Coffee shop, environmental behavior, and design (How does social behavior and interaction influence coffee shop design?)

Re-thinking the concept of coffee shop as “a third place between home and work (Oldenburg, 1989)” and its conventional seating layout, this thesis studied characteristics that encourage social behaviors and the meaning of coffee shops in modern U.S. society. The study was qualitative that included literature reviews, research techniques of observation documentations, behavior mappings, behavior sketches and interviews. 9 coffee shops were observed and 469 café patrons were analyzed for data conduction, 15 interviews were collected to reveal patron attitudes toward physical and social perspectives of coffee shop. The research findings showed various social behaviors besides conversation happened in coffee shops that affected to social climate. Mobile workers are becoming the predominating customers, which caused the third place concept in dispute. In response to paradigm shifts of environmental, social and technological culture of coffee shops, new needs merge for creating alternative seating solutions that emphasize flexibility and space versatility. The design outcome, CaFLEX, is versatile furniture that combines a table, a chair and an outlet. With easy operating mechanism it can be moved or merged to adapt various seating configurations. Two cafés with suggested transformative seating layouts are also designed by utilizing the CaFLEX, which includes a small espresso bar in downtown Chicago, and another big coffee shop located at Urbana.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.F.A.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Art and Design

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2014

Author dc:creator

• Qian, Manqian

Contributors dc:contributor

• Weightman, David I.

• coffee shop
• third place
• flexible furniture
• transformative seating arrangement
• mobile working
• working space
• social behavior
• social climate

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2014 Manqian Qian

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/49363

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/49363