Abstract

This paper discusses ongoing research that investigates the hypothesis that unexplored vital forces (such as pleasure, enjoyment, curiosity) could significantly impact creativity during the design process and furthermore explores how a new proposed interaction between the primary agents of the design model (designers, builders and users) can create innovative design propositions, generate more meaningful experiences and proposes a new human-centered design paradigm. While offering predictable and safe results through repetition, traditional construction techniques often do not leave space for the development of an interaction between human beings and their environments. With a stated purpose of enhancing the user’s experience, a new approach in design thinking shifts the focus of building design and construction from the product to the process: a personalized and sustainable human environment interaction. The focus on human experience can become a driving force for construction development, as evidenced by the construction of a 1:1 scale prototype which tested simultaneously materials and new processes and incorporated the human factor as an innovative element in the design and construction process. Taking a different prospective from that of a fast-paced modern world mainly focused on the final product, the prototype aims at preserving human interaction through patient, inquisitive and reflective work that challenges our notions of aesthetics and the ordinary. This investigation highlights the importance of exploring the relationship between architectural form and current construction practice with the introduction of human experience within a technological setting, an exploration that could open the door to technological innovation in design and guide the (re)definition of meaning, place and identity in modern design theory and architectural language, equally for designers, builders and users.