Output details

House No. 1.1 -

General Description:

House No.1.1 arose from a design for a contemporary Case Study House (CSH) to critically reflect upon the original CSH Program initiated in 1945 by Los Angeles-based Arts & Architecture magazine.

QUESTIONS / AIMS / OBJECTIVES -

The CSH Program ended in 1966 after showcasing 36 designs that embodied the social aspirations and technical possibilities of the day. In response to its re-instigation in 2010, I ask:

(1) What were the aims of the original program and how can these be re-framed to suit a contemporary situation?

(2) Can new construction techniques allow a house to be - in the spirit of the original CSH Program - ‘capable of duplication’ whilst simultaneously being an ‘individual performance’?

Contexts

The construction industry has changed radically since 1945: buildings may soon be 3D printed from virtual models, questioning 20th-century reliance upon modular pre-fabrication; Modernism’s tenet regarding universal design principles has been tested, with embodiment of individual context now more significant.

Methods

This project explores how an archetypal symbol of ‘home’ - the first house to appear in a Hollywood film - can be recreated from a photograph and inhabited. The process of identifying Hollywood’s ‘House No.1’ is told through a film storyboard, encompassing Renaissance neo-Platonic literature, early cinematography and LA real estate development.

Impact

Design commissioned and published by PIN-UP Magazine Issue 9, and presented at the Museum of Arts and Design, New York (24.02.11) at a seminar entitled A New Order: Case Studies in Re-appropriations of Space and Lifestyle. Papers on the project presented by the author at the RIBA conference Research Matters in London (20.11.12) and as a keynote speaker at DMU conference Legacy: Mythology and Authenticity in the Humanities (28.06.13). The project was showcased at DMU’s conference Research Excellence (13.04.13)

Authorship

Sam Causer is the sole author of this work.