Room for Thought: Rethinking Home and Community Design

Janet Arnett is the former campus manager of adult education at Ontario’s Georgian College. She is the author of Antiques and Collectibles: Starting Small, The Grange at Knock, and 673 Ways to Save Money.

How does the room you’re in now relate to the other rooms in your
home? How does the house relate to the other houses in the
neighbourhoods? Is there a comfortable community feeling? If so, what
creates and supports that feeling?

Friedman, an architect and planner, explores these questions as part of
his belief that homes and neighbourhoods are first and foremost about
people—“the point where design touches life.”

Recognizing that home-buying decisions are complex, he explores a
number of the elements that make us appreciate or become discontented
with our homes and neighbourhoods. These include room layout, trends in
furniture and appliance design, homes as entertainment centres, the
physical changes people experience as they age, the influence of the car
on how we design our homes and communities, energy efficiency factors,
and technological advances such as the creating of plastic “wood”
and the factory prefabrication of homes. He touches on mixed-use
neighbourhoods, segregation by family type, the placement of garages,
human scale, and some of his own housing experiences.

Twenty-one short essays provide the book with a structure that
facilitates discussion on a variety of topics all united by their link
to the central theme that for communities to be comfortable “the only
guide is civility.” Homes, Friedman says, are the backdrops of our
lives and home design can facilitate better family relations.

The style is low key, an easy read that will prove to be
thought-provoking for those in any aspect of the housing or development
industry, municipal planners, and home buyers contemplating their next
relocations.