Housing : Flexibility

Abstract

One of the many reasons to build an environment is to satisfy the needs of its user. In the context of housing and its users, in olden times houses were built by people and for people who were supposed to reside in it. The modifications were made by the users based on their culture, religion or vocational requirements. This also has emanated regional vernacular architecture.

But in the 19 th century the scenario in housing changed excessively. Housing, in present situation, is developed by designers and that too for faceless clients. For design conditions, which involve large group of individuals, it becomes impossible to resolve every single need and design accordingly.

“Because we can never learn what each person reallywants for himself, no one will ever be capable of inventing for others the perfect dwelling” 1

As an outcome of this, one faces an evolution of housing out of standardization which follows a “top-down” design process according to prevalent factors and similar design is provided to every other client. A “top-down” design process is that where the completed designed house is provided to the users without any opinion of the user in the designing of that house, which is opposed to the traditional way of man building his own house.

“… we have come to the point where uniform dwellings are assembled in monotonous, uniform building blocks.” 2

For example, mass housing schemes are designed as a production of identical functional units for non-identical users. In current situation, individuals of diverse cultures and different backgrounds reside together in urban settlements, which scantily acknowledges their diversities and varying life styles. Under these circumstances, the mass-housing scheme fail to cater to the particular requirements of each and every client residing in it.

To solve these issues, mass housing needs an element of flexibility. An element that can allow one to personalize, that lets one to grow his own built environment, that can give one an opportunity to undergo transformation according to his tradition, culture or financial backgrounds.

Flexibility in housing can be achieved by various methods. Throughout history, architects and theoreticians like Habraken, Hertzberger, Oxman and Correa have provided manifestos on how to achieve better housing and how can an urban settlement be made better place to live.

Research Questions

This study has been done in two parts based on two sets ofresearch questions:

1. What is flexibility and what are the different ways in whichflexibility can be achieved? What are the implications offlexibility in housing?

2. What are the trends of transformation that have been followed in a housing by the occupants and how the flexibility, provided by the designer, has responded to these changes?

Aim

The study, here, tries to build-up an understanding of the phenomenon of flexibility in housing. In order to do that, theories and methods regarding flexibility have been discussed. This is followed by implementations of these methods in a few housing projects.

Furthermore, a closer look is taken on how the flexibilityhas come in-handy by a post-occupancy analysis ofIncremental Housing at Belapur.

Objectives

1. Provide an overview of the contemporary time scenarioof urbanisation and housing.

2. Understand flexibility in terms of housing by providing knowledge about what is flexibility and when is it needed and discuss various theories and methods to achieve flexibility in housing, followed by implementation of these methods in housing projects.

3. Trace the trends of modifications, categorised as “Personalisation, Additions and Replacements” through post-occupancy analysis of a housing project, this shall reveal the knowledge about how a provided flexibility has helped in the evolution of an urban planned settlement.