Exploring the influence of contemporary facade design on occupant satisfaction: a preliminary study in office buildings

This paper describes the preliminary findings of a post-occupancy evaluation campaign conducted on contemporary and energy-efficient office buildings with different façades treatments. The aim is to investigate occupants’ comfort and perceived productivity and to observe to what extent the space appearance and the façade design play a role in the ultimate user’s satisfaction and overall comfort. Two Swiss office buildings with different vertical enclosures are considered for this preliminary study: one has regular-shaped windows and regular blinds while the other presents a double-skin façade with a coloured silk-printed pattern partially covering the external pane and semi-transparent internal roller blinds. The results reported in this paper relate to an on-line extensive survey distributed among the buildings occupants to provide a global estimation of the comfort and perception they experience in their office. Findings suggest that in case of high dissatisfaction with some environmental factors, these influence strongly people’s overall comfort evaluation but not the self-rated productivity. However, when comfort ratings are less critical –though not optimal-, overall comfort as well as perceived productivity are more strongly correlated to the pleasantness of the space than to the environmental factors. Nevertheless, in the case of patterned glazing, the façade design has a low influence on comfort perception. The study suggests that further research should be conducted, especially to look at façade designs that play a greater role in determining the appearance and/or a certain level of personal environmental control in a workspace.