Reimagining dwelling

In our recent history, certain events have fundamentally altered how we perceive and experience our homes. Here in Europe, during the pandemic, most of us spent more time indoors and with more people than we were accustomed to. Facing physical restrictions, people were compelled to do things at home that would normally take place elsewhere. This set up a conflict in our living spaces between competing demands: functionality and convention on the one hand, and pragmatic usage on the other.

In 1985, architect Jacques Hondelatte and architecture group Épinard Bleu penned an article that already addressed these issues at that time. Entitled “Exorcisme : pour la liberté d'usage” (“Exorcism for the freedom of usage”), it was published in L’Architecture Aujourd’hui. The article amounted to an attack on the predominate role that conventional approaches played in residential architecture. Hondelatte said that “I’d love to live in the Taj Mahal, the Tower of Pisa, or the Statue of Liberty,” contemplating whether we wouldn’t actually “live better in places that weren’t initially designed to be lived in.” Reserving particular criticism for rigid functional designs and the preconceptions that constrain our freedom to inhabit our homes as we wish, he offered up a possible solution: “No bedrooms, living rooms or bathrooms; no predetermined spaces for sleeping, working or eating.” Instead, he championed an architectural approach that prized atmospheric dimension over function.

More than just an extra room

In the 17th century, architects had already found such spaces in botany, in the warm temperatures and heady floral scents of greenhouses. When used as an extension of the home, these structures of steel and glass became a social space par excellence. Perhaps the most striking example of this social aspect was the Crystal Palace – the monumental glass building designed by Joseph Paxton for the 1851 Great Exhibition. Greenhouses thus became detached from their colonial roots and signaled a new era of domestic space emancipation. With the development of the iron and glass-making industry, they became increasingly popular and accessible – and largely forgotten in early 20th century.

Greenhouses gained traction as a low-cost, low-tech method for generating passive energy.

Developments in the past half-century – during the 1970s oil crisis and with the emergence of environmentalism – have seen architects take a renewed interest in greenhouses as a space for experimentation and innovation. For some, they represent an opportunity to reconnect with nature. For others, they’re a way to use renewable natural resources. Either way, greenhouses are again gaining traction as a low-cost, low-tech method for generating passive energy. When connected to a home, they serve as an extra room that captures the sun’s heat, yet with no predetermined function. They’re an example of less-prescriptive architecture; an option that blurs the traditional boundary between the dichotomous indoors and outdoors while providing an additional space whose atmosphere changes with the seasons. These reasons make their architecture worth exploring as a way to reimagine dwelling.

Tiago P. Borges, architect and PhD student at EPFL’s Laboratory of Elementary Architecture and Studies of Types (EAST)

• This article appeared in the April 2024 issue of HABITAT magazine, which is published by three local dailies – La Côte (Vaud Canton), Le Nouvelliste (Valais Canton) and Arcinfo (Neuchâtel Canton) – under a joint initiative between EPFL and ESH Médias to showcase the R&D being carried out at EPFL on advanced construction techniques.