Thinking
Beyond The Homely:
Countryside Properties & the Shape
of Time |
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This
paper investigates the nature of the
‘homely’ in England today.
Focusing on the work of one developer
– Countryside Properties –
I ask what the popularity of the neo-vernacular
‘urban village’, and the
tactics used to construct this genre,
might tell us about homely ideals and
demands.
First considering, then dismissing,
postmodern claims of the nostalgia–driven
consumption of simulacra, I go on to
propose that people are not deceived
into purchasing the ‘inauthentic’,
but knowingly enter into ‘pacts’
with ‘instantly mature’
environments. What matters, I suggest,
is not so much surface evocation of
the Past, but the constructed ‘texture’
of Passed Time, and the sense of narrative
evolution that this confers to both
site and individual dwelling.
Building on theories of ‘authenticity’
as not inherent to things, but a quality
that emerges in our environments through
our relationships with them, I propose
that the ‘homely’ too is
not an identifiable essence or ‘sense
of place’, but an interaction
of body and mind with environment. That
being the case,in order to be receptive
to our homely needs and desires, might
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environments
be designed to proactively offer spaces
for these to take root?
Concluding, the paper takes theory back
to practice by considering the relevance
of such ideas to housing development,
and to evolving practices of inhabitation. |
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Published
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by
Daisy Froud,
Home Cultures,
cover and pp211-233,
Vol.1, issue 3
For full article, go to:
www.ingentaconnect.com
For free pdf of earlier version of
article, click
here
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