Color materiality and urban equipment: factor of inclusion, comfort and safety

Abstract

Color is inseparable from matter, shape, object. Color, as an integral part of light, is inherent to the project, and is therefore an element of form. As long as there is light, Color is a component of everything around us and of ourselves, affecting us at every moment of our lives: our body but also our emotions, disposition and mental faculties. Color is light made visible, through interaction with surfaces of all kinds: opaque or translucent surfaces make Color visible. Whether designing a hand-scale object or a piece of equipment, interior design or architecture or urban space, they all deal with spatialities. The characterization of these spatialities goes through the structure, surface texture, coating, type of light (natural or artificial), shape/background relationships, ways of approaching and reading modes, and their correct use or fruition. Color, being matter, directly linked to the surfaces of objects, has to be understood globally and as part of the conceptual process of the product.However, designers are not always aware that the product they design, such as the Color inherent to the respective material used in its construction, can be a factor of inclusion or exclusion of its users, in addition to several other components that can value or not its use or fruition. The main aim of this paper is exactly Color as the material of urban equipment, addressing psychological and physiological aspects of Color, and the importance of its knowledge and correct handling in the act of designing equipment for urban space, not only as an integral part of the creative process, assuming itself as a cultural and imaginative act, but also as a product of a rational approach that can allow greater inclusion and provide greater comfort and safety to its users. In the development of this research Project, a mixed methodology was used, consisting of a literature review and a survey of users of urban garden equipment, aged between 35 and 75. The results achieved so far are presented, which underline the importance of a correct application of the Color materiality when designing urban equipment.

Keywords: Color materiality, Urban equipment, Human-Centred design, Color cognition, Inclusive design

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1004127