Do You Like Your Space Fixed or Flex?

On our minds

Last month, we wrote about nudge theory—the practice of designing an environment to encourage a specific behavior. (A fun example is at Volkswagen Sweden, where a staircase was transformed into a piano, to encourage people to exercise.) Design that nudges might be considered the opposite of hackable. They're prescriptive, defined as: "laying down a rule" and "specifying with authority." Prescriptive and hackable design are not mutually exclusive; elements of both may exist in the same space. Today, we're focused on exploring what makes a space hackable and why this approach is so valuable. (This is a topic we've been talking about for over a decade.)

To help clarify these concepts, let's start with "a tale of two buildings". In 2004, the $300 million Stata Center, designed by Frank Gehry, opened on MIT's campus. The building is well-known for tilted columns, slanted and curved facades and mixed materials. In Gehry's words, it looks "like a party of drunken robots got together to celebrate." The building houses computer and AI labs, in addition to the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy. It's an expression of Gehry's creativity, but does it encourage creative problem-solving in its occupants?

The primary artery of the Stata Center winds around the odd angles, chalkboard-covered walls, classrooms, labs, sitting nooks, cafes, shops and vending machines. Sometimes offshoots of this corridor purposefully lead to dead-ends, in order to facilitate socialization among students (hello, nudge theory). But ultimately, some would argue, the effect of the singularly important corridor is a cookie-cutter, institutional vibe, despite the fact that it is housed in an incredibly distinctive building.

To many, the space seems intractably divided, with rooms side-by-side but totally separate. There are too few instances of sliding walls to create a large area for an expo or performance, and limited wide-open gathering spaces, or furniture that can't be reconfigured on the spot. In other words, the Stata Center isn't hackable and the particular design - room after room along a corridor - almost feels like a sort of indexing of people and ideas.

Where the Stata Center now sits, there used to be a large warehouse called Building 20. It was hastily built in 1943 as a temporary structure to conduct war-related research. It housed the Radiation Lab, or "Rad Lab," which shut down after World War II. But within a few years of opening, it had already hosted nine Nobel Prize winners and dozens of other physics heavyweights.

Later, Building 20 housed small MIT programs and research activities. If something on campus seemed too quirky or insubstantial to occupy space in a "permanent" building, it could find a home in Building 20. Architecturally, the building was boring — triple-level boxes placed at right angles, with a flat roof. The interior spaces were large and open, with a concrete floor, until they were demolished in 1998 to make way for the Stata Center.

This interior was dynamic, changing over time, as wallboards were thrown up and taken down to accommodate various occupants and their projects. Because the building was supposed to be "temporary," occupants were free to do what they liked. Folks drilled holes and ran wires through them. They built and tore apart labs. Physics break-throughs continued to spring from the building, almost as if birthed by magic. Noam Chomsky pioneered modern linguistics from an office there. Building 20 was immensely hackable. In fact, it was the home of the Tech Model Railroad Club, now the oldest hacking group in North America. (They started in 1946, hacking the circuits to elaborate model train tracks, before moving on to computers in the 1960s.)

This story is not intended to disparage Stata Center and pedestal Building 20. Being inside the Stata Center is a powerful experience. It's a bit like hiking the Fiery Furnace, a labyrinth of thin, towering, sandstone fins at Arches National Park. When you look up from the main corridor of Stata, through the swerving cross-sections of steel and glass, you glimpse naturally animated, peek-a-boo sun patterns. It's impressive. You feel awe at your smallness amongst the disarming caverns carved by the building's contours. Many people feel similarly in the passageways of the Furnace. But when you climb the Furnace formations and perch dozens of feet in the air, when you look out across the spires rather than up at them, you're awed in a different way — not by a power outside of you, but by your own possibility. You feel more full than small.

At PLASTARC, we're fans of awe and beauty of any kind. But there is a special quality to the beauty that comes from freedom — the freedom to make choices and messes. When we create without boundaries, from the fullness of ourselves, grand things happen. (Cutting back to the MIT anecdote, the soon-to-be-completed Met Warehouse renovation by Diller Scofidio Renfro has been described as intentionally open-ended, rough-hewn in a way that enables the work of its occupants to 'complete' the building.)

Sometimes we need order. Sometimes it's difficult to focus in a chaotic space. But sometimes we need to toss things around and leave fabric scraps and dirty dishes on the floor. Every workspace, whether it's in a home or an office, needs a degree of hackability. This may be as simple as chairs that roll, furniture that folds, or spaces that can be divided or opened. But we all need spaces where not everything has to be put back the same way at the end of every workday. We feel and act differently inside buildings that invite us to participate and engage. Sometimes we need nudges — and sometimes we just need to be.

From the archives

February is the shortest month, but sometimes it feels like the longest! Winter is getting old, so conversation topics better be fresh. In past Februarys, PLASTARC has discussed the return-to-office plateau and what it means for corporate leaders and facility managers. In 2024, we launched a webinar series about using AI to enhance the workplace experience, and in 2022, we spent a February morning with the folks at IFMA, hanging out in their virtual "mosh pit" and examining the role environment plays in helping workers manage mental illness.

We'll leave you with this 2020 Tiny Desk entry, "Blackstronauts," by Britton & The Sting. February is Black History Month, and although this song has more of a Black Futurism vibe, it's about Black people doing great things. We hope it inspires you to keep hacking away at things, to keep disrupting whatever systems feel like traps.