Overlooked
Modi Vivendi
Research and design thesis for the Masters of Design in Interior Architecture at Rhode Island School of Design.
Published personally for educational purposes, 2023
Research & Design Advisors: Jeffrey Katz, Barbara Stehle, and Alice T. Friedman
Traditional gender roles, performance of heterosexuality, marriage, parenthood, and a large variety of other societal expectations manifest themselves in the domestic realm, both intangibly and spatially. Even in the present day, designers with non-user clients — developers, investors, real estate firms, etc. — will design with the heteronormative household (nuclear family) in mind. Although current residential design strategies still allow for a diversity of occupants, society would greatly benefit from architecture that intentionally includes non-heteronormative ways of living into their design process. This thesis intends to encourage residential designers to inform their design decisions on non-heteronormative modi vivendi, recognizing how the queer (LGBTQ+) lived experience can inspire design. The project also highlights how promoting homemaking through architectural design can encourage the inhabitants’ full self to emerge by enabling them to make said space their own, a “safe space” to exist freely.
The conceptualization process of the project incorporates three methods of analysis: understanding case studies and precedents, drawing on architectural queer space theory, and interacting with representatives of the queer community. The research leads to a design catalog that simultaneously provides new strategies to expand the residential design field and identifies current ones that overlap queer space theory and are inspired or related to the queer experience.
Renders, graphics, book design, photographs, and other visuals by Natalia Silva
Throughout history, western cultures have addressed home as not simply a place where one finds shelter, but the place where one exists. The word home carries a different meaning to our society than “house” or “apartment," hence the phrase ‘make yourself at home.’ Homemaking is an inherent need; some anthropological theories go as far as to say that it is even a part of defining selfhood.
Heteronormativity has led to a history of social and patriarchal oppression and marginalization to those who challenge it. Similarly, designing intuitively, and exclusively, from the heteronormative perspective has led other relevant, equally important ways of living to be overlooked. This thesis recognizes the oppression and combats current negligence towards non-heteronormative domesticities.
Non-heteronormativity is represented in a variety of domestic typologies. Most fall under three sub-categories: queer community, dependency, and family circumstance. The focus for this thesis is on the queer community.
Allow For Spectrum: Binary labels and rigidity restrict the fluidity of human nature. Challenging binaries, and stagnancy in spatial form results in bolder, more interesting, spaces. Reveal & Address Boundaries: Addressing boundaries, whether to challenge or enforce them, responds to research on queer space from both the theoretical and ethnographic perspectives.
Sense of Self: Promoting homemaking, to invite the inhabitants’ individuality to be manifested. Sense of Belonging: Responding to different configurations of relationships while considering how interior architecture and design can enhance the feeling of comfort and belonging in shared domestic spaces.
The project research incorporates three methods of analysis: understanding precedents, drawing on architectural queer space theory, and interacting with representatives of the queer community. It leads to a design catalog that simultaneously provides new strategies to expand the residential design field and identifies current ones that are inspired from non-heteronormative domesticities.
