330 CHAPTER I3

tion about older people in their designs. Firms using an early version of Howell
and Epp’s research report, Shared Spaces (1976), were asked to analyze their
own plans and record as annotations on the designs “what they perceived to be
important design decisions with an explanation of why each decision was made
and the projected impact they expected that decision to have on future elderly
residents” (p. 15). Epp et al. (1979) used the designers’ annotations to trace
which data from the book designers included and how they did so. For exam—
ple, in one project, responding to what they felt the research implied, designers
relocated a main entry door to provide a place for residents to wait and watch
for taxicabs or friends picking them up. They also relocated a machine room to
enable residents waiting for the elevator to “preview” the community room—
to see what is going on there without having to walk into it. The designers
themselves behaviorally analyzed the resulting design of the entry and annotat—
ed their plans, enabling the research team to review the predictions from their
point of View (see figure).

PLAN ANNOTATION

Annotating plans is a useful communication method in collaborative and group
design projects to identify neuroscience and behavioral issues in plans—to point
out which are significant to the use and impact of the eventual environment, to
identify which have been addressed or not, to indicate which have been ade-
quately responded to in design or not, and so on. Annotation simply means
writing observations, comments, and hypotheses directly on architectural plans
to make issues explicit and to share them easily with others. What is difficult
and requires time and skill is to do this without obscuring the message the plans
themselves are intended to impart.

Plan annotation can be useful in both practice and research, and is par—
ticularly useful in linking the two.

0 Issue identification annotations: At the start of design, plans can be
annotated with questions to be addressed in the next phase of design such as:
“Wayfinding: Will this entry location contribute the most to building users
being able to find their way easily?” and “Privacy: Will the windows between
the corridor and the offices provide enough privacy for employees to concen-
trate adequately?”

0 Critique annotations: In design reviews during design development,
plan annotation can be employed when research data and evidence are being
brought to bear on design decisions. Design review critique annotations identi-
fy where behavioral and neuroscience design performance criteria are or are not
well met. For example, “Wandering or walking: Is the hearth destination at the
end of the hallway path for Alzheimer’s residents in an assisted living residence
large enough and clearly identified to make sense to them?”

0 Presentation annotations: When designs are being shared with
clients, presentation annotations can focus the group’s attention on the neu—
roscience and behavioral intentions and goals of the design. For example,