Park seating furniture design in Hong Kong : a case study of inclusive design and its relation to user interaction

Abstract

Park is not a personal commodity. Nevertheless, it could provide qualities of privacy and social life. Park furniture project demands more attention and coordination deal to complexity of managing stakeholders, design decisions and manufacturing aspects in recent years. The authors, in perspective as a commissioned designer, will share the development, observation and evaluation on a latest public seating furniture design project ‘Park Déco’ organized and coordinated by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) of Hong Kong Government and Hong Kong Design Centre (HKDC) respectively. The design process in relation to inclusive design approach and observational study of exploring various furniture design strategies on user interaction will be discussed. The project Park Déco at Cornwall Street Park (CSP) in Kowloon Tong Hong Kong was completed at September 2012 and three sets of innovative park furniture has generated for exploring new park design typology in Hong Kong. It is significant that LCSD considered the project as the first design driven experiment to explore ‘openness’ of park furniture on top of the principle ‘inclusiveness’. And the paper demonstrates a designer’s reflection on practice and expects to extend the typology for park seating furniture design in future.