The Quality Without a Name

The only  way to  build  beautiful and  functional public  spaces is to learn  the  code  that  unlocks the  riddle:  how do such  places happen? We have  all experienced environments that  exhibit  the timeless way of building.  Alexander said these places  reveal “the quality  without a name.”  Think back to a place where  everything seems just right. You cannot quite  put your finger on it, it is hard to  explain  to  somebody else,  and  your  words  will always  seem inadequate—but there  is something there  that  transcends other places  you  have  experienced. Alexander  suggested, “There  is a central quality,  which  is the  root  criterion of life and  spirit  in a man,  a town,  a building  or a wilderness. This quality  is objective and precise, but it cannot be named.”Why does this matter? When you consider that there are billions of people  in the world,  the challenge that  the Imagineers had  to create spaces that  appeal  to such  a broad  range  of opinions and cultures would   seem   insurmountable. However,   Walt  and  his design team understood what Alexander meant, and they achieved this “quality without a name”—the quality that appeals universally to all people—in many  parts  of Disneyland. Surely this  is one  of the  reasons for the  park’s  tremendous success and  why guests keep coming  back. Had he lived to build his other  environmental design  projects, Walt would  have  infused  them  with  the  same quality.  “Success is doing  ordinary things  extraordinarily  well,” according to business philosopher Jim Rohn; this was one of Walt’s greatest strengths.Walt was  not  the  first  person to  produce animated films,  but he elevated  the  art  form  to a level that  has  yet to be topped. In Designing  Disney’s Theme  Parks, cultural historian Karal Ann Marling said, “The painstaking art of animation was, after all, the art of perfecting the world. It was a world over which Walt Disney exercised total, beneficent control.” Walt wanted to have the same impact  on  the  art  of three-dimensional spatial design  with  the opening of Disneyland. Millions  of visitors  come  to  the  Disney theme parks  to experience the  Disney  “magic.”  So what  exactly are  they  looking   for?  In  Disneywar,   James  B. Stewart defined the  Disney magic  as that  moment when  “people’s  apprehension turns into  awe  and  delight.”  When  Disney  guests step  into  the environment based on a timeless way of building—an environment that  has the quality without a name—they realize that  they are in a place where  their dreams can come true.Perhaps you have witnessed how a carefully designed, immersive environment can make  a significant impression on the individual and  can  quickly change one’s  mood  and  behavior. Walt had  the vision and  desire  to create such  a place.  As a result,  he changed the way we look at the public realm.  How did he do this? Why are some  places  filled with life while other  places  seem  so lifeless?Christopher Alexander  suggested that  “What we call ‘life’ is a general condition, which exists, to some  degree  or other, in every part of space: brick, stone, grass, river, painting, building, daffodil, human being, forest,  city.” Alexander added, “The key to this idea is  that  every  part  of  space—every connected  region  of  space, small or large—has some  degree  of life.” Most importantly, “This degree of life is well defined, objectively existing, and measurable.” A space  that  demonstrates a high-quality, positive  experience for the majority of people is one that has a “higher degree  of life.” Understanding what  these measurable qualities are  can  help  to unlock  the riddle of how to create wonderful places.Many urban planners and architects find it important to be able to  measure how  successful a  space  or  structure is.  Alexander tried to be more precise  by saying, “We are going to pay attention to what  we can  see  and  what  we can  identify  and  what  we can know.”  That is the  start.  It is also  important that  the  knowledge be shared, that  it be “put in some  kind of experimental form, that another person can  then  be  convinced of.”  Architect  Matthew Frederick  provided  one definition for sharable knowledge. He suggested, “If you can’t explain  your ideas  to your grandmother in  terms   that   she  understands, you  don’t  know  your  subject well enough.”
If you are a city planner and see your role as a resource management expert,  then  the  solution is  to  demand that everything be  measurable. So how  do  you  measure something as seemingly intangible as a “higher  degree  of life”? How do you describe that  quality in a way everybody  can understand?