eames houseerin chartrand | 12.06.11 | design theories | evda 621

space

What is the formal logic of space?

Just as the body, the space of the Eames house is very much apart of the bridging between the active home space and the natural space. The space of the home, in one way, can be seen through the windows, that embody the home and the studio which are strategically placed to emphasize this “metronomic approach to closed and open spaces” (Steele, 11). In the house, the “space is not treated as a tangible substance to be contained, or as some mystical, ameliorative substance that would gradually uplift those who experienced it, but as a logical consequence of structure” (Steele, 12).

spacespace as logic

How does your space deal with time and how might this space evolve over time?

The architectural space begins to be defined through various collections that the Eames would accumulate which can be seen in the film House After Five Years of Living. In the Eames House time can be seen through accumulation and change, where change becomes realized in terms of addition and shifting rather than something made to become completely different or altered. Space relevant to object becomes about transition and traces of experience and living. This notion can be related to the Wise reading Assemblage where he refers to such elements and this idea of the collection of things to assemblage that he defines as “a group of fossils that, appearing together, characterize a particular stratum” (Wise, 77). This idea also conveys this constant making and unmaking process that Deleuze and Guattari’s speak to where assemblages become dismantled and the elements with which they are made begin to circulate.

spacespace as object

AS CAN BE SEEN IN THE FILM, HOUSE AFTER FIVE YEARS OF LIVING, THE EAMES HOUSE NOT ONLY TREATS SPACE AS AN AREA, RATHER IT AS A COMBINATION AND COMPILING OF THINGS AND VIEWS THAT MAKES UP THEIR LIVES. WITH THE COLLECTION AND ACCUMULATION OF THINGS DOES SPACE BECOME MORE RICH? MORE CROWDED? BOTH?

ACCUMULATION DIAGRAM

What are the architectural consequences?

Does space begin to be divided through architecture? Are lines of the building distinctions in space? The Eames House being a space that selectively frames views through the transparency of glass panels can in a sense then be viewed as an architectural space that demands a sense of control. Even in plan, the various arrangements of parts can be to provide a similar kind of experiences through such staccato sequence. However, while the Eames House is very particular in placement, providing a level of control over natural light, shadow and view, there is an interplay between the spaces that is left to natural elements which create a dynamic interplay of the controlled spaces creating then an element that becomes uncontrolled through the controlled.

spacespace as consequence

How is space governed?

Every space is linked with every space. Overlapping. Blending. Space exists in a mixture, with transition points, lines and planes where space is constantly being transferred and reversed back. Similar to the ideas from The Smooth and the Striated by Deleuze and Guattari, the space in the Eames House has an interplay between the measurable and immeasurable where the notion of space is about the bridging of experience and the physicality of the home to that of the natural environment of the site. The diagrams are representing space as intensive processes of movement that have subtle shifts in along points that create new space within the space.

spacespace as intensity

spaceWorks Cited

Deleuze, Gilles and Felix Guattari. “The Smooth and the Striated” in A Thousand Plateaus’s. University of Minesota Press, 1997. Print.

Steele, James. Eames House: Charles and Ray Eames. London: Phaidon Press Limited, 1994. Print.

Wise, J. Macgregor. “Assemblage” in C.J. Stivale, ed., Gilles Deleuze: Key Concepts. McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2005. Print.