Herman Miller New Office Furniture System: A computer aided design program, used for the laying-out of office spaces, adopted to the needs of the user

01/01/1988

Electronic, Floppy Disk

Three floppy disks and one 2HD hard disk containing the computer aided design program for the layout of offices with furniture. Indicative shots from the program were exhibited in “Designed in California – Rise of the User” on March 2018 in the San Fransisco MOMA.

Created by:

Christopher Alexander, Center for Environmental Structure, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

Content of

Project

The Personal Workplace - New System of Office Furniture 1988 to 1990

Zeeland, MI, U.S.A.

Office Furniture, Designed , Two personal offices with furniture prototypes built by C.E.S.

Client:

Herman Miller, Inc. - Rob Harvey, Vice President

C.E.S. staff:

Christopher Alexander, Artemis Anninou, Gary Black

Design and construction process:

Theree design principles guided the development of the project: 1) Layout of the personal work space by their users in order to meet their own personal needs; this process is achievable through the use of a computer program developed at C.E.S. which carries a worker through the design process. 2) Use of flexible manufacturing techniques, which allow individualisation of each piece of furniture, without increasing costs; the purpose of this feature is to eliminate the modularity that is part and parcel of current systems. 3) The basis of design is the real human needs and desires, not on the latest trend.

Project stages:

Generic rules for office layout process Use of full scale mock-ups Fabrication of full size furniture prototypes and office rooms by C.E.S. Design Development drawings done after fabrication

Herman Miller, the second largest manufacturer of office furniture in the United States, commissioned C.E.S. to develop the "personal workplace", a new system of furniture, which aimed at changing the nature of the American workplace completely. The emphasis was on ...

References

Public Events

"Designed in California - Rise of the User" Exhibition 01/03/2018 to 30/05/2018

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA, U.S.A.

Exhibition

C.E.S. staff:

Lily Alexander

Organized by:

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

The artifacts exibited in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art included works developed for the Herman Miller Furniture Project: One of Christopher Alexander’s gouache sketches from his sketchbook; four paper models of office furniture built by Artemis Anninou, and ...

Records

Herman Miller New Office Furniture System: Herman Miller Inc. Computer Work - The Office Program 23/08/1989

Project, Reference Document

Authors:

Christopher Alexander, Center for Environmental Structure, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

A written composition of an office program version designed to aid a manager in laying out his/her office to be optimally comfortable and usable. Initial paragraph explains the basic approach of the program with the rest being mainly its algebraic ...

Photographs

Herman Miller New Office Furniture System: Photographs of computer screens from an office layout process program 01/03/1989

Project, Design Process

Photographer:

Christopher Alexander/C.E.S., Martinez, CA, U.S.A.

Source:

Slide

Characteristics:

Color

Office space being designed using a basic computer lay-out process program, developed by Christopher Alexander. A step-by-step record of furniture being laid-out in an office space, using a special computer program designed for this process.