User Involvement in the Design Process of Multifunctional Buildings

Nowadays user involvement in design processes often is lacking due to the growing number of parties and specialists that participate and limited time to deliver the design. As easy as it used to be in former times for architects to get users involved, as difficult it became nowadays. Lacking user involvement easily might cause function and performance problems afterwards. For a Dutch architectural office that faced important user involvement problems a research project was executed. The goal of the project was to explore the most effective and efficient way to manage user involvement in the design of multifunctional schools. These are also known as ‘brede school’. The outcomes indicate that for adequate user involvement, specific forms of handling such users during the planning, design and realization process is needed. The findings also show that a flexible method that adjusts itself to the different phases and tasks is needed. To that account, a tool for architects getting users involved in the right and adequate way was developed. By using the tool, the architects get an overview on the type of user involvement needed, the frequency of the involvement and the type of user involvement for the next phase in the planning and design and phase. The tool opens in that way the possibility for quick observations and decisions to involve users in the process. The paper finalizes with conclusions and recommendations for further research.