How do we define “home”? Although our ideas about home are constantly being rethought, the careful examination of “home” has recently come to our attention for architects and nonarchitects alike. Almost everyone has had to confront their perspective of “home” as they have adapted workplaces, social gatherings, fitness routines, and everyday life. We now not only internalize a home, but look at how our homes digitally connect to the rest of the world.
Nonetheless, “home” remains the most significant architectural place we experience throughout our lives. Home represents safety, ownership, privacy, and stability. Home is where we can be alone and with people we care about most. Historically, the home has been a place of permanence. Despite how chaotic our lives are, we cherish the consistency of sleeping in the same bed and performing the same daily rituals here.
Through the ages, architects have continuously investigated the role that homes play in our lives. These investigations present us with new notions of home environments that completely rethink the home, like Peter Eisenman’s House VI or Kurokawa’s Nagakin Capsule Tower, and sometimes rethink specific things within a home, like the elevator in OMA’s Maison Bordeaux.
