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The purpose of the Smithsonian Design Standards (SDS) is to provide consistent standards and criteria to guide all design, construction, maintenance, and repair projects for the facilities of the Smithsonian Institution (SI). It includes best practices, general criteria and design requirements, space-specific criteria, and prescriptive specifications.
Volume 1 of the SDS is organized into 2 sections, Design Guidelines and Technical Sections. The Design Guideline Chapters provide requirements on a variety of general topics for the designer during design. The second part of Volume 1 includes Technical Sections intended to provide guidance on requirements for specific topics.