cAd-bAc∥設計+關懷∥Lawrence's Blog: 轉載：Designing for the Other 90%

全球10%人口掌握全世界近85%資源
擁有建築知識的社群
卻常受城市法規體系與財團箝制的市場影響
有意或無意
去享受建築政策所勾勒下的經濟安定感
更甚者或恣意配合企業財團的金脈揮霍著85%帶來的放縱

建築教育讓設計者
常以身為建築師或建築設計者或都市規劃者自居
卻總忽略設計者對社會價值的正向意識
被設計費佔總工程預算的數目所蠱惑
或為迎接下個更大型設計案或等待下個更財大氣粗的建設公司而盲從

我們忽略了什麼?
90%人口捧著15%資源勇敢生存的本能

人類的貧富差距
是一種挑戰
挑戰窮的人的生存本能
挑戰富的人究竟可放下多少的本能

設計者在人類貧富差距史中
有越來越多刺激和反思了………

以下文章是這些集體意識慢慢凝聚中的共鳴

Archinect Reviews: 'Designing for the Other 90%'

Reviewed by Quilian Riano

By now we are more than familiar with the numbers; 10% of the world's population owns 85% of the world's wealth (Brown, 2006), 17% of the world's population lives in extreme poverty, less than $1 a day, another 23% live in moderate poverty, less than $2 a day (Chen & Ravallion, 2004). We are talking about 40% of the population, 3.8 billion people or almost 3 times the total population of China, at the lowest end of the world's economic scale. When one is confronted with these overwhelming numbers and statistics it is hard to find any hope of being able to help change the situation. However, once we look closer, the statistics reveal an emerging market of consumers with a variety of design needs and a combined purchasing power of over $100 billion dollars a month. Keep in mind that we are still talking about the people at the lowest edge of economic indicators, once you add those in relative poverty, according to country, you have a whopping 5.9 Billion people or 90% of the world's population as potential clients.

Global Village Shelter

It is clear that the need is overwhelming and, in a sign that design institutions are beginning to notice it, the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum addresses it in its 'Design for the Other 90%' exhibit. The exhibit includes a variety of design strategies that have taken 'helping the poor' outside the charity arena, and into the entrepreneurial design realm. Clearly, what the exhibit advocates is not profiteering from those in need, but rather for designers to work closer with the poorest clients to give them an opportunity to earn a productive life while remaining within their means. The exhibit itself is displayed in the garden of Andrew Carnegie's Fifth Avenue Mansion, now home to the Cooper Hewitt, giving the exhibit a luscious, if not ironic, backdrop. A series of small architectural interventions await outside creating a small village populated by the furniture and other objects that make up the rest of the exhibit. These small architectural interventions roughly break into two categories, shelters and public space pavilions.

There are many other simple and elegant solutions to the very real problems of the world's poor which I urge everyone to explore through the online catalogue. One that caught my attention particularly is the Solar Dish Kitchen, which was constructed in a collaboration with the community, architecture students, professionals such as James Adamson from the Jersey Devils, and artists. The dish is a lesson on how to smartly and appropriately use the environmental conditions of a site as part of a low-cost, low-impact architectural strategy. It is simple, cost effective, low-impact design solutions such as these, and not charity, that will help those people with the most needs around the world.