Project #2 – Architecture and Family Life Style

 

This is a project that will help you examine the relationship between the dynamics of your family life and the architecture of your home.  Many of the psychological needs for privacy, personal space, and territoriality that we have been discussing this term are mediated by the architecture of a family’s living space.

 

PROCEDURES

 

Reproduce, on unlined paper, as well as you can remember, a rough floor plan of your family residence when you were age 16-17.  Do not label the rooms by standard names but letter them A, B, C.  Note doorways in and out of the residence by spaces with containing two arrows pointing in opposite directions.  Use spaces with a single arrow to denote interior doorways.  If there were two or more floors to your residence, use a separate sheet of paper for each floor.

 

Accompany this diagram with a written report.  This report should contain a cover sheet with the name of the project, the name of this course, and your name. Write an essay in which you answer many of the following questions about the most common patterns of spatial behavior and usage by the members of your family.  Employ the letter codes that you have used in your floor plan when referring to specific areas in the home.  Illustrate your answers with incidents, examples, and descriptions of family events, and feel free to include other information not requested by these questions if you think that it is interesting and relevant. Include the following information in the first paragraph of the essay: The number, sex, relationship to you, and ages of household members at that time.  Name the city, state, and country of the residence’s location as well.

 

 

  1. In what spaces did family members congregate most frequently?  What types of activities occurred in these spaces?

 

  1. Which areas were used only by one individual at a time?  What types of activities occurred here?

 

  1. Name some activities that NEVER occurred in these heavily used spaces.

 

  1. Which areas of the home were seldom or never used by anyone?  What was this space designed for?

 

  1. Come up with three words to describe your feelings about each of the spaces that you described in the questions above.

 

  1. In what space(s) did family meals occur? Were these same spaces used for interactions with close friends or others from outside of the family?

 

  1. Were there any areas that were used ONLY for visitors and outside acquaintances?

 

  1. Describe any other activities that might have occurred in eating spaces.

 

  1. Were there any areas that you would consider to be primarily “ceremonial” in nature?  That is, spaces that were reserved for special occasions and for which great care was taken to keep them clean and attractive even when they were not in use?

 

  1. If there were any pets in the home, were there spaces that “belonged” to them and spaces in which they were not allowed?

 

  1. Were different people in the family responsible for the upkeep and appearance of different areas?

 

  1. Were there any spaces for which you had to seek permission to enter?

 

  1. What spaces in the residence, if any, did you consider to be your own? Could you be assured of relative privacy in this area?  Were there any circumstances in which these private territories did NOT WORK?  Did everyone in the family have equal access to private spaces?

 

  1. How important did you think privacy was for you at age 16-17?  Why?

 

  1. Were there any recurring conflicts in the family in the access to or use of space in the home?  If so, describe the nature of these conflicts.

 

  1. Please mention any other interesting insights into the use of space in your home that may have occurred to you as you completed this assignment.

 

  1. Finally, if you could redesign your home to better meet the psychological needs of your family, what would you change?