Alternative pathways to understanding and designing for happiness in the home

This article considers the value of making long-term happiness a key priority in designing for the home and how creative methods, art therapy techniques in particular, can be fundamental in this process. It presents different approaches for investigating home happiness by offering an overview of happiness, design and home literature informing the research process, and techniques employed so far. Accordingly, photo elicitation and art therapy techniques are used at different stages of the research to investigate home happiness and locate design directions. This article therefore discusses how these approaches could assist designers in the creation of happy home design interventions, including commercial products, product-service-systems and/or public/community services, and, through this, potentially lead to happier future homes and more sustainable lifestyles.