apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Ohh, I find this fascinating. I didn’t realize there was a whole cottage industry of people thinking about the emotions surrounding home ownership/renovation/goals.

I posted last week on a thread on craftsman interiors about how visceral my reaction to those interiors. I’m trying to work out some of these ideas, but I’ve been aware for a really long time that my yearning for a house/home of my own is a healing process.

Sounds great but so many people are just happy to be able to afford a reasonable home especially young people in their first home. Most people can work out what their ideal home is for themselves.

No joke... this is interesting and all but most of us I think would count ourselves lucky to get our homes secondhand.

But I agree that people don't always know what they want. My husband has always talked about getting a big house but when I pushed us to move to a bigger apartment, he was completely wrecked. For him, upgrades often corresponded to a decline in relationships. I can only hope we can work out all of this crap before we put in a down payment. And then the in-laws want to get involved with their own (conflicting) set of wants? Not looking forward to it.

I would argue that the inherent ability to identify the emotional needs and wants of a client is what separates a successful architect from the crowd.

In my experience the dialog between architects and clients becomes far too serious and verbose to really address the simplest needs of the design in an effort to create a space that is timelessly comfortable for THEM (the clients) to inhabit. My advice to a potential client would be to gather images, images, and more images of what you 'want' from your home and find an architect that is flexible and allows your sense of humor and idiosyncrasies to dictate, at least to a certain extent, the climate of the design process.

I am uncertain as to how forms and questionnaires can help cultivate a healthy personal architect client relationship. This seems like a sales pitch more suited to programming commercial space, but hey, I'm just one guy right?

oh, yippie!
"Tuscan" on the outside, barn (?!) on the inside... classy with a K.... a frankenhaus indeed! Why not a gothic yurt while we're at it? with Turkish minarets of course!
figures that this behemoth house in Texas, is for only 2 people. And, they want to "age in place" there? That house is going to suck their golden years nest egg dry with maintenance costs... can you imagine heating and cooling it? how about cleaning it? And, as they age, how about gong up and down those stairs to get to bed? What architect with a conscience would allow clients these ill conceived flights of fancy?
my gawd, when are we going to learn the more isn't better? and, when is the media (mags. newspapers design shows) going to stop force feeding us this kind of drivel so that we feel like we have to emulate and aspire to it?

Chris_94131 . . . I so agree with you. To age in place, you need one level and a small, easy to maintain space. While I love to look at pictures of large, beautiful spaces, owning one is conspicuous consumption.

it's sad that so many people, especially those in the design professions and those who just love design, are not more aware of fields such as design psychology. i think it's the fault of education and researchers themselves. chris travis is attempting to ameliorate that disconnect between design and human beings (their psychical and psychological make ups). while i'm sure he would love the recognition for his own architecture firm, his point is that design can be therapeutic. that Truehome concept, though not visible in the article, is meant to be applied by other designers as well. if and when the website becomes fully functional, anyone would be able to take their results to any designer...not just him.

Thanks so much to Apartment Therapy for sharing this article about our Truehome approach to design with the community.

We are moving along at Truehome.net and expect to finally get our unique approach to design on the web some time this Fall. For those interested - the website is Truehome.net - and my blog, where I write extensively about "home as an eco-system," our psychological approach to design criteria, and the "experience of feeling a home" is at http://architecture-of-life.blogspot.com

With appreciation and respect,
Christopher K. Travis
CEO
Truehome.net

My thanks to Apartment Therapy for sharing this New York Times article about our Truehome approach to architecture.

For architects, interior designers, wellbeing specialists and others who might be interested in learning more about Truehome - http://www.truehome.net - and how to create a home that fits the lifestyle and personality of their clients, I suggest a visit to my blog.

I write extensively about the subject there and also post about other voices who are promoting "conscious design," human factors approaches to design and the science that informs the systematic approach we expect to make available to consumers and design professionals in the Fall of 2009.

My blog is at http://architecture-of-life.blogspot.com

With appreciation and respect,

Christopher K. Travis
CEO
Nidiant Corporation - Truehome.net