Hacker News Reader

Comment by cma | Hacker News Reader

If low ceilings were more expensive than high ceilings, and photos/videos of creative people in their high-end design studios working on marketing campaigns, feature film, graphic design, and photography were always in low-ceiling'ed spaces rather than wide open exposed beam converted warehouses, etc. that we see today, the study might observe the opposite effect. And the same article might be written saying low ceilings are better for creativity because they are cozy and bring potent genetic memories of the kind of small hand built shelters early humanity evolved with.

Probably not, but just a thought.

View on HN

An architect once told me that low ceilings are desirable in certain parts of homes because they give a very comforting, secure presence.

High ceilings do feel better for group and work spaces, room to breath.

[0] an actual anecdote that happened to me.

Frank Lloyd Wright used low ceilings in entranceways so that the house would “open up” as you walked into it.

So, like an igloo?

Also as a smart way to dissuade people from loitering around an entrance in a public building.

"...so that the house would “open up” as you walked into it."

This is a well-known effect that architects have employed for centuries. In fact, you probably encounter it in many places without even thinking about it:

- when walking into a cinema auditorium, you walk through a low-ceiling entrance or corridor and then the auditorium space opens up in front of you. This effect is even more dramatic in some old theatres and opera houses

- the historic concept of contrasting spaces has been used in many different ways by changing the type of space or the size/scale of a space. For example, the narrow streets of a medieval town that suddenly and dramatically open up to a large market square.

The Swiss architect Le Corbusier designed a block of flats (apartments) called the Unité d'habitation (housing unit) in Marseille in France. It was completed in the 1950s and had a huge influence on the design of post-war housing across Europe (it generated much controversy too).

The duplex flats have a narrow width of just 3.66 metres. As you enter the flat, the first ceiling height is 2.26 metres (which Le Corbusier described as "intimate"). This leads into the double-height space of the living room (i.e. the second ceiling height). The windows in this double-height space are 15 square metres. Light floods in to the apartment in winter and summer and, according to Le Corbusier, can penetrate to a depth of 20 metres. The flats are fitted with stairs without risers to accentuate the sense of space.

Here are some pictures of an apartment: https://www.flickr.com/photos/88017382@N00/8562877755/ http://www.house42.com/2010/10/14/unite-dhabitation-duplex-a...

Pedant moment. You want the verb form, breathe.

"Breath" is a noun that means "the air taken into or expelled from the lungs."

While reading the article I was wondering what the affects of a low ceiling would have on sleeping habits.

Sample size of 1, but I generally feel more relaxed and creative when I work in a (large-ish) place with high ceilings. If I need extreme focus for moderately short periods of time, I tend to revert to preferring a small, low ceiling place. Confounding factors most likely involved.

So, to paraphrase, "if things were not as they are we could come to a different conclusion". Yes, that is a thought, it was not worth writing down though.

> ...it was not worth writing down though.

I disagree. Nature versus nurture is a difficult but interesting topic. Is our preference for high ceilings caused by culture and experience, or is it something we're genetically predisposed to? It seems like it would be a hard question to answer, but that doesn't mean it isn't worth thinking about.

Please don't say rude things to other users on HN, even when you consider a comment bad. It only makes the site worse for all of us.

I was basically saying maybe the cause for the creativity increase in test subjects is due to a cultural association of high-status creative occupations rather than because the extra head-space tingles our neural spatial exploration networks.

In the alternate "high ceiling'ed places yield lower creativity" world, maybe we would say of the same exact fMRI study that obviously the neural spatial exploration networks are being overloaded by processing the tall room, hindered from devoting neural energy to the creative tasks at hand like they can so efficiently in the low-ceiling rooms, or some other story.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com