A Formalization Framework for Integrating Social Design Intentions into Digital Building Models

Human-centered qualities (e.g., privacy, sense of orientation, etc.) significantly impact the social sustainability of buildings and the well-being of their occupants. However, due to their subjective nature, such qualities are often implicit and are not documented properly during the planning phase of construction projects. While several types of design intentions are documented throughout the lifecycle of building projects, intentions that are socially oriented and target soft aspects that reflect occupants’ experience (e.g., comfort, well-being, etc.), are evidently missing from current digital building models, hence risking constructing uninhabitable or socially unsustainable buildings. Through an extensive interdisciplinary collaboration between building scientists, practicing architects, and computer scientists, this paper addresses this gap by introducing a formalization framework, “ProFormalize”, to capture social design intentions (SDIs) in digital building models. This work presents a novel approach to digitalize SDIs in buildings, bridging a critical gap between architectural design intentions and explicit digital representations. Following a case-study-driven approach and a co-creation-based methodology, we developed the framework aiming to establish the foundations for developing a decision-support software tool (plugin) that enables architects, who are directly involved in the research process, to integrate SDIs into digital building models. The expert feedback demonstrates that the framework can make implicit SDIs explicit, which enables architects to integrate them into digital building models. Expert feedback suggested that a software tool developed based on this framework can enhance decision-making due to the traceability and analyzability of digital models.