Yes! Waiting on exact time!
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Hi @reef-associate and @reef-full members !
Following our post two weeks ago (Common spaces – making decisions!) and the decision taken in the plenary to organize a workshop dedicated to listing the functions desired for the common spaces (as the architects have requested that we do), the Common Spaces Helping Circle (CSHC) has prepared a second questionnaire for all Associate and Full Members to fill in, available in this Google form. Your answers to the questionnaire will be analysed by the CSHC and used as preparation material for the actual workshop. (The raw data of the surveys will also be made available.)
Date of the workshop: 6 July from 9h to 13h (at L’Échappée, Laeken)
It is strongly recommended that you first read Alberto’s recent post on the topic of how buildings learn (How buildings learn: some reading as we prepare to discuss common spaces and other building-related matters), and also this blog post that Lucia came across (The Common House - The Heart of a Cohousing Community — Schemata Workshop). I’m not sure if the books and/or philosophies of the latter post are good or not, but it’s a very nice account of why it’s important to try and think well about what we’re doing here 
Please could everyone who wants to have a voice in this process (of deciding on the common spaces) fill in the survey by Wednesday evening, so that we can process the results before the workshop on Saturday. We intended to make this available much sooner, but it has been no small thing to put it together, particularly in a period when so much has been going on with the Reef. It should take about 15 minutes to complete, although it can be done much quicker if there are functions that you don’t have particularly strong feelings about, and it can be returned to more than once rather than do it all in one go.
The decisions that we make, or choose not to make, will play a big part in the functioning of the community that we are all planning on being a part of. For this reason, we encourage people to take the time to fill in the survey and participate in the upcoming decision-making processes. We are also optimistic that we will all continue to approach this discussion with openness, honesty and a willingness to compromise, because that’s how we roll
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A reminder to all @reef-associate and @reef-full members that the deadline for filing out the common spaces survey (link in previous post) is officially tonight, and unofficially Thursday lunchtime… thanks !
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Hi @reeflings !
Anyone interested in viewing the results of the common spaces survey can find them here: Login – Nextcloud
Thanks @els for collating them for everyone
Could anyone from the common spaces helping circle (@els @LuciaM @Sarah) tell me if it would be possible to provide the survey in a readable format for the Exploring Members, so that the results will make more sense for those who didn’t fill it in?
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Hi @mieke @els @SophieC @Sophie_B @ugne @manuelpueyo @MariaAM @Sarah @LuciaM and @joannes !
The common spaces workshop takes place this Saturday morning at the l’echappée cohousing in Laeken. We will begin at 10am, not 9am as it said in the original poll, and finish at 1pm. I believe that we will be able to have a tour of l’echappée immediately afterwards, and we may be joined by some Exploring Members for that. Subsequent food, drinks and frivolity possible, as always…
Joannes has very kindly offered to facilitate the workshop using his ‘tried and tested’ storytelling approach to cocreating common spaces. It’s really important that we start on time on Saturday, to have enough time to do the technique well. He and I will be there from about 9ish, so feel free to come early, especially if you would like to have a good look at the way that l’echappée have organised their common space, with the guest room mezzanine, etc…
(@Sarah - who do we have to contact to be let in at 9h?)
In the post above this one, you will find a link to a correlation of the common spaces survey results. It is highly recommended that people attending the workshop have a look at them beforehand, although if you don’t find the time to do that, Els will be giving a brief presentation of them at the beginning of the workshop.
For the rest of the workshop, we will be using a ‘day-in-the-life’ approach, where we break into small groups and tell stories about a day at the Reef during the week, or the weekend, or a holiday. This will be followed by presentations and reflections, and lead to cards of functions arranged in a hypothetical Reef space (Joannes - feel free to jump in with more detail if my very brief summary isn’t doing the approach justice). Finally, there will be some reaction rounds, and an attempt to put the results of our time together into a form that adds another constructive element to our process.
For those who can’t make it, the presentations and reflections following the group work will be recorded and made available on this thread afterwards.
Looking forward to seeing you all on Saturday…
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Thx for organizing, I am already looking forward. Do we bring lunch or do we go somewhere for lunch afterwards?
At 1pm - Marie from L’echappé will make a tour of commun spaces for exploring member /or the one’s who didn’t see it yet. It will last 1/2h.
Then the idea is to go for lunch at BE.THERE (not everything is open but a good part of it). There are tables and possibilities to buy things around. So, also possible to bring things from home.
For the meeting, I’ll bring coffe&the/tisane + some biscuits. If needed, bring also what you want…
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Thanks @SophieC !
I’ll bring some oat milk and sugar…
And as we won’t be having lunch until about 2ish, definitely a good idea to come prepared with snacks everyone
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Thanks so much for all the work guys! Very interesting stuff!
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hi, I created a PDF version of the survey results as they were in the odt document early evening yesterday, nicely printable on A3 (and A4 for those who possess a magnifying glass). I used Excel to make it convenient.
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Thanks Joannes !
Hi @reeflings !
As many of you know, the common spaces helping circle (with people from Team Facilitation and Team Building) has been tasked with providing the architects with as clear a position as possible for a common spaces programme, to go with the individual units programme, in August. This has involved:
- A first survey (focusing on preferences with regard to spaces)
- A second survey (a more detailed focus on functionality and usage)
- A workshop (using a storytelling technique to identify overlapping values and functions)
- Visits to the cohousings at Tivoli and l’Echappée
For those interested in the specific results from these processes:
- The individual surveys and overview documents for the first survey can be found in this folder: Login – Nextcloud. You can also read the post at the top of this thread, which was written shortly afterwards.
- The second survey included questions about spatial configuration, frequency of use, etc., with additional questions about financing and level of initial construction we want to go for. Overview documents can be found in this folder: Login – Nextcloud.
- The workshop was in three parts (storytelling, shared values/functions and visual representation of space). Photos, videos and overview documents can be found in this folder: Login – Nextcloud.
- Info on the visits to Tivoli and l’Echappée can be found here: https://edgeryders.eu/t/what-we-learned-at-tivoli/18644/6 and Visit to l'Echappée (July 2024)
At recent plenaries, two related proposals have been consented to:
- Number of bike spaces: Login – Nextcloud
- Accessibility – proposal on elevators: Login – Nextcloud
There have also been two recent developments with regard to this ongoing discussion:
- At a recent plenary, Alberto argued for a minimalist approach to the initial stage of setting up the common spaces (for more info, see this thread: How buildings learn: some reading as we prepare to discuss common spaces and other building-related matters), which was generally agreed to as a basic principle.
- At a recent Full Members meeting, Lie argued for an approach at this stage which involved asking for everything, regardless of budget, and then adjusting once we have all the info regarding costs and space requirements from the architects, which was consented to.
The next, and final, step in this process is for the helping circle to put together a proposal of what information/requirements we will give to the architects in mid-August, based on all of the information gathered above, and for that proposal to be consented to either at the next Full Members meeting or at the plenary meeting on 14 August.
The proposal can be found here: Login – Nextcloud
It should be noted that the specific requests from the architects with regard to the info we give them were:
- Can we articulate our wish list in terms of ‘common functions’ rather than ‘common spaces’?
- How many bikes spaces do we want?
- Would we like more space at the -1 level?
- What do we want to do regarding elevators ?
This proposal is still a working document. You are welcome to make comments, either in the thread below or in the document, but please do not edit the text…
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Comment from me:
Reef-only common space: Asterix at the ground level, part facing Obelix. Another idea that was suggested, was to have this space at Obelix + 3, sharing the place with most light/sun with all Reeflings
Both these solutions have a disadvantage: they do not allow the common spaces to be all in the same volume, where we can experiment with different solutions (make the Reef-only space bigger. or smaller, or divide by time instead of by space, etc.) I strongly advocate for all the common functions to be in the same physical space, that we will divide as needed.
I don’t see a problem with light. We could make a wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the garden for the entire commons complex. We should do it. That will give you all the light you want, and then some.
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For me ,
- an advantage of having it in Asterix (facing Obelix): extending the common space of Obelix of Asterix to the garden (summer terrace, barbecue, …), won’t be bothering any ground floor units too much (i guess), as there won’t be any linked directly to that part of the garden.
- an advantage pleading towards your proposal: you might only need one toilet (?) (which will be weelchair proof i guess, so taking up some space). If you would go for 2 completely separate common spaces, you will definitely need two toilets i assume…
Hello @ChrisM @Sarah @mieke @els and @joannes.
Thanks a lot for all the time and energy, and for putting together the proposal.
On a number of points (where to put the Reeflings-only living room and the guest room), the document lists options, but does not include a proposal. Do you have a clear view on how to take this forward at the FM plenary on Thursday?
Feedback from myself: the proposal specifies the desired number of square meters for certain spaces, which seems to go against the architects’ request to come forward with functions (and no further specifications). Unless there is something I am missing, I would like to bring in an objection, as I worry that this will limit the architects’ freedom for no reason.
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Thanks for engaging with this The original idea was to have yet another workshop where we co-create this proposal together, led by the common spaces helping circle who would present the various data collected. However, with the “summer” arriving and time being of the essence, we decided to put as much of the proposal together ourselves and post it here for comments and feedback. I realise that I should have been clearer about that, as the document in question is actually a ‘proposal in the making’.
We though there would be a bit more discussion generated by the post, but perhaps the lack of it is a good sign In terms of moving forward, we have 60 minutes at the FM meeting on Thursday evening. The aim is to address the grey areas (the ones you mention, such as Reeflings-only living room and the guest room, and @alberto’s concern about dividing up the common space available) as a group. In an ideal scenario, this gets done effortlessly and we consent to the amended proposal. Alternatively, the helping circle makes some adjustments after the meeting, flags them up here, and the result is consented to on the 14th…
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I realised I forgot to bring up something tonight, which is about the number of accessible bikes. I’m not sure that 1/4 is enough, and I wanted to have a bit of a sounding out to see what people’s needs were.
Shall I do some kind of a poll to get more info on this, asking how many of their total number of bikes would people need readily available? Maybe also including associate members, to get a broader idea?
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