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Build the shelf right into the structure of the building— THICKENING THE OUTER WALL (2Il). It is a good place to put your personal treasures—things from your life (253). . . .
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| 202 BUILT-IN SEATS* |
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92+
. . . throughout the building—sequence of sitting spaces (142)—there are alcoves, entrances, corners, and windows where it is natural to make built-in seats—entrance room (130), alcoves (179)) window place (180). This pattern helps complete them.
Built-in seats are great. Everybody loves them. They make a building feel comfortable and luxurious. But most often they do not actually work. They are placed wrong, or too narrow, or the back does not slope, or the view is wrong, or the seat is too hard. This pattern tells you what to do to make a built-in seat that really works.
Why do built-in scats so often not work properly? The reasons are simple and fairly easy to correct. But the problems are critical. If the seats are wrongly made, they just will not be used, and they will be a waste of space, a waste of money, and a wasted golden opportunity. What arc the critical considerations?
Position: It is natural to put the built-in seat into an unobtrusive corner—that is where it melts most easily into the structure and the wall. But, as a result, it is often out of the
way. If you want to build a seat, ask yourself where you would
place a sofa or a comfortable armchair—and build the seat there, not tucked into some hopeless corner.
Width and comfort: Built-in seats are often too hard, too narrow, and too stiff-backed. No one wants to sit on a shelf, especially not for any length of time. Make the seat as wide as a really comfortable chair (at least 18 inches), with a back that
slopes gently (not upright), and put a warm soft cushion on it
and on the back, so that it is really comfortable.
View: Most people want to look at something when they sit— either at other people or a view. Built-in seats often place you so that you are facing away from the view or azvciy from the other people in the room. Place the seat so that a person sitting down is looking at something interesting.
places need to be near each other, for commercial reasons. Second, workplaces destroy the quiet and safety of residential neighborhoods.
But this separation creates enormous rifts in people’s emotional lives. Children grow up in areas where there are no men, except on weekends; women are trapped in an atmosphere where they are expected to be pretty, unintelligent housekeepers; men are forced to accept a schism in which they spend the greater part of their waking lives “at work, and away from their families” and then the other part of their lives “with their families, away from work.”
Throughout, this separation reinforces the idea that work is a toil, while only family life is “living”—a schizophrenic view which creates tremendous problems for all the members of a family.
In order to overcome this schism and re-establish the connection between love and work, central to a sane society, there needs to be a redistribution of all workplaces throughout the areas where people live, in such a way that children are near both men and women during the day, women are able to see themselves both as loving mothers and wives and still capable of creative work, and men too are able to experience the hourly connection of their lives as workmen and their lives as loving husbands and fathers.
What are the requirements for a distribution of work that can overcome these problems?
r. Every home is within 20-30 minutes of many hundreds of workplaces.
2. Many workplaces are within walking distance of children and families.
3. Workers can go home casually for lunch, run errands, work half-time, and spend half the day at home.
4. Some workplaces are in homes; there are many opportunities for people to work from their homes or to take work home.
5. Neighborhoods are protected from the traffic and noise generated by “noxious” workplaces.
The only pattern of work which does justice to these requirements is a pattern of scattered work: a pattern in which work is strongly decentralized. To protect the neighborhoods from the noise and traffic that workplaces often generate, some noisy work
BUILDINGS
Therefore:
Before you build the seat, get hold of an old arm chair or a sofa, and put it into the position where you intend to build a seat. Move it until you really like it. Leave it there for a few days. See if you enjoy sitting in it. Move it if you don’t. When you have got it into a position which you like, and where you often find yourself sitting, you know it is a good position. Now build a seat that is just as wide, and just as well padded—and your built-in seat will work.
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| Once you decide where to put the seat, make it part of the thick walls (197), so that it is a part of the structure, not just an addition—thickening the outer wall (211). . . . |
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| 203 CHILD CAVES |
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. . . the places specially devoted to children’s play—adventure PLAYGROUND (73), CHILDREN’S HOME (86), CHILDREN’S REALM (137)—and THICK WALLS (197)—can be embellished with a special detail.
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Children love to be in tiny, cave-like places.
In the course of their play, young children seek out cave-like spaces to get into and under—old crates, under tables, in tents, etc. (For evidence see L. E. White, “The Outdoor Play of Children Living in Flats,” Living in Towns, Leo Kupcr, ed., London, 1953, pp. 235-64.)
They try to make special places for themselves and for their friends—most of the world about them is “adult space” and they are trying to carve out a place that is kid size.
When children are playing in such a “cave”—each child takes up about 5 square feet; furthermore, children like to do this in groups, so the caves should be large enough to accommodate this: these sorts of groups range in size from three to five—so 15 to 25 square feet, plus about 15 square feet for games and circulation, gives a rough maximum size for caves.
Therefore:
203 CHILD CAVES
Wherever children play, around the house, in the neigh-borhood, in schools, make small “caves” for them. Tuck these caves away in natural left over spaces, under stairs, under kitchen counters. Keep the ceiling heights low—2 feet 6 inches to 4 feet—and the entrance tiny.
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3 to 4 foot ceiling
Build the caves right into the fabric of the walls—thickening the outer walls (211). Make the doors very tiny to match the caves—an extreme version of low doorway (224). . . .
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204 SECRET PLACE
. . . and here is a finishing touch to the thick walls, perhaps even to the low ceilings—thick walls (197), ceiling height VARIETY ( I 90) .
Where can the need for concealment be expressed; the need to hide; the need for something precious to be lost, and then revealed ?
We believe that there is a need in people to live with a secret place in their homes: a place that is used in special ways, and revealed only at very special moments.