Transcripts
1. Introduction: Today's landscape of
work is changing. People can work from everywhere and at times that are
convenient to them. Whether you want to set up
a home office for yourself or have had one for a while that needs a bit
of freshening up, this class is for you. My purpose with this class
is to teach you how to think a little bit like an
architect about your space, strategically, creatively, sustainably, and
budget conscious. I also wanted to give you some evergreen guidelines based in the latest
scientific research. What does scientifical
research have to do with design, you might ask. Well, the latest
scientific research is telling us more and more how the design of space impacts our psychological
health and well-being. A couple of things I'm
going to touch on are how nature impacts our health
and recuperation time. How certain smells
heightened our attention, making us less
prone to mistakes. How our eyes are
tuned to symmetry, and that engaging in some do-it-yourself projects are not only good for
the environment, but they're also good
for your mental health. This class is composed
of three chapters. The first chapter
is fundamentals, where we will try
to understand on one side your work
style and on the other, the space in which
your home office will go and how the first one
will influence the second. In the second chapter, we will talk about the elements that make a great home office. In the third chapter, tying it all together, we'll talk about the
guidelines according to which these elements
will be joined together, as well as some great examples
of home office design, and we will explain also
how you can do that too. Hi, my name is Ana Marcu, I'm a licensed architect
and the owner of Videar Architecture Studio
based in Vienna, Austria. My background is in architecture
and building science, and I'm very passionate about
architectural psychology and how the design of
space impacts our health, well-being, emotions,
and behavior. Stick around for some great tips on how to transform
your home office into a tool that will help you become the most creative
and productive self.
2. What Work Do You Do?: Welcome to the first lesson. Before we start
designing anything, we need to make sure we fully understand the two
major factors at play, the human and space. In order to understand
you the human, we need to go through a
series of exercises where we can identify all the
different tasks that you will be performing
at your desk and the amount of storage
you will need for all the tools and devices that will help you
perform the best. Additionally, we'll explore what your work patterns
are or what kind of environment stimulates
you the most in order for you to
accomplish your best work. Let's have a look. Our
first exercise is about identifying the
different types of tasks taking place at desk, as well as the amount of time that you need
for each of them. I would recommend
you do this exercise for a period of one month to identify not only the tasks
that take place repeatedly, but also those tasks that
only take place once a month. Here's how it could look like. In the first column,
we have type of work, in the second the
time per month, in the third, a couple of notes. I imagined a graphic
designer writing down this table and he
or her activities, but you write down whatever
makes sense for you. Research and reading,
sketch and design, Skillshare classes, social
media posts, and taxes. Here's the time allocated
for each of them, [BACKGROUND] which makes a
total of 140 hour per month. What is it that we notice in this table or why is
this table important? For once we notice that
sketch and design is one of the activities that takes the most amount of
time during a month. That means whatever
tools, paper, and devices we might be using, have to be really close by, easy to reach, quick to grab. We need them in the
immediate vicinity. The things like social media and taxes only
happen once a month. Whatever tools, paper, and
devices that we might be needing for them can
be further away. This is important,
especially if we don't have that much space for our home office and we need to be very careful where
we can put everything. In this way, we can prioritize
what needs to be close by and what can go in
harder to reach places. We also know that per week, we spend roughly 35 hours. That means that we need to
invest in a very good chair. We'll be sitting a long
amount of time at our desk, and therefore we have
to invest in the chair that is comfortable, is sturdy, that holds our back, makes it easy for us to
sit at our desk. We also have to invest in a separate room if
our home allows it. We have to make sure
that we can be in a room where we'll not be disturbed for long
periods of time. If it had been less
than 35 hours per week, then we could think of more temporary
solution for our home, especially if our home
is not very large. So for example a wall mounted table like
the one on the right, could be a solution for you for a couple
of hours per week. You just lift it up, work at it, and then put it back
down and you can use that space for
something else. Another solution is this one
underneath the staircase. It has enough space for
a laptop and a lamp, a little bit of storage, and you can work for a
couple of hours. It's definitely not a solution that you want to have for 35, 40 hours a week, but if you have just a couple of hours
per week working at home, especially if you don't have enough space this solution
might be for you. We have to consider very
closely what you need. But what kind of
workspace might we use? On the left side we have the blogger who has a
normal science table, not a lot of storage, a couple of books,
and one computer. On the right side
on the other hand, is a different story.
We have an artist. You have a large table
and one that is inclined, a lot of need for space, for storage, for paints. It looks completely different and the needs are
completely different. What the artist needs is
not what the blogger needs. So now we have to look
a little bit closer and what is it that we need for our workspace before
we start designing it?
3. What Do You Need?: We look back at our table and we have on one
column the type of work. For each type of work
that we wrote down, we now have to write down
all the tools and devices and the paper that we might need for each of
these activities. It doesn't matter if one
of them repeat itself, we just have to do
a small brain dump, in which we articulate everything we need for
each of those activities. Let's have a look at them. These are our activities. Now we have to write
down what is it that we need for each of
these activities. We have books, office supplies, and computer for
research and reading. We might have A3 and A4
paper sketch and design, maybe paper rolls
and pencils and pens, and Skillshare classes. We might need a microphone, a webcam, some light
to a computer. For the social media
posts we need again, the camera and computer
and maybe an iPad. For the taxes we need
our files and books, maybe our computer again. Try to get into as much detail as you can for each
of these tasks. Remember we said that
sketch and design activity is the one that takes
the most amount of time. The paper and the sketch paper, the pencils and pens, they really have to be in
the immediate vicinity.
4. How Much Do You Need?: Our last table is about listing out all the tools,
devices, and paper, as well as objects of emotional
value that you will need to store around our
home office space. We need this information
because we want to make sure how much storage
space we should plan for. Are we the blogger
or the artist? How much stuff do we need and how much surface do we need? Let's list out from the
previous table all the tools, devices, and paper
that we actually have in the first
column of existing. Then also try to
think about what are the projected objects
that you might want to have in your
possession that might also need a storage space. We shouldn't think only about the story space
that we need now, but also the one we need
in the near future. Then we try to estimate the amount of surface needed
in use for all of this. I know the surface in terms of square meters like you need
for maybe your printer, but also the length
of your shelf. It can be endlessly long, but you need to know
if you need one meter, two meter, 10 meters,
how much do you need? How many books? How
much paper do you have? How much do you
roughly need right now? Let's list them out. These are the things
that we currently have. For projected, we might need to buy some more paint supplies, and maybe your printer, which is also very important because printers usually are very close by to your home office desk. You want to make
sure you would plan a shelf or cabinet for that. You need to know that you'll
be bringing more files, so you need to plan for a shelf. That's about it. Now we look
at the surface that we need. Either you can lay
all these objects out on your table and try to roughly estimate
how much that is, or some of these
objects like a printer come with their own surface
and you can measure it out. Maybe you already have them
stored somewhere on a shelf. You can just measure
that shelf if we intend to move them
away from that shelf. Just try to estimate
this best as you can. How much surface to the
things that you intend to store around your home
office space need? You don't want to clutter
your home office space, but you also don't want to look through your
entire house for the tools and devices that you actually need in your
immediate vicinity. You want to have a good understanding of
all the things that you have and all the things
that you'll need in the future and also
how much surface all these things require. [NOISE] Specifically for
objects of emotional value, which might be paintings
are collectibles, you want to make sure
that you give them a really good place where
you can often look at. If you have paintings
that might be the wall in front of your table, or you need an amount of
shelf length if you know you really love your
Star Wars collection that needs a special place. You need to have
an idea of where your objects will go and how
easy it is to reach them.
5. What Are Your Quirks?: Lastly, you want to
think of what is requiring you to
do your best work. These are particular features
specific to you only. Here's what I mean, and you should definitely think about these
things on your own. Are you a night owl
or a morning person? If you spend most of your time
at night doing your work, maybe you're a writer and you like to spend the
quiet time at night, then you should definitely
think more about giving special attention
to the artificial lighting and less about next
to which window is should you install your
table because clearly, the best time of day for you to do your best
work is at night. If you're a morning person, then perhaps you
don't have to invest in another home office. Perhaps you can just
share a table with somebody from your family in your best work in
the morning until the afternoon and you can take over the table in the
afternoon until night. So before you start making big investments
in your home office, think a little bit about
your needs and how you operate and if going forward, the way you originally thought
is actually the best way. What else might there be? Are you an extrovert
or an introvert? If you are an extrovert, and you really like working with other people or
even working around other people makes
you filled with joy and you do your best work when you are around
other people, then definitely do not invest your money
in a home office. You're going to
spend big bucks on your home office and still be somewhere else
doing your work. So perhaps investing in membership of a co-working
space might be better for you. But if you are a
creative introvert, then a home office is
definitely something you might need to look at. Are you the kind of person
who likes everything on the table or in the closet? Personally, I really like having a really large table
on which I can display everything and
quickly pick it up, but some people really liked
their things in the closet. If you are one of those, then you want to think
about the kind of storage that you will have. Personally, a pegboard
is very good for me. I had everything inside. Other people really
like putting things in very well-assembled
boxes in a locker. That's for them.
Another thing is if your messy type or you like things
alphabetically arranged. I would definitely
subscribe under the messy, just because I like working with a lot of
tools, and at the end, I like to put them in boxes, but other people really like
their stuff arranged by color and by labels
and by titles. I've always been a big
admirer of such people. If you're not a messy type, don't even bother
investing in doors, you can definitely
save a lot of money from investing in
shelves which are open.
6. What Stimulates You?: Lastly, you want to look at where do you currently
do your best work? I think a little bit about the environments that
best stimulate you. Perhaps you can even
do a Pinterest board. What is it that those
environments do for you? What is specific about
them that really make you happy and make you feel like you could do
your best work there? Is it the nature
that they display? Is it the people? There are specific people
that you like working with, and around, and
they stimulate you? Is it the fact that you have quiet time that you
can finally work? Is it the good coffee
[LAUGHTER] that they offer? Might there be some smells that stimulate you; some perfumes, or the smell of croissant that you like when you go into
your favorite coffee shop? Sometimes there can
be some chilled background music that gets set to the tone and the mood for
a specific kind of work, and sometimes, or
even often enough, there is the interior design, the choice of color, or specific space that
you genuinely like. The reason I'm
encouraging you to think about it is because you want to take a little bit of the mood and the stimulations that make you feel the best, and do the best work, and implement them
in your home office. This is very important to stimulate your
creativity a little bit. To recap, monitor yourself, and identify all the activities that you perform in a month. Identify and prioritize
all the tools, paper, and devices that you
need for each of your tasks. Figure out the surface, your paper tools, and your eyes' actually need. Find out what your particular
preferences for work are, determine what your
favorite environments are, and what specifically
about them, stimulate your creativity,
and your focus. How can you bring that
into your home office?
7. Measure The Space: Our first building block in understanding our space
is to measure it. As an architect, I can
draw out pretty quickly, building models in CD or
3D modeling programs, but I'm assuming you
have none of that. I thought about a very
simple way in which you can measure a room and also understand the units
at the same time. Just take a ruled piece of paper and you draw out your
walls on it, like this. You might say 10
centimeters is one square. It means that one
meter is 10 squares. Or if you work in
the imperial system, and you say four
inch is one square, then I have three squares
are equal to one foot. Let's assume for
example that we want to draw a table that is 60 centimeters wide and
120 centimeters long. If we take our unit at 10
centimeters is one square, then we have a table that is
six squares by 12 squares. If, on the other hand, we find that we don't have enough ruled paper for
this dimension and we want to make the
table smaller and we can say we have 20
centimeters for one square, and then our table is three
squares by six squares. Whatever unit system you
choose, stick to it. If you choose 10
centimeters to one square, then draw everything
in this system. If you choose 20
centimeters to one square, then draw everything
out in this system. Do not mix them. Let's take for
example this room. For the sake of the exercise, I've made it 320 centimeters wide and 350 centimeters long. That means on our
ruled piece of paper, that is 32 by 35 squares
[LAUGHTER] in the unit system, one to 10 centimeters. That also means
that the window is 15 squares and the
door is nine squares. I hope by now you
understand how to draw your room on your
ruled piece of paper. What is it we need to
know about this room? We need to know the width and the length and we
also need to know where the windows
and the doors are located in relationship
to the rest of the walls. As you can see here, my window is positioned one
meter away from each wall, left to right, while my door is positioned 60
centimeters away from one wall and 200
away from the other. Another important
thing to know is where our light switches
and sockets are. This is especially important if we intend to
buy new furniture. We want to make sure that we don't cover our light switches. We want to make especially
sure that we don't cover all our sockets in the
room or if we cover them, it was intended that way
and we can still reach them with the cables of
our electrical devices. Lastly, we also want
to look at where our window is located in relationship to the
floor and the ceiling. This is particularly
important if we want to place our
table in front of it but also to understand the space that is left
available for furniture. We also want to
know the distance from sockets to the wall, especially if we intend to
place our desk further away.
8. Measure Your Furniture: Besides measuring the space, you also have to
measure your furniture. Why is this important? Because you don't want to have situations where you purchase your furniture and it
turns out that it's bigger than the space
you allocated to it. Like in this case, the shelves to the right or
the wardrobe to the left. You want to make
sure that it fits perfectly like in
this situation. You also want to measure
the furniture that you already have just to get a good understanding
of the opportunities and challenges that
your room provides. In this case, I have some pieces of
furniture in the room; a table to the right with
the chair and a trolley, and to the left, some shelves. Shelves can be between
35-45 centimeters wide, it can also be a wardrobe if
it's up to 60 centimeters. What do you need to pay
attention to in this case? You need to make sure, and this is something that
you always need to make sure, that the space between the table and whatever lies
behind your chair, whether it's a piece of
furniture or a wall, should be at least one meter. In this case is two meter 30, which is fine, but you don't want to have it less than that. It's quite
uncomfortable to get up from your chair and
leave the room. Another important dimension is the space between your table
and the wall to the left, and the space between your table and the wall to the right. You need to understand how much space you
have available there, and what kind of pieces
of furniture might they fit depending on how much
storage need you have? Additionally, there are particular corners that
you need to watch out for, like the base between the
window and the table. In this case, there
is enough space, but it might be that your
table overlaps the window. In that case, hopefully
it is below the window. If it's above the window, [LAUGHTER] you
might have to find an elegant way for
solving that problem. If you have instead of shelves, you have a wardrobe or
lockers with doors, you have to check
in which direction these doors open and
that they don't clash with an existing door like
the door from your space. Watch out for those.
[LAUGHTER] The last thing that you need to watch out for is the space you leave
between pieces of furniture. You want to be sure that you can reach
everything in your room from your shelves to your
locker, to your table. If two pieces of furniture meet, and try to make elegant
solution out of it. Like in this case here, where you have the table seamlessly flowing
into the shelf, therefore making the surface of the table a piece of the shelf. I don't think you can do that
with standards furniture, but you can definitely do this
together with a carpenter. As you can see there,
there's also a niche for sockets below and
above the table. So it's quite
elegantly resolved.
9. Composition And Functionality: A few thoughts
about composition. I want you to take
your room piece of paper you have
drawn your room, and try to figure
out on which side of this room your table
would fit best. Maybe you have a
new fresh room or maybe your home desk is
in already existing room. I want you to make
an exercise of imagination where
you would walk into this room and figure out what the best location of
your table would be, based on how easy it will be for you to use that
table in that space. Let's take our room. We have our door and window. Where would the location
of the table fit best? In this version, I have put
the table on the left side. What happens when
going into the room, I open the door and wow, one big table corner greets me, as well as impression
of clutter of the room because of the chair that is positioned
right in the middle. Looks very scattered, not very
orderly this composition, and will probably not be the best way to position
the table in this room. What other situations
do we have? We can put the table at the back wall right
next to the door. What's bothering me
about this version is that the window is in my back. Whatever I'm doing at my table, I will not be able
to see because of the big shadow my body is
going to leave on the table. This situation is
definitely not good either. We only have two walls where
we can position our table, either to the wall at the right side or the
wall with the window. This would be very
helpful because I can use the space behind the door to position my shelves from one
wall to the other, making the space
look very clear. On the other side, create a balanced composition
with my table. If I want, I can make this
symmetrical composition with the table in the middle and exactly the same
furniture left and right, or I can make it a little bit
more asymmetrical and put some plants on one side and a
row container on the other. Then I can also have shelves
on top of the table. I can position my table
to the left side, which is closer to the window, and leave a little
bit more space for maybe a wardrobe or some
shelves on the right side. What I can do is also make a really large
table wall to wall. In this case, it will
be three meter 20. I personally would
love such a table, because I do a lot
of hand drawing, I work with really large pieces
of papers and architects. I always need a lot
of surface on which I can roll out all
the paper rolls. If you're an artist,
you might like this, if you are a model maker you might enjoy this kind of table. If you only work with your PC, this might not necessarily
be something you need. If your space offers
it, go for it, but if not, you can do
with also a smaller table. I also like the version of
putting my table right next to the window because
then I could take advantage of the natural
light right away. I keep my really
large table and I can connect it to the shelf like
in the exercise before. I can also have
shelves to the back and this makes the
room a little bit more compact and easy to
understand when you get in. If I don't need
that much storage, then you shouldn't
purchase that much shelf. Keep your room as simple and
as uncluttered as you can. You can have your table
right next to the window, and your shelves at the back. Or if you need a little
bit more storage, you can add more shelves left
and right of the window. This will limit a
little bit the amount of light going into the room. But because you have your
table right at the window, this won't be much of
a problem for you. I hope these are enough
ideas for you to think about what would be the
best location of your table in the room.
10. Daylight: A few thoughts about how important daylight
is to your ability to perform your best work. Exposure to sunlight
is thought to increase the brain's release of a
hormone called serotonin. Serotonin is associated
with boosting mood and helping a person
feel calm and focused. Exposure to light affects
your circadian rhythm, which is basically a
24-hour internal clock that is running in the
background of your brain. It cycles between
sleepiness and alertness. It's also known as
the sleep-wake cycle. Sunlight strongly
affects your appetite, your mood, your ability to
heal, and productivity. It plays an important role
in your ability to be alert, and your capacity for
mental and physical tasks. Lighting is the dominant factor in the brain's ability to focus. Studies have shown
that learners in brightly lit environments got higher grades than those
in dimly lit classrooms. Study conducted by the
Sorbonne University covering 30 European
countries conclude that academic performance
can increase by up to 15% when students work in classrooms
with larger windows, to both increase daylight and better view to
the outside world. Lack of exposure to light can generate the seasonal
effective disorder. It symptoms are lethargy and
alterations in thinking. Having the right
lighting conditions will make a huge difference
in the work environment. It will induce more
positive behaviors and increased creativity. Additionally, consider
taking breaks in the sunlight to regenerate. Exposure to daylight
and sunlight are especially important
for your health. You the human need sunlight
so you can operate the best. Depending on what you do, your work might also need the full spectrum
of natural light. If you're an artist
or a model maker, then you want to
take full advantage of the daylight hours. It's then will your colors
will look the best. If you're the
proverbial night owl, then this might
not matter to you, but even if you do your
best work at night, you will still need to
get your time in the sun. Let's take the room example
from the previous exercise. With you at home,
look at the room in which you intend to
place your home office. What cardinal direction
is your window facing? Does having direct sunlight
help or hurt your work? If you work with
a lot of screens, then the facing of
window might not be the best position for
you because of glare, but also because
they will probably block the entire window. If you work with more
paper than objects, than screens, then the work
sunlight might be helpful. If you're facing
East, you will get your sunlight in the morning
and if you're facing West, you'll have sunlight
in the evening. If your room is facing South, you will have direct
sunlight all day. Depending where you are
located in the world, and the type of
work that you do, this might be both a good
thing and a bad thing. But having too much sunlight
is a good problem to have because you can regulate it with curtains and
shades and blinds, which will also help
you regulate the heat. If you are facing North, then you will not see
direct sunlight ever, at least not from this window. The same can happen if you face a big building or a small
courtyard or brick wall. It can be a good thing
if you live in a country where the summer temperatures
can reach very high levels. But for work, you
will need the support of a lot of artificial
lighting in the room. Not to worry though,
there are already very affordable LED
lighting systems that mimic natural daylight
and can change color to reflect the entire spectrum
of day light colors. We significantly support
your circadian rhythm.
11. Table: Let's talk about tables. What should you know about them? Tables can come in
multiple shapes and sizes and depending on how you work and the availability
of your space. Your choice on what table
to pick can vary greatly. I can't go into every table
size, shape, and style, but here are a couple of strategic ideas from
me on how to go about picking a table and what features you might
have to look out for. Because it is important to know if your furniture
fits this space, I can tell you that the width of an average table is
between 60-80 cm. The length can vary, but an average office
space table at least in Europe is 160 cm long. The first feature
that you have to look out for is flexibility. When choosing your work table, you might want to pick the
table and the legs separately. There are, at least,
three reasons I can think of why
this makes sense. If you damage any of the parts, you don't have to replace
the entire table. Should you relocate which in the mobile society of
today happens a lot, the transportation and
storage of the parts is going to be much easier. Just imagine bringing your table up the stairs to your apartment. Do you want to bring the
parts or the entire table? If you happen to need
more storage later on, you can always
replace one leg or both with containers,
with drawers. You can add more legs and
more tables to the system. Like in this image here, you can have two tables
sharing one container. Why do I like this? Flexibility is a very strong
component of sustainability. It helps you adapt
the furniture. You have two new demands
instead of throwing it away entirely so you can
replace it with another table. Why throw away the
entire furniture when you can just
throw away the parts? Of course, this prolongs the
life of your furniture in your home minimizing the amount of landfill waste that
you are producing. These approaches are, of course also very friendly
to the budget. Another flexible table is this
one from breadedEscalope, which is a design studio
here in Vienna, Austria. They freed the table
frame on which different surface
units can be installed depending on the activity
that has to be performed. You can have an
office table like below or a carpenter's
workstation. The table can support you in a large number of activities. Everything is on the table. You don't have to search
for it in drawers. As technology advances and we work with more and more devices, so must the table
adapt their features. Some tables come with drawers
that you can access from the surface where you
can store and charge tablets and keyboards together with other office supplies. They also offer hideaways
for electrical sockets. Another accessory you
might want to look for is this cable support
here to the right. It doesn't look like much, but it makes the
cable chaos much more manageable as well as
more pleasing to the eye. There are also some table
storage accessories like this pedestal on your
left for your screen, which helps your posture by lifting the screen
a little higher as well as creating more
quickly available storage for your office desk. You might want to
consider setting up a higher table to support you in doing some work standing. If your budget allows it, maybe you can purchase a
height-adjustable table, but if your budget is low, you can install this
wall-mounted table somewhere in your house. I can't stress this enough, but sitting prolonged hours at desk can be very damaging for your health and
anything you can do to stop sitting so much will help your long-term
health tremendously.
12. Chair: These days we could be sitting anywhere in order
to do our work, but if you are seated
at a table and especially if we
work many hours, then you will need
a proper chair. There are many chairs you could be choosing
from, so I thought, I would give you a few tips on what quality an ideal
chair you should have, not so much on how
it should look like. The backrest of an
office chair should be adjustable and follow
the shape of the spine. It should also support the
curve of the lower back. Your feet should rest flat
on the floor comfortably, if not adjust the chair
height or add a foot rest. Arm rest should be close to the body and allow the
shoulders to relax. Arm height should be adjustable and match
the height of the desk. This will prevent strain
to the shoulders. In a sitting position
looking forward, what you should see in
front of your eyes is the center of the screen
of your computer. The back of the chair should
come to the middle of the shoulder blades in order
to provide adequate support. If it's above the shoulder
it's even better. The seat of the chair
should be long enough to put two or three finger lengths
between it and the knee. If you're on the budget
associate the chair should not be the piece of furniture
you want to save money on. Of all the furniture that
is part of your home office the chair can have the biggest
impact on your health, so you want to make sure that
you have a very good one. There are many different
types of chairs out there, and some people swear
by this exercise ball. The idea of sitting on an
exercise ball instead of a traditional office chair
is that the instability of the exercise ball requires
the user to increase trunk muscle activation and
thus increase core strength, improving posture and
decrease discomfort. Apparently, it can also help
you burn some calories.
13. Storage: Ample storage, both
accessible and hidden, are important in a home office. In any office situation,
reference material, paperwork, and crunchy
files can easily pile up, and make the space
feel cluttered. Organizing these components
can polish your workspace. Where could you find a
home office storage? As touched upon in
the table chapter, we could find it
underneath the desk, in the shape of
containers and cabinets with drawers for people
in office supplies. We can also find it
in front of the desk, in the shape of peg boards, which are especially good for people who use a lot of tools, or to the left and the
right side of the table. Here you find the supplies
that are most frequent in use. If you should need
scanners and printers, try to plan for them. Where should they be located? How will you access
an electrical socket? How easy will it be to use? In this example, we can draw
out the devices in use, and then push them backwards. It all depends on the
list of tools, devices, and paper that you created
in the first exercise.
14. Lighting : Before we go into the
electrical lighting topic, I would encourage
you to maximize the use of your natural light. It's a strategy that is going
to save you a lot of money, but also natural light as mentioned in the
previous chapter, is going to be the
healthiest for you. This is why I will
generally discourage you to paint the walls of
your workspace very dark, especially if your
space is very small. It is particularly bad if
you live in a hot climate. Dark colors absorb UV light, which heats whatever
surface towards that color and you
will have to pay a lot more for ventilation
than you would have with lighter color walls. There are, however, some
cases where it makes sense. If it's a small
patch of color or just one wall covered
with lighter color art, they really make the light art shine and they also
attract the view. Dark walls might also be supportive of your
work if you are a videographer and you generally need the darker space
to edit your videos, or you use a dark wall
as a background for filming yourself in let's
see, YouTube videos. You want your skin
color to pop from the background and that could make your videos quite dramatic. In that case, it makes sense. Other than that,
I can't think of many situations where going black and dark gray
is good for you, so stick to light colored walls. Where should light
be positioned so you have the best
view of your desk? As a general rule, try to have ambient light further
away from your desk, and the more diffused
light closer to your desk. You do not want to create any strong shadows
from any one side. If you do, like
from a desk lamp, then you can adjust it
accordingly what you are doing. If you position the
light right above, make sure it's further away and not quite
over your head, otherwise, you have a big
head shadow on your desk. If it's further in front, you will not get the
full spectrum of light. If you have a shelf
above your workspace, light should come at an
angle so you don't have any hand shadows on your desk. You can also diffuse the
light by adding a layer of translucent plastic stripe
on top of your lights, or by having them face
the opposite direction. That way you receive
the light that has been reflected on the wall. You can also use LED lights
to create a certain mood, in this case a very
computer gamer vibe. You can find all kinds of
colored lights on the market. Lastly, if you have
a small budget, you can have more ambient
light on your desk and bring back the
Christmas mood with Christmas tree lights.
15. Intro: Part 3: Nature has been the place we
call home for about 8,000 generations and only
six generations have passed since the
beginning of agriculture. A mere 12 generations
have passed since the birth of the modern
city that we know today. We live in a bit
of an experiment. Do you think that
this might have an impact on our health,
wellness, and well-being? When we are in nature, all our senses are engaged. We do take color and texture and temperature
and humidity. The weather is a complex
information system that connects to
all our sensors. A highly insulated environment, while it protects us, it's also alienating a
little bit our senses. Because we live in the age
of information overload, sensory deprivation tanks
have become quite prevalent. But according to research, complete sensory deprivation,
even for about 2, 3 days, can dramatically reduce our cognitive abilities and even have us hallucinating. So I'm not saying that we should leave everything
behind and move into nature, I am saying that perhaps we should understimulate
our mind a little bit, and overstimulate the rest
of our senses in order to achieve a state of health,
happiness, and well-being. How might we re-engage
our sentences with nature while still
living in a modern city?
16. Nature: The first tip that I
have for you is to surround yourself
with more plants. They bring both a psychological and physiological benefit. We all know that plants
improve air quality and raise oxygen levels and remove air
pollutants from the room. But what most people don't know is that according to research, even a couple of plants in the windowless room can
improve productivity, can decrease blood pressure, and even support a more generous
behavior towards others. Plants even have an influence
on your recovery as a 1980 study shows that
patient's recovery from gallbladder surgery
left the hospital sooner and needed
less pain medication when their windows faced
a group of trees than patients whose windows
faced a brick wall. Studies from United
States, Britain, and the Netherlands also
show that people who live in greener areas
have less incidence of anxiety and depression
and recover quicker from stressful life events than people living in
less greener areas. Try to surround yourself with
as many plants as you can. Even the fresh cut
flowers will do.
17. Artificial Nature: Although more research
is needed in this area, it appears that nature has an impact on our
health and well-being, even when it's not real. [LAUGHTER] The mere exposure to the color green seems to have an impact on your creativity. The research from 1993 on a
hospital emergency room where a windowless environment
was improved with a big savanna mural
and lots of plants, show to have a huge impact
on decreasing patients aggressive behavior as well as significantly
decrease their stress.
18. Materials: The third tip I have for you
is to use natural materials. You know how the doctor
says that processed food is not good for you and you
should eat natural foods? [LAUGHTER] Well, the same thing applies for natural textures. Try to surround yourself
with wall coverings, carpet and furniture that
use natural materials, such as wood, stone, weaker and natural fibers.
19. Seeing and Touching : Tip number 5, have color and texture
in your environment. You know how when
kids are upset, they reach for their teddy bear, or when we are in a
negative state of mind, or feeling anxious, we reach for that soft blanket or want to crawl
under the covers, that's because when we are
in a negative state of mind, we have an increased
sensitivity to touch. But in conditions of
health and happiness, our visual sensitivity
encourages broad exploration. Color is therefore not just
a piece of decoration, but if you think about it, in nature, color informs us of an abundant
environment of energy. Color extends through the
full thickness of an object. It means a stage of growth, it means the concentration
of minerals. To generalize, happy
people like to look, [LAUGHTER] and sad
people crave touch. To summarize, in
order to achieve a sense of health
and well-being, you need to have both visual and tactile
stimulation in your environment.
20. Sound: Tip Number 6, use ambient sound. Recordings of natural
sounds have been used in children's hospital to relieve
pain and calm patients, as well as ease the
stress of travel in lounges in airports
all over the world. A possible explanation as to
why we respond to ambient sounds is that we have
evolved to rely on them, particularly bird songs, as a sign of safety in
our environment. Before a big storm, or really dangerous
situations birds flee and the world
goes really quiet. Quiet is not a good sound
to hear, but ambient sound, on the other hand, is a sign of business as usual in
the natural kingdom. If you have one advantage
with working from home, is that you can
play any music you like without bothering
any colleagues. [LAUGHTER] Use ambient sound to calm your mind and put
yourself in a state of well-being and
achieve a high level of productivity in
your home office.
21. Smell: The last tip I have
for you is to use your sense of smell. [LAUGHTER] The sense of smell is directly linked to the
emotional center of our brain, causing a flood of warm and fuzzy feelings
with a simple sniff. Unlike touch or taste, the sense of smell is directly correlated with
past experiences. Research has shown
that fragrances have a measurable effect on our mood and particularly on
eight factors: depression, stress, anxiety,
apathy, relaxation, stimulation, happiness,
and sensuality. [LAUGHTER] The mere
scent of coffee seems to help people
focus better. According to research made
by the University of Ohio, smelling lemon raises the levels of a chemical called
norepinephrine, which is linked to easier decision-making
and increased motivation. Also essential oils from
the Hinoki cypress, which is a tree found
in the forest of Japan, used in hotel rooms
humidifiers help guests relax and increase the amount
of natural killer cells, which are a type of
white blood cells that are critical to the immune
system functioning. The smell of lemongrass also
reduces stress and anxiety. Cinnamon seems to improve attention and increase
motor responses. The smell of peppermint
helps increase alertness and improve
performance in vigilance tests. In conclusion, fragrances are emotional and
you can use the advantage of your home office to test various types of fragrances
without bothering any colleagues until you find the fragrance that helps you relax to improve your focus, alertness, concentration,
and productivity.
22. Ordered Complexity: According to Alando
[inaudible] our brains are all the time searching for patterns
in the world around us. If we can spot the pattern immediately and
something is too simple, then we lose interest. We find it dull and tedious. If something is too
chaotic, too complex, we can't really
spot the pattern, we feel frustrated and annoyed. We dislike chaos
because if there isn't enough order and
regularity around us, we feel lost and confused. Beauty lies between
too much order, not enough order, between boredom and chaos. It's that midpoint
where we can understand an underlying structure
but at the same time, it is filled with
complexity and variety. Then that becomes a
little interesting. We find it beautiful. Let's look at
tiles, for example. The ones on the
left are ordered. We can identify the
pattern immediately. The ones on the
right have no order. They represent chaos. But the ones in the
middle are intriguing. We can see an
underlying structure, but we can really pinpoint
what the pattern is. Keeps us curious. It's quite beautiful. This again, has a relationship
with how nature is constructed and
makes sense to us. Nature doesn't use square grid, but it follows a fractal
structural logic. It's the logic
that the growth of plants follows and that
of the animal skin. We see a group with
similar features growing in a certain
gradient logic. We see the leaves
belonging to one tree. We see the shapes
belonging to one animal. We identify the elements as one. Objects with similar features, like repeating colors, shapes, and textures in different
parts of the room, help our eyes view
the room as a whole, rather than a mishmash
of disconnected things. Research shows that
we are attracted to environment with moderate
degree of complexity, but only if the complexity
is well-structured. If we take the composition
of this workspace, it's quite beautiful.
Why is that? There is an underlying
horizontal structure realized by the
shelves and the table. Every shelf has its own
category of objects on display. The first shelves are paintings, then come gray files, then thread rolls
and colored papers, all little jars and boxes, then comes a collection of scissors and then the
table with the computers, and then the file cabinets
underneath the table. Everything has its place and all the objects from the
same category share a shelf. You don't see paintings below the scissors or the
scissors higher up. But what unifies these
compositions are the color shades of pink
and yellow and orange, which made the entire
composition look like one unit. Let's take the studio here. If you look at the shelves, we can already recognize from afar the different
threads of color. Each color has its shelf. The top side of the shelves
are plants and paintings. The bottom side of the
shelves are boxes. This happens everywhere. The gray colors of the
chair and the thread roll, the wooden elements
of boxes and shelves, and people in paintings
that are visible in multiple objects around the room help us see the room as a whole. Patterns can sooth
us in a similar way. They are complex designs on
a simple structure and they can turn around a
dull environment into a sophisticated one. The same effect can be
created by a floor. See how it attracts your view away from a rather
plain-looking table.
23. Simplicity: In the old complexity chapter, we talked about chaos as a generator of frustration
and confusion, which is why you
should try to keep your workplace environment as simple and as
clutter-free as possible. Many researchers have already proven that clutter can
negatively affect your mood, your resilience, and your
ability to work productively. Very cluttered homes can cause mental and
emotional distress, mainly because its occupants
have the impression that they have no control
over the environment, and therefore, no control
over their own lives. Clutter competes for
your attention and it may be exhausting to
fight it all the time, which increases your annoyance [LAUGHTER] and decreases
your mental resources, making you very frustrated, and there's nothing more unproductive than a
frustrated worker. Try to keep your environment
as clutter-free as possible and here are a couple of examples of
how you might do that. If you take a look at the environments that
suit us the most, you will see two things, order and horizontal lines. We get this sense of calm when our brains can quickly
decipher our environment. Despite living in modern times, our brains still operate
like they did for our ancestors and are
always looking for threats. This quickly ciphering lets us know that we are safe
and we can relax, we will not be
ignored that today. This is especially evident
in the presence of water or when we are at
the top of the mountain. How might we express simplicity in our
home office design? We could make use of
horizontal lines by widening the table or
using low furniture. Horizontal lines
can be created with open shelves for the removal of vertical lines like table legs. It can also mean the
stripping down the space of all unnecessary
furniture and storage. The furniture that is on display is from
natural materials. The table legs are made
of thin metal frames, accentuating the minimalist
aspects of the design. Keep the range of
colors to a minimum. Either focusing on
natural wooden color or by mixing a pastel
color like this, light pink with light gray. It still look sophisticated but simple and the space
is easy to understand. Keep things as
orderly as you can, but if you can't, keep the clutter behind doors. If you know you are
messy by design, make use of furniture doors. You don't have to look
at clutter every day. In this example, the shelves above the
desk and the storage below the table are completely
hidden behind doors. Also, keep the pieces of
furniture to the minimum-
24. Symmetry: The human eyes is
very attuned to symmetry because it
represents a sign of life. The majority of living
creatures are symmetrical. Symmetry can symbolize
food or danger. Symmetry also
represents vibrancy in health and sign of better
reproductive fitness. It's what we look for in
a mate of opposite sex. In 2013, a study of the
University of Liverpool, psychologists
discovered that people associate these symmetry with positive words like
pleasure, paradise, and heaven and
asymmetrical random forms with words like disaster,
evil, and death. Symmetry is associated with
beauty even in our language. Combined with simplicity, symmetry is a very
potent design strategy. In the case of a workspace, the table is the centerpiece and the right and the
left side are equal. You have the use
of horizontality, as well as similar color tones. The space is easy to understand, it's delightful in the choice
of materials and colors. In case your home office room is a little larger then
the furniture piece behind the desk can be symmetrical or you can have
two symmetrical desks, [LAUGHTER] one
next to the other. What I love about this design
is also the use of texture. The eye is attracted to
the cheers and the carpet, making the whole composition
look very, very beautiful.
25. DIY: Everyone has heard of recycling, but what about upcycling? Recycling is the process of
turning waste into a product, but of a lesser quality. Upcycling, on the other hand, turns wastes into material or product of a higher quality. How might this look like? Let's say you have a
teapot with a broken lid. Now, this teapot is
essentially junk. You can't use it to
drink tea anymore. But if you take
this teapot and use it as a storage box for
your pens and pencils, you've essentially turn junk into a higher quality product. This is what upcycling
is all about. Do-it-yourself
projects also seems to have a therapeutical
effect on the mind. Research has shown
that activities like vegetables
growing, carpentry, knitting can all have an
impact on your stress, anxiety, and depression. There is value in
routine action. The mind rests, functioning hands also foster
flow in the mind. This leads to joyful
and creative thought. Peak moments occur when we
ponder and we daydream. The act of building something and putting your
own blood, sweat, and tears seems to
imbue the object with additional value above and
beyond its inherent value, which the researcher
stub as the IKEA effect. In one such research, participants who build
a simple storage box from IKEA were willing to pay for it a lot more than participants who merely
observe to build box. This additional value
seems to be related not just with the effort that people put in to build the box, but also with the
fact that it has been completed as boxes who are incomplete or disassembled
did not receive the same amount of value
as completed boxes. By creating your do-it-yourself
furniture projects, not only will you benefit
psychologically, well, you will also add more
value to your project, which in return benefits
the environment, win-win. I have here a couple of examples of upcycled
home offices. I'm hoping to encourage you
to think differently and upcycle the pieces of
furniture or the [inaudible] that you might already have. You could also purchase
pieces of furniture from antique shops
or secondhand shops, repaint them, restructure them, and give them a new life. Some of these examples
require light skills, others more advanced skills. You do what works best for you. You can use all the army
cabinets and support of table surface like
in this example. The tabletop can also
be salvaged wood. You can repurpose
old factory shelves or this beautiful
industrial lamp. You can design your
own art piece lamp from old cups and [inaudible]. I love how the colored pieces of glass cups and plates put together make a
piece of art if you can't recognize each of
the part scheme anymore. How about this table lamp? Just spray paint with
[inaudible] a bunch of old toys, glue them together, and suddenly you have
a new table lamp. You could also use paper
to create a lamp shade. Can take plain old
wooden crates, paint them with pastel colors, and create a beautiful
composition. Together with books, the core elements
and parts of plants, you can also use colorful wrapping paper
like the one on the right. You use it to cover the
bottom of the crate. It become a beautiful
colored shells. If you have any light
carpentry skills, you can even build a desk
yourself out of planks of wood. You can create a
frame for the table, to stabilize the six legs
with crisscross planks. If you are missing drawers, you can add some yourself
to the bottom of the table. If you have an old
chair that you are not yet ready to throw away, you can change the fabric cover for something more appealing. This one looks incredible. You can be more bold
with the cover like these beautiful chairs
covered with floral patterns. I hope with these examples, they encourage you to try and do-it-yourself
project of your own.
26. Color: Our sense of vision is one of the strongest senses and it's an integral part
of our survival, particularly our ability
to find sources of energy. Scientists believe that
it allowed humans to find the sugar which ripe fruits
and young nutritious leaves. Color vision providers such an advantage that our
ancient brains evolve the reduced
capacity for smell in order to allow an increased
capacity for vision. Color vision was
so important that we sacrifice our sense
of smell for it. For millions of years, bright colors predicted
reliably nourishment, which activates an ancient
circuit that lights up with pleasure at the idea of finding
something sweet to eat. We think of color
as superficial, but our ancient brain thinks of color as something
really exciting. It lights up as if it has just found a
tree full of fruits. These responses
are embedded into us and we don't know
why this happens, but it does, and this is a
very important information. We might think that
we are modern humans, but we're still operating
with ancient brains. More broadly, color is an indicator of the
richness of surroundings, of an environment
that is able to support us and
sustain us long time. Studies may on office spaces
show that people who worked in bright-colored
spaces are more joyful, more creative, more interested, more confident than people
who worked in dull spaces. Bright light colors are more
energizing than dull colors. Since you don't have to work in an environment that has been
designed for you already, you can use this
information to design a space for yourself that
uses color to bring you joy, to make you happy, and to set you in
the kind of mood that you need for work. A brightly lit field of flowers informs you about
an environment that has the power to support you
with energy for a long time. That is intrinsically related
to our sense of happiness. These exuberant aesthetic is particularly visible
in candy shops. If you take the idea
of this explosion of brightly lit colors and try to position them in a
recognizable pattern, you will be able to
replicate that natural aesthetic that recreates
a sense of joy in us. For example, the
simple white pegboard onto which the rainbow
colors have been painted. It creates a totally
different effect and had it been a simple white. Take this beautiful
arrangement of wooden boxes whose button
has been coated with a colorful piece of
fabric that shows not only color but texture too. A similar effect can
be achieved with colorful wallpaper
or colorful art. Using bright pastel colors of pink and purple as well
as textured floor, can create a similar effect. Additionally, research
demonstrates that round shapes add to the
exuberant feelings, we feel safe around them. They encouraged us to run, to jump, and move. Round pieces of furniture do not hurt us if you bump
into them and being surrounded by furniture or objects with rounded
corners seems to encourage our
thinking and becoming more flowing or creative. Finally, one last example, where pastel colors were used generously on the
walls, the table, and the pieces of art, but because we can still see
an underlying structure, it doesn't bother us, in fact, it makes us happy. The fact that the colors of
bright orange and bright pink repeat themselves on multiple
levels of this composition, makes us perceive the
room as a whole and not a separate pieces
near each other. I hope all these examples
will encourage you to use a little bit more color to bring a little bit more joy and
happiness in your life.
27. Final Thoughts : Congratulations. You have made it to the end of the class. I hope you learned
some new things and already feel
inspired to apply them. If you wish to expand
your knowledge even further on this topic, I encourage you to go to my
Skillshare teacher profile. There you will find
them more classes on complementary topics which I
have no doubt you will love. If you're craving even more, I highly recommend that you explore the wealth of
resources available on my website and we think the attached bonus
resources PDF. There you'll discover
more classes, book suggestions, and free
complementary worksheets. Particularly the
worksheets will help you deepen your understanding
of the topics discussed in the class and identify
the changes that will have the biggest impact
on your personal well-being. If you're interested in more
freebies or live classes, I encourage you to sign
up to my newsletter. Each Sunday I send out home design ideas
straight to your inbox, all tailored to promote a hole that will help you
become happier, healthier, and more creative. You'll be kept in the loop about my monthly Zoom calls
and special events, that's why I have
big free resources, book recommendations,
and I'll let you know about upcoming classes. If you like this class, I would appreciate the review. It tells Skillshare that
you like my class and it encourages other people
to discover my work. Please use the discussion
section to let me know your thoughts and
questions about the class. I'll be happy to help you clarify any concept
you do not understand. Additionally, if you
leave a class project, I will be able to help you
with more personalized and in-depth support so
I encourage you to share your home design
progress with me. We are at the end, See you in the next class.
Ana Marcu, Home Wellbeing, Licensed architect
