iterations of work from computers where once in their place stood looms spinning reels of material and furnaces spewing steel.

We haven't come all that far from the industrial revolution in terms of how we work. There's still the clock in/out format of an 8 hour day over 5 days a week. We still have the need to travel to and from a set place of employment and hierarchy of overseers to ensure the virtual cogs keep on turning.

We have mobile technology to work with including many forms of communication, so why are we still following this outdated Victorian work model? 

There have been many attempts to 'jazz up' the workplace by adding all kinds of 'fun', colourful, quirky props and gimmicks that are supposed to make the chore of going in to a box and sitting in rows of desks alongside people we barely know, more bearable. Why are we essentially spending increasingly more time with strangers, than with our real friends or loved ones? 

Work Isn't Working

The modern office has many flaws. Gone are the days of doors. Personal offices, if they are still used, are exclusively the places for the top exec to reside in. Everyone else is out on the 'shop floor', where they are more visible and readily available for interactions. 

This means extroverted sales people can mix with introverted creatives and anyone can approach whoever they please to get what they 'want'. Yet, loud pushy sales people are arguably not going to be a benefit to the quieter creative types and therefore dealing with a barrage of requests can distract us from the task of actually doing the work. 

There are clear preferences for Myers Briggs introverted personality types to have solitude and arguably, there have been many good books and cases brought to the attention of office environment architects that highlight the problem of having such open-plan spaces. It's been shown how in-effective these places can be for the many introverted thinkers who require quite solitude to conceive or creative new ideas. I look forward to the day when the work revolution finally comes.

Eco Living

SUSTAINABLE ABODES

Living in the 21st Century is going to see a lot more focus on sustainable living. Environmental changes will encourage us to search for cleaner, renewable energy resources and the quest for finding better, more ecological ways for living will transform all of our lives.

There's been so much media attention on what the necessary changes are over the last 30 years - and yet, there appears to be little advancement on how we're going to achieve any of this. It feels like the same mindset that potentially destroyed civilisation on Easter Island is here in the 21st century - namely, civilisation out of control, contributing even more greenhouse gasses, toxic waste and magnifying the problems to a point of no return.

Looking at some of the proposed alternative houses available out there - there seems to be a complete failure to understand what we are going to need for the common good, as is evident from this article on The Telegraph's website. What we need, are affordable houses - that are ecologically efficient - and we need to start creating them to live in very soon.

So what's stopping us from making more affordable energy-efficient homes? The idea that we have to compromise on our contemporary modes of living are what's holding us back - as people are generally mis-informed about what an eco-home can be. The other issue facing us, is the cost of the land and the focus on making money pushing up prices far beyond what is affordable by the masses.

The UK government owns a massive £330 billion of land and property which has land suitable for housing development. If an initiative could be introduced that segments off parts of the country for community-style permaculture living, we could see a change in how people live - as they adopt a lower-cost lifestyle and over time, eventually adapt to a truly sustainable style of living.

Power To The People

CITIZENS UNITE

Fast going are the days when the power elite could sway the masses through spin pushed out in the newspapers and in TV. 

Now, through the Internet and social media, we have the opportunity to have our voices heard. We can make our own videos, connect and share information with the world and through our own research, educate ourselves to make our minds up what is right and wrong. 

A recent political initiative that has been opposed by communities in the north of England, has today been stopped. The stand against fracking. This is a significant move for the people of this country and marks what I believe to be a move towards true democracy. A place where the people can see that their opinions matter. 

Thankfully, we all still have the power to force the government and the agencies motivated by greed, to divulge the information we need to see before political decisions are made. It's thanks to Greanpeace and other defenders of the people who fight to protect our environment that we will now know the original content of the research document on fracking before it was edited to make fracking seem more appealing. 

There's many instances where this kind of underhand behaviour has been used before and this will be the last time it will happen so easily, I'm sure. I feel that maybe the people of the USA have a bigger battle on their hands as the corporations really do have so much power but it is still possible if they can see what has happened in this country today - they'll know that it's possible. 

By donating a small amount of money and time, we can all help save the environment, empower local communities, see an end to corruption and put the power back into the rightful hands of the worlds citizens - away from corporations and puppet politicians. 

The power of buildings

THE RIGHT ENVIRONMENT

If your job revolves around working on computers like mine does, the advantages of having mobile technology now mean you can work from pretty much anywhere. You have a choice. If you are fortunate enough to live near the sea or your home office window opens out onto a sublime view of the mountains or rolling countryside, you'll have nature there to inspire you every day. Being a city dweller, it's not as easy to take inspiration from nature unless your house has a garden, backs on to a park/woods or overlooks a river, so we have to create our environments to inspire us.

Architecture

Beautiful buildings are 3-dimensional structures of working art. They are designed to have function but also form, with focus on shape, texture, colour & light - in clever ways to make us feel secure, enlightened & powerful. To be around beautiful architecture, you have to be in a place to view it and up til recently, I had a fantastic view of St Paul's and The River Thames from my workplace. Seeing the sun reflecting from the dome of this monumental British cathedral - the light creating an ethereal glow - I'd get a nostalgic sense of belonging to something great. The images of St Paul's standing defiantly amid the devastation from the blitz - propaganda, I know but still powerful enough to evoke emotions of pride, dignity and courage through adversity. 

Creating environments

Now I'm working from a home office, the environment is confined to just the internal space of a small room and therefore, the environment has to be improved with the use of furnishings, lighting and enhanced with objet d'art, plants & music. This can also be a great place for creativity but to really take advantage of the technology readily available to me and easy accessibility via public transport to the many beautiful places in a city like London, I need to make use of other great spaces to work from. This might be a gallery, library, restaurant, cafe or bar.

One place that immediately springs to mind is the cafe in The Victoria & Albert Museum. Not only is this a beautiful building from the outside, but it has so much inside in the forms of exhibitions and the cafe is buzzing with creative energy.

The power of art as architecture

Louis Khan was someone who really understood how to create emotional connection to buildings and the environment. The opening image on this blog is one of my favourites. I don't know enough about the great minds behind some of the world's most amazing architecture, but It's definitely an important topic I'll be looking into more, as buildings & man-made structures will be my source of inspiration while living in a city.

For further reading I'll look into these:
The Power of Architecture
The Power of Buildings

Another great source of inspiration on architecture that I listen to is called 99% invisible - one of the recent podcasts that really moved me, is the one on the World Trade Centre.

I also found this article on using the power of your environment to promote positive change this morning that's worth a read too.