Wayne Schaap

Diagramming Space: The Appliance House

Diagramming space: spaces of the future, defined by logic, society and the never ending march of time through space. Allison and Peter Smithson's Appliance House is a house that explores the idea of the future, a future 50 years beyond moment in time that it was created, and whether or not their predictions are accurate matters little within my exploration of how spaces are created. I can however utilize the knowledge that gained from diagramming the Appliance House, to begin to produce a set of diagrams that explore how unrealized spaces can be diagrammed today, exploring the potential for tomorrow. With that in mind the next series of diagrams relate to the diagrams of the Appliance House, while also exploring the idea of how space is created and how space is interconnected.

The first diagra views space within a boundary and the interconnected spaces that can be created within that boundary. Similar to the Appliance house, this diagram embraces the boundary edge condition within the context of site, forming spaces relative to the boundary.

This diagram, although simple, demonstrates the interconnectedness between spaces and explores the cause and effect relationships that evolve and inform the creation of space. As Henri Lefebvre observed in his essay, The Production of Space, thing cannot be, "created independently of each other in space whether moveable (furniture) or fixed (buildings)" (Lefebvre, 2000). The above diagram illustrates the interconnectedness between spaces that Lefebvre talks about, but lacks a deeper context to begin to inform how the interconnectedness between spaces can evolve over time.

Using the above diagram as a starting point, the next diagram further explores the idea of the interconnectedness between spaces. By exploring the idea of multiple perspectives, next diagram develops a deeper understanding of the possible effects of individual and social perspectives on the creation and understanding of space.

The spatial boundary in this case is simply a three dimensional exploded version of the first diagram. In plan view these two examples would appear to be identical to the first diagram, yet, simply by changing the perspective of the viewer, the spatial logic informs the creation of completely different spaces. The patchwork of spaces explored by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari in their essay, "The Smooth and the Striated," emerges as spatial understanding within the logic of the above diagrams. The interconnectedness between spaces emerges from the associated changes in perspective, illustrating

the complexity of created space; relative perspectives inform the creation of spaces, as well as, the observation of created spaces.

The above two diagrams explore the creation of space relative to the context of interconnectedness, but fail to explore the idea of time within that contextual relationship. The next two diagrams begin to explore how time can alter and begin to inform the creation of spaces while acknowledging the interconnectedness between those spaces.

In the above diagram the lines represent different moments in time, and the different line weights represent the duration of time. The spaces created between the lines illustrate the creation of space relative to the moments in time, while the spaces created begin to demonstrate the relationship between smooth and striated space. The shifted lines in the bottom diagram begin to explore the creation of spaces within spaces during the same moments in time. The spaces created are similar, yet different, while still being connected to the surrounding space and time relationships.

The final diagram in this series explores the idea of the future and how space might be created in the future. The interconnectedness between spaces observed by exploring the past can similarly be explored in the future. The space of the future will be similar to the space of the past, yet the information age will increase the interconnectedness between spaces, introducing new meta-spaces within the spatial framework that already exists. The network culture, observed by Kazys Varnelis and

the blurring of the boundaries between reality and fiction will start to inform the creation of space in the future. Developing a more complex understanding of the interconnected relationships between real space and meta-space will create adaptive potential within the context of understanding and developing space.

The space of the future will be fluid and dynamic like the plastic mould-ability observed in the Appliance House and will integrate real space, with the meta-spaces of network information systems. The interconnectedness created between these two types of space will develop into a creation of space that is both familiar and dynamic, allowing the physical spaces of the future to develop emergent characteristics, creating spaces that are adaptable and multi-dimensional.

BibliographyLefebvre. (2000). The Production of Space. In K. M. Hays, Architectural Theory since 1968 (pp. 178-188). New York: MIT Press.