Humanscale

by Diffrient, Alvin R. Tilley, Joan Bardagjy

Humanscale is a set of ready references (3 volumes, each furnished with 3 two-sided pictorial selectors with rotary dials and appropriate accompanying manuals) for use by designers in many fields. Engineers, architects, industrial designers, interior designers, furniture designers and craftsmen will find the concentrated information on human factors basic and easy to use for successful design.

Humanscale is dedicated to understanding people—their physical attributes, abilities, and limitations. It incorporates an extensive amount of human engineering data compiled and organized by Henry Dreyfuss Associates over a period of more than 35 years. Much time was consumed sifting through piles of books, pamphlets and clippings. For convenience, dimensioned charts of human figures were made and surrounded by factual data which showed body relationships not readily perceived through numbers alone. When research led to the fields of anthropology, biomechanics, psychology, sociology, physiology, orthopedics, geriatrics, pediatrics and others a decision was made to introduce rotating analog wheels full of data. Now a single face of graphics can easily show 20,000 bits of information.

1 pages, Paperback

First published January 10, 1991