Jan Johnson, FIIDA

Vice President of Workplace Strategy
Allsteel, Muscatine

Expertise/Specializations/Interests: workplace strategy; architecture and design industry; human behavior in the built environment, social cohesion

What is the best and highest purpose of interior design?

Fundamentally, interior design has the goal of enhancing the experience of interaction—whether that’s between an individual or a team and their environment, or between family members, or healthcare provider and patient, or service provider and guest.

The range of those experiences might span a series of concentric domains: i.e., human senses and physiology, emotions, comfort; familial or community interdependence and support; enterprise ‘fit-to-task’, functional needs, behavioral norms and culture; ‘weak ties’ at the larger community level.

Interior Design considers the appropriate use of processes and tools to learn and translate needs/wants, the wise use of resources, and ways to minimize the impact of its creations/recommendations over their useful life—all so that the engagement throughout the  design process itself is supportive and beneficial: people feel heard, a part of the co-creation process and vested in the outcomes. And we create informed consumers/stewards of their spaces/places.