BLUEPRINTS 2024:
An Architectural Conference
for Early Learning Design

MONDAY, January 22nd, 2024
1:00–5:00PM | Tacoma, WA

Blueprints 2024: An Architectural Conference for Early Learning Design offers a unique opportunity to build relationships and gain knowledge from passionate experts committed to improving the quality of early childhood environments. If you were three years old and three feet tall, how would the elements in your environment inspire you to play, take risks, and create?

The Child Care Capacity Initiative is bringing together experts and thought leaders to elevate the physical environment by designing, developing, and uplifting early childhood education. We are hosting an ongoing dialogue around creating and celebrating exceptional spaces for early learners that reflect the community they welcome. We seek to create spaces that acknowledge that children and educators are capable and competent. The result is a creative, dynamic, physical space that enhances the relationships between children, families and educators.

Blueprints 2024 will examine early childhood learning through the lens of the built environment by integrating values of the program throughout the design as participants consider the ways in which early learning design can support developmental, social-emotional learning, and academic goals.

Speakers will offer insight from the fields of trauma-informed architectural design, risky play, designing from a child’s perspective, and designing a natural environment. Architects will connect theory to on-the-ground practice, with presentations designed to challenge the status-quo and inspire new approaches and design solutions.

The event will conclude with a look outdoors into the world of landscape architecture; designing a hands-on natural environment centered on nature-based learning. We will explore innovative ways to design facilities that meet the unique needs of young children and the educators responsible for their care. Please join us to discover a new way to embrace the environment in our early learning spaces!

Click below for more information:

Questions about Blueprints 2024? Send us an email.

designing from the perspective of a child

Mona Zellers, AIA, NCARB
PARTNER, Johnston Architects

Mona Zellers of Johnston Architects will be presenting on designing from the perspective of a child by introducing a series of strategies for supporting and exploring the components of early literacy. Her presentation will explore the nuances of how these activities transfer into architecture throughout a project including the integration of spaces for motor skills, as well as spaces designed for noise and quiet. This presentation explores intentionality in design by purposing to create space that won’t trigger fight or flight responses, but instead designing space where children feel welcome and comfortable.

How can interventions and values can be built in to a space to encourage interaction with the environment? How can we ensure spaces are living and changing? Early learning spaces must develop as children develop which means including things in the environment that help build understanding of the community. Mona Zellers will explore creating opportunities for play while exploring behavior settings. This presentation will challenge us to focus on children in design while insisting that space must be more than a box.

Trauma-Informed Design

Mike Lindstrom, Principal, AIA, LEED AP
Studio MLA

Studio MLA will be presenting on Trauma-Informed Design. How to design spaces to be sensitive to those experiencing them, exploring healing aspects, avoiding triggers, and designing for a diverse audience. Mike Lindstrom, Principal of Studio MLA, will share about ways to ease some of the traditional designs to consider how everyone might enter the space. He will be diving into why Trauma Informed Design is necessary and good for everyone.

Studio MLA will explore why the plan/program/construction has been priority in architectural design with the feeling you get when you walk into a space left at the bottom of the list. This presentation offers encouragement to consider how bringing the “experience of feeling” into a space informs the practical aspects of design. What is the emotional content of each space? How can you center people and their lived experiences in your designs and planning?  What room can you leave for people to bring themselves into the environment? Design starts out with “do no harm” and grows into making a space for the community.  

This presentation will explore bringing forward humanity in design. This means recognizing that people arrive with deep unaddressed traumas. A lot of educators have high ACES scores, and they haven’t dealt with their own personal trauma. What in the environment reflects their needs? If educators can see themselves represented, their anxiety drops. Think about agency, autonomy, and how to move about in the environment. Trauma takes up cognitive load, which means people don’t have as much space left to reflect and relate to the environment. How do environments impact children? We will explore what it is to reflect, relate, receive, and rest in early learning design.

EXPLORING TACTILE MATERIALS FOR EARLY LEARNING

Ko Wibowo, AIA, LEED AP BD+C,
Architecture for Everyone

This presentation by Ko Wibowo, Architecture for Everyone, will explore how to use cost effective materials in the design selection that develop senses, including playing and seeing with texture, connecting with nature, utilizing sustainable natural materials, while ensuring usage of materials that are safe for children’s engagement. These materials and their maintenance costs can be incorporated with a budget in mind. This presentation will explore which materials need more care than others and how to plan for long term sustainability in design. Ko Wibowo will share about designing a natural environment that enhances learning and allows for a peaceful and enjoyable experience. We will explore how to add enhancements focused on children’s learning which attracts new families and the community to a space.

How do you make the environment engaging and beautiful so that you can serve more of the community? How do you encourage a sense of pride and ownership for staff and families? What is the most affordable material? What are materials that last under daily use?  Discover how to incorporate natural materials into your designs and how to think for sustainability.

ADMISSION/COST

Blueprints 2024 is FREE to attend.
Your admission has been covered by the Child Care Capacity Initiative.

You DO NOT need to be a resident of Pierce County to attend.

Location

STAR Center
3873 S 66th St., Tacoma, WA 98409
(See Map Below)

CATERING

Ingallina's Box Lunch will provide a refreshing self-serve menu, available throughout the conference.