I had the pleasure to interview Didier Ma who lives on the 27th floor in Tokyo with his partner, dog and fishes! Since they are quite a few individuals, sharing a rather small space – they need to be efficient with their space.
Before the interview I had prepared a set of open ended questions but was prepared to improvise when needed. I started off asking “tell me about your typical workday from home” to understand what type of work he conducts at his desk. The questions I had prepared were the following:
Ma had a large versatile area where he could do both standing work as well as playing the piano or perform VR games. I decided to focus on the area where his main desk was located since I he had expressed concern about a trouble corner. This trouble corner is on the left side of the desk area (circled in white above). This quickly became a trouble spot where papers, controllers etc. would pile up.
“I think we all have a trouble area where things easily start piling up – but I like having it tidy ..!”
Since de-cluttering is not always easy: my suggestion is free up more space – by utilizing the wall behind the two desks. My idea is to “invest” in two sets of IKEA Ivar wooden shelves where the two work unitsstill fit underneath. A section in the shelf has been dedicated to Ma’s partnerwho needs space for the paper work related to taxes etc as well as a dedicatedspot for the VR game controllers.
“My partner has his own agency which means that he could use a bit more space for paperwork now when tax season is coming up”
"I love it! Thank you so much for doing this. I particularly like the get out of my sign wall storage. As part of the assignment, my feedback would be that my partner will not use the office and I’m the only sole user here. I may get rid of the 2nd chair and storage and put the PC on the floor directly in exchange of more desk space" - Ma
With this feedback I realized that I might have necelected the main person in the project - Ma! My reasoning was to declutter the space to give more space for him to have an harmonious and organized space. What I think I sohuld have done differently is to convey the message is a sense that the new layout is doing so, rather than it creating space for the partner. In the next iteration I will also take in consideration the "easy fixes" such as lowering the computer in the left section of the table to free up more space! Not sure how that thought slipped me! It was a joy collaborating with Ma on this project!