The Art of the Bubble Diagram

What I find particularly fun and engaging about working with an interdisciplinary team (like the one John has assembled to develop the strategic plan for TEC children's ministry) is that everyone gets to share what they know and impart their knowledge for the benefit of the group. I quite enjoy the part where I get to share what I know with others. It's kind of like the old Christmas adage that it is better to give than to receive, but not exactly. I find the giving and the receiving to be equally appealing, especially when I have the opportunity to share something that I am familiar with and in the end, develop a more intimate understanding of the subject for myself. But I digress.

In our last meeting, John had asked for a definition of a bubble diagram. So what I thought I might do here is to describe a little about what I know about bubble diagrams and how I've discovered others use them.

Bubble diagrams are essentially visual representations of the relationships between different elements within a design.

Architects and other designers of three dimensional space like to use them as tools that allow an idea about a series of relationships to be documented quickly. The bubbles are usually labeled (as in the diagram above) and different-sized bubbles within a diagram are often used to explain relationships of scale between different elements. The idea behind doing them quickly is so that many different ideas can be developed quickly without getting too tied down to any one idea too quickly.

The bubble diagram above is an architectural concept describing the relationship between many different elements in a building program. Usually bubble diagrams begin with very round shaped bubbles and become more rectilinear as a project progresses, reflecting the development and decision-making of the design process. I have included several other types of bubble diagrams below ranging from an exhibit planning diagram, to a site/landscape planning diagram and from the simple to the complex. We may use several types of bubble diagrams as we master plan the TEC Youth Center project.

Here is a succinct description (click on the "begin here" button at the top) of what bubble diagrams are often used for in the world of architecture. Here are some other interior/architectural bubble diagrams to ponder.