Image
Image
Research at Cuningham
Bold ideas become buildable realities when grounded in the right evidence. Cuningham’s research-driven design process integrates diverse methodologies, gathering rich qualitative and quantitative data to help solve our clients’ most pressing real-world issues. From evaluating post-occupancy performance and tracking industry benchmarks to exploring emerging materials and methods, our research examines the forces reshaping the built environment, tests emerging ideas, and turns new knowledge into expertise you can build on.
How Research-Informed Design Delivers Value
Cuningham’s research practice is focused on answering questions that can help organizations:
- Make more confident capital and design decisions using evidence alongside experience and intuition
- Get more value from space and resources without compromising experience, mission or performance
- Reduce project uncertainty and risk through better coordination, evaluation, and feedback
- Design for adaptability as organizational needs, technologies, and expectations change
- Improve human outcomes including well-being, belonging, engagement, collaboration, and wayfinding
- Build stakeholder alignment around a shared vision and clearer design priorities
- Evaluate whether environments perform as intended through post-occupancy research and other measures
- Translate lessons from one project into better decisions on the next
Image
Understand Your Users and Their Experiences
User research, ethnographic observation, surveys, interviews, focus groups, and journey mapping help uncover users’ needs, behaviors, and expectations. These insights inform programming and design decisions while identifying opportunities to improve the experiences and outcomes that matter most.
Image
Understand Your Market and Identify Opportunities
Market and demand analysis, cultural foresight, semiotics, and competitive experience benchmarking reveal the forces shaping your organization. This context helps identify unmet needs, anticipate changes, and create meaningful differentiation.
Image
See How Your Space Performs
Behavior mapping, utilization studies, environmental monitoring, and pre- and post-occupancy evaluations show how environments are used and experienced. By comparing intended performance with observed results, we identify opportunities to improve current spaces and inform future investments.
Image
Explore Possibilities and Reduce Risk
Scenario testing, predictive insights, prototyping, and pilot studies allow teams to compare potential approaches before committing to full-scale implementation. Future-focused research also examines how changes in technology, demographics, culture, and behavior may affect environments over time.
Image
Turn Complex Information into Clear Direction
Data analysis, visualization, toolkits, and playbooks translate research into practical guidance. These tools help stakeholders understand the evidence, align around priorities, and move forward with confidence.
Evidence You Can Build On
Organizations are being asked to make more consequential decisions about their buildings and environments with fewer resources, greater uncertainty, and rapidly changing expectations.
Our 2026–2028 Architecture & Design Research Agenda reflects our commitment to pair creativity with evidence. It focuses on asking meaningful questions, learning from our work, and applying those insights to create environments that are bold, beautiful, and buildable. The agenda identifies the areas where focused inquiry can deliver the greatest value for our clients, partners, and the broader design community.
Download the agenda to:
- Discover areas of inquiry influencing the future of the built environment.
- Explore how design can improve performance while reducing resource use, uncertainty, and risk.
- Consider new ways to evaluate value beyond cost and square footage.
- Identify opportunities to study an active or completed project, test an emerging idea, or collaborate on future research.
Featured Research and Presentations
Helping organizations make more informed design decisions and creating places that perform better for the people who use them.
Image
Research
Designing for Dignity: Inclusive Restrooms as Infrastructure for Student Safety, Health, and Belonging
Image
Research
Redefining Luxury: The Role of Healthy Materials in Sustainable and Wellness-Focused Hospitality
Image
Research
From Windowless to Restorative: Evaluating Daylight-Mimicking Fixtures in a Special Education Learning Environment
Image
Research
Aligning school design with adolescent development
Image
