Indulge. Experience. Taste. Opposite page: The City of Victoria's upgrades to five parkades included improved wayfinding. This page: Mike and Maaike's wallpaper helps locate washrooms.
CAN GOOD DESIGN REDUCE CRIME? In fact, the refurbishments to the city parkades have been successful in unexpected ways. The Victoria Police Department has reported that the crime rate is lower in and around them, and custodians attest that since the new graphics have been installed, the parkades are kept cleaner by the general public, perhaps an indirect response to design appreciation. Farther afield, a wayfinding system called “Legible London” was implemented in the UK city to promote walking and cycling around the city for both visitors and residents, and was no doubt helpful during the recent Olympics. In addition to the easily-identifiable signs, maps and “street furniture” that make up the Legible London program, the system helps people find their way by highlighting landmarks and estimating the time it will take to reach a destination. Key information is displayed at relative eye height. Vancouver installed new wayfinding signs, too, leading up to its Olympic Games, and they continue to serve the public well as navigational tools. New and inventive methods of wayfinding design are popping up everywhere. San Francisco-based design studio Mike & Maaike created a series of wayfinding wallpaper, featuring recognizable symbols such as a pattern of directional arrows and the word EXIT. Wayfinding as an interior finish “creates new possibilities for architects, interior designers and space planners,” say the designers. Effective signage has become imperative to our daily lives, but even the most clever wayfinding design is sometimes not without environmental limitations. “Signs cannot solve architectural problems, for example,” says Gallop. “But they can often mitigate the difficulties and frustrations encountered in a complex, confusing built environment.” VB
A F O O D & W i N E C E l E B R At i O N S E P T. 1 4 - 1 6 , 2 0 1 2 F e at u r i n g : • Biodynamic Wine Seminar With Stefan Soltysiak, Dir. of Education for Rodney Strong • Island Wines and local Cheese Tasting • Exotic Tea Session • Mediterranean Olive Tasting • Wine Crush and Oyster Slush • Chocolate Tasting with Dessert Wines • Five Course Gourmet Dinner Hosted by Stefan Soltysiak from Rodney Strong, paired with the best of Californian and International Wines • Indulgent Sunday Brunch
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