Habitation : Architectural and Mental Representation

Summary

In 2005 I designed and completed a theoretical architectural research thesis at the School of Architecture at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, supervised by prof. Kyriaki Tsoukala. The motivation for my work was my personal concern around the concepts of dwelling in contemporary cities. It was triggered by observing assorted lifestyles and interacting with people carrying disparate backgrounds and experiences with a common self-evident property: living in an urban environment.

In an effort to apprehend the perception and the desires of urban inhabitants I studied the aforementioned topics in a more organized manner by using scientific methods so as to approach more objective conclusions to the main questions:

How do housing users interpret terms like “housing”, “dwelling” and “habitation”?

Can you extract helpful conclusions around one’s understanding of the terms?

Where does this understanding originate from?

Research Preparation

Since the beginning of the project several issues came up regarding the scope and the process of the research, helping to form useful guidelines. The concept of housing is very broad typology-wise and one should research it in relation to individual dwelling experiences.

Taking into account the selected dwellers’ common properties (the main one being their cultural commonplace, in this case the Greek city) formed the sum of housing properties to be presented and discussed in an organized manner.

As supplementary discussion material, there was the intention to present fifteen housing types with various spatial qualities at different locations. After a series of pilot interviews and due to the interviewees’ fatigue (a factor that blurred their judgment), the number of housing examples was reduced to six. The final selection of the presented examples represented an assortment of western living characteristics. It offered the chance for a smoother flowing interview with potentially more useful results.

Another issue was the way the examples would be represented. The initial intention was to present virtual reality models via headset or on-screen walkthroughs but a series of tests made it clear that it was an unsatisfactory experience and could not convey true spatial flavor. Only people who had long-term experience with computers felt comfortable and this was very limiting for the case study sample. In another test run a series of printed photographs was used exhibiting interior and exterior spaces. The participants showed familiarity with the medium and had such satisfactory response that using photographic material was a much more practical choice.

Stages of the Final Research

• Realizing a number of pilot interviews to test and adjust the content, form and style

• Finalizing the questionnaire

• Gathering a series of housing examples through visual representations as visual aids

• Choosing a research sample of participants for the case studies

• Gathering and analyzing the participants’ backgrounds

• Performing the interviews

• Performing discourse analysis on the interviews

• Studying and comparing gathered data, taking the participants’ background into account

• Extracting conclusions

Case Study Profiles

There was no intention to interview a very large, statistically usable number of participants, as this was not the purpose of the research. Instead, a conscious choice was made to select fifteen people with various backgrounds and to focus on the individual cases.

The participants spanned from 20 to 70 years old females and males, all residing in towns and cities in Greece and operating professionally outside of architecture.

The Questionnaire

Profiling

01. Sex / Age / Profession

02. Where is your permanent residence?

03. What is your current / past / desired housing type?

04. Are you satisfied by your current residence? Elaborate.

05. Describe your residence. How do you actually use each designated space?

06. What is the most important attribute in a residence?

07. Grade the following in order of importance: aesthetics / spatial layout / built quality & infrastructures

08. Have you ever visited a residence that stands out for you?

09. What concepts does the term “habitation” trigger to you?

10. What are the essential components of housing?

Paradigm discussion

01. Describe them

02. Compare them

03. Detect commonalities/dissimilarities

04. Group them

05. Point out positive/negative elements

06. Which one stands out?

07. Where could you have come across each one?

08. Where could a family / couple / person live?

09. Assign the following concepts to paradigms:

shelter / privacy / openness / relaxation / creativity / working space / insecurity / unlivable / ill designed

10. Can you picture yourself living in one? Elaborate

The Housing Paradigms

• Werner Aisslinger - Loftcube – 2003

• Herzog & de Meuron - House in Leymen – 1996-1997

• Unnamed Housing Block in Thessaloniki - 1970

• Chamberlin, Powell, Bon - Barbican towers - 1956

• Lina Bo Bardi - Glass House – 1950-1951

• Nantzi Manor in Kastoria – late 19th century

Research Results Overview

Setting up such research work had merits in its own.

Realizing through testing in 2003 that VR technology and 3d modeling representation could not be as efficient as traditional architectural photography and limiting the actual size of the research to make sure useful results could come up were two very important milestones.

As for the actual interviews, it was quite challenging and humbling to dutifully complete profile backgrounds and discourse analysis as thoroughly as possible. Focusing on detachment from vague casual discussions and delving deeper into specific topics and experiences provided access to compelling feedback.

The participants acknowledged as a whole that urban housing in Greece is highly problematic. As much as they intended to customize their personal space into something viable and even when few declared more or less content with their current residence, they all considered detached housing as an ideal typology.

Discussing on housing units tended to focus on their surroundings as well (in some cases more so) making it obvious that “housing” is not an out-of-context building.

The prevailing cultural axioms were challenged. Although most senior participants desired to consciously migrate to the countryside at some point in their lifetime, they were not as aesthetically conservative as expected. The rest of the participants felt it essential to operate in an urban environment and considered that even when urban housing is far from ideal, it at least attempts to provide a contemporary version of housing as a shelter.

It was a very intriguing and educational experience to test my own assumptions on housing against organized scientific research. Some notions were verified while in some cases I was pleasantly surprised. All in all I have set up a basis for further personal theoretical research and have trained my client approach method in a way that felt much more controlled, organized and meaningful.