Change of geography is a difficult thing to handle. Imagine if you got up one morning and found yourself in a space where the walls of your room have changed directions, your bed has turned and you are no longer facing the window you slept against at night. Not only will it be completely disorienting, but the structuring of the house will no longer guide you in the same way...they no longer direct you like before.
I am saying the above in reference to the ongoing shuffle of my working place at the Sterling Memorial library at Yale which is going a major renovation. I had just gotten used to my work place after a semester of work which made my body mover and twist in regular ways. I had all my turns calculated, steps were measured and heights were defined. However, now I no longer engage with the space in the same way. By virtue of shift and change of the old working conditions, the space which one bends, moves or sits is absolutely different.
Similarly, I changed 3 houses in my first year. And every time it was different - the shapes, heights and smells of all these rooms were different. The seasons I occupied them in were different. The neighbourhoods and the views they framed were drastically different. The sounds that occurred while at home and the way the morning showed and woke me up were just not the same. The light and the people were different. Thus this space (New Haven) has never been settling for me. My research in domesticity underplayed a large role in this understanding.
If we were to extrapolate this learning to a larger level in architecture, the results are even more drastic. Churning landscapes into different territories altogether affect a large mass of people. New typologies of buildings change the settled character of built space, affecting masses of people together pushing them to a transformation. Transformations are always difficult because they ask you to reconsider old habits, old norms. However, being critical is only then a matter of closely looking at the nature of change, how would it affect you and what would it do to a probable future...
Anyway, I haven't developed this writing well, because originally I meant to describe geography as a physical setting of sorts. This physicality structures us as much as we design it. As Lefebvre calls it - we share a dialectic relationship.
Last night, I entered the apartment I stay in late. It was pitch dark, but i managed to make my way to the room because my steps were measured and I had tactile landmarks for myself. I turned left and right at the right place and took cues by feeling the objects in the dark before i finally gauged the switch of the lamp! It did not dash myself, hurt my body or bang against any wall. The geography of the house was now familiar to me, it has become a part of me...soon to change though.
But does this remind you of how Alibaba found his way to the treasure inspite of the fact that he was blindfolded for the first time when he was taken there?
I am saying the above in reference to the ongoing shuffle of my working place at the Sterling Memorial library at Yale which is going a major renovation. I had just gotten used to my work place after a semester of work which made my body mover and twist in regular ways. I had all my turns calculated, steps were measured and heights were defined. However, now I no longer engage with the space in the same way. By virtue of shift and change of the old working conditions, the space which one bends, moves or sits is absolutely different.
Similarly, I changed 3 houses in my first year. And every time it was different - the shapes, heights and smells of all these rooms were different. The seasons I occupied them in were different. The neighbourhoods and the views they framed were drastically different. The sounds that occurred while at home and the way the morning showed and woke me up were just not the same. The light and the people were different. Thus this space (New Haven) has never been settling for me. My research in domesticity underplayed a large role in this understanding.
The notion of 'unsettling' becomes starker when every action that your body gets accustomed to is challenged time and again. What they call it the "choreography" of built space...Re-imagine then, the initial scenario - where the geography of your house has changed. You realize that you no longer see the same view while reading on your desk, the light coming from a particular direction while you watch television has changed or the height of your wash basin had gone lower by two inches or the switchboard you blindedly used before entering the room has changed its wall. The way in which the house folded your body is no longer the same. Sometimes this can bring irritation, because the choreography of the house calls for a change in your physical actions.
If we were to extrapolate this learning to a larger level in architecture, the results are even more drastic. Churning landscapes into different territories altogether affect a large mass of people. New typologies of buildings change the settled character of built space, affecting masses of people together pushing them to a transformation. Transformations are always difficult because they ask you to reconsider old habits, old norms. However, being critical is only then a matter of closely looking at the nature of change, how would it affect you and what would it do to a probable future...
Anyway, I haven't developed this writing well, because originally I meant to describe geography as a physical setting of sorts. This physicality structures us as much as we design it. As Lefebvre calls it - we share a dialectic relationship.
Last night, I entered the apartment I stay in late. It was pitch dark, but i managed to make my way to the room because my steps were measured and I had tactile landmarks for myself. I turned left and right at the right place and took cues by feeling the objects in the dark before i finally gauged the switch of the lamp! It did not dash myself, hurt my body or bang against any wall. The geography of the house was now familiar to me, it has become a part of me...soon to change though.
But does this remind you of how Alibaba found his way to the treasure inspite of the fact that he was blindfolded for the first time when he was taken there?
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