Friday, September 19, 2008

Proposal/Arch 652

I wrote a proposal for the " Architectural Research Methods" for my grduate study here in BSU.
the pre-writing goes like this;
Proposal/ Arch 652
Fall Semester /2008


“Unknown cities within the city…. The foundation of self respect in their society is not having cash but a place to live.”
-Professor Richard Sennet

“The house was not so hard to make because I kept the structure minimum…..It sometimes gets cold but I like the view of the river.”
-Okawara, A homeless in Tokyo

“These homes (of homeless) embody simplicity and functionality at one with their environment, like the Japanese Tea house of Sen Rikyu.”
-Architect Kyohei Sakaguchi

Architecture has taken a great leap since the beginning of the human civilization. The materiality, techniques, forms; functionality has profoundly changed since early shelter of nomadic tribes to modern intelligent buildings. Architects and designers throughout the world have put most of their energy in creating aesthetically beautiful, structurally sound and functionally user-friendly built environment. In such an encouraging scenario, when I observe the world around one questions comes up in my mind, what about the architecture of the homeless people.

Small enclosure of materials like flattened cardboards, corrugated metal roofs, sheets of plastic, leftover materials in Dr. Wes Janz’s word ensure them same security and sense of privacy that our house provides us. Intricate network of metal pipes, geometrical roofs, and even use of solar panel reflects their interest in design fulfilling function. Though they are not architect, their construction approach to support their need of shelter always draws my attention.

Thus, I propose to study a tragic arena of architecture, existing architecture of homeless people. The materials used, forms, structures along with the surrounding environment in different part of the world. I want to discover their inherent feelings about their home.


To achieve this, I will carry out literature study on the construction of homeless people using available books, internets and magazines. I will collect talks, views and case studies (if possible) of the related groups or individuals to discover their world of architecture and social aspects. Based on such study a set of photographs, structure and material study will be compiled in a report form.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Deepak,

I am not sure if you find this of interest, but I am interested in the numerous amounts of abandon houses. I considered trying to find a way to reuse these houses for the homeless. Perhaps one house could be segmented into apartments to help get people off the streets. I'm not quite sure how this would be funded and I decided to take a slightly different route, but if this is of interest to you, you might want to consider it.

Anonymous said...

Deepak.

What about the idea of giving homeless people building material and seeing what they design and create for their home. Letting them create a sense of place. Or look up case studies that revolve around the basic needs of homeless people in a urban scale. i don't have any brilliant ideas for you, but i like where you're going.

Anonymous said...

Deepak,

Great project! My feeling is that your conclusions and designs will be very specific to each "client" , each homeless person. you may want to focus on specific solutions for a couple different homeless people that are very specific to each of their needs.

Anonymous said...

Juarez Mexico, is another poverty stricken "slum town". I would research how they pattern their cities, what they centralize themselves by. So what becomes important for this group of people, and if it becomes a portable project as you are saying what do they need, and how big can it be. Is this something for one or for many, this could become a backpack or a "parasitic architecture".

Anonymous said...

http://www.bloodnfiremuncie.com/

here is the link to Blood and Fire, I believe there is another besides this, but I am not for sure.

Anonymous said...

HOMELESSNESS-

IS THERE A SOLUTION- ARE THE PEOPLE WE SPEAK OF REALLY CONTENT WITH THEIR SITUATION. THERE ARE MANY SOCIAL & ECONOMICAL IMPLICATIONS THAT EXIST THAT HAVE A GREATER INFLUENCE THAN THE ARCHITECTURE. IS IT THE EXISTING BUILT ENVIRONMENT THAT HAS CAUSED SOME TO BE HOMELESS?

WHY ARE THEY HOMELESS?

Anonymous said...

Deepak – Homeless people, Slums within cities, 2 billion of 8 billion will be slum dwellers, how can we as architects affect the homeless or slum dwellings. You have already done this, but I would look at some books on portable architecture and how it can be applied to the less fortunate. Might want to look at how cities can employ portable architecture to help the homeless, rather than build these homeless shelters.

Anonymous said...

deepak-

architecture and homelessness...would the architecture be evaluated using the same system as traditional architecture or would an alternate means of "judgement" need to be constructed? what would make homeless dwelling architecturally viable? also, what is "homelessness"?...a very clear definition of the term would need to be established before an approach could be derived.

very interesting topic though...again, i am very intrigued by the idea of historically opposing topics (architecture vs. graffiti, architecture vs. homelessness, etc.) great stuff.
good luck,

Anonymous said...

Here is a video I saw a few months ago regarding a homeless mans house. http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2007/11/21/ca.mole.man.kmph?iref=videosearch

Anonymous said...

Deepak -

Maybe this would help... http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE7D6143BF93BA15750C0A965958260

You mentioned Sam Davis -

He was on one of the sites, I pulled up:

http://berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2002/10/25_architecture.html

A possible book?

http://www.routledgearchitecture.com/books/International-Perspectives-on-Rural-Homelessness-isbn9780415343725

Good luck!