Sweet Potatoes Offices and Workshops: Hand-painted office interiors

1985

Work of Art for Project, Hand-painted Interior

Hand-painted walls, ceiling and built-in furniture in light blue, dark blue and white with red ceiling ornaments; varnished gouache applied on wood surfaces prepared with gesso.

Created by:

Christopher Alexander, Kleoniki Tsotropoulou

Content of

Project

Offices and Workshops for Sweet Potatoes Children's Clothing Factory 1985 to 1986

1509A San Pablo Avenue, 94702, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

Offices & Workshops, Office Furniture, Realized , Construction completed in Apr-1986

Client:

Mrs. Anna Sala, Ms. Josie Jurcivina

C.E.S. staff:

Christopher Alexander, Artemis Anninou, Gary Black, Mark Brinner

Contractor:

Center for Environmetal Structure

Project cost:

$20,000

Design and construction process:

1) Layout of the offices by "Sweet Potatoes" employees: They used a patented office furniture layout process developed by C.E.S. This process allowed users to work with C.E.S. staff to lay out all common areas and individual workstations for themselves. The result was a highly personalized plan of the office, generated entirely by "Sweet Potatoes" employees. 2) Design and fabrication of the individual pieces of furniture at the C.E.S. Workshop in Martinez 3) Installation of the furniture by C.E.S. Personnel: As pieces were completed, they were shipped to Sweet Potatoes, where the C.E.S. assembly crew installed the different items, including thick walls, columns, doorways, desks, lighting, ceilings, floors, cabinets, screens, chairs.

Project stages:

Office layout process used by clients Layout on site by clients and C.E.S. Design Development drawings done after layout Direct Construction management and on-site design decisions

2,300 square feet of interior office space for the management and administrative staff for "Sweet Potatoes" clothing factory to accommodate two partners and eleven employees. All interior furnishings, walls, floors, ceilings, lighting, built-in cabinets, desks, storage, chairs, tables, custom fitted ...

Contents

Photographs

Sweet Potatoes Offices and Workshops: Hand-painted Office Interiors - Photographs 01/01/1986

Interior View

Photographer:

Mark Darley/Esto, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

Source:

Digital

Characteristics:

Color

Two photographs of the hand-painted interior.

References

Scientific Research

Color and Inner Light: The Eleven Color Properties

Areas of focus:

Structure of Space

Guiding idea:

Centers and Fields of Centers

Christopher Alexander postulated that centers and the field of centers they create are the building blocks from which wholeness is made. However, he further argued that geometry alone is not sufficient, and that color is the way wholeness comes to ...