The issue of the conditions governing the reuse of previously developed knowledge during design activities and its effects on the process assumes considerable importance in the built environment sector. We link this with another issue, being the effects of taking into consideration social practices and user experience on the relevance of built products. We believe that the joint consideration of the two problems provides a better understanding of the interleaving between the relevance of the products and the quality of their production and management processes. Thus, by exploring theoretical and empirical studies that feed this understanding, we want to contribute to the theoretical foundation of usability of buildings. We argue that usability is achieved by the interplay of user experience, design and management processes, and buildings.