The Home of The Future
“Recognizing the need is the primary condition for design.”
I’ve been watching some wonderful Architectural Digest design videos lately trying to shake up my Netflix quarantine binge cycles. One series highlights the set design details that went into shows like The Brady Bunch and Mad Men. It’s been really fascinating to see how societal, cultural, and economic changes impacted the styling, layout and function of the home. In recent decades it has been technology, and our relationship to it, that’s most influenced home design. Our devices and apps have made it possible to touch base with home while we spent so much of our time away from it.
Today, it is a microscopic molecule that has not only impacted us societally, culturally and economically, but will surely have impact on the next wave of home designs. Prior to this world pandemic, home was the place we began and ended every day. Sandwiched in between was work, school, gym, shopping, socializing and leisure activities. It was the outside world where all the action happened, but that has come to quite the screeching halt.
Now, all of those activities suddenly have nowhere to happen, so they’ve shown up on the doorsteps to our homes, seeking shelter like an unexpected houseguest who’s given no indication when they will be leaving.
Spending so much more time at homes is definitely making us re-evaluate how we relate to our spaces, and that is always the impetus for architectural and design innovation. The dining room, once reserved for the occasional dinner party is now an office and classroom. The kitchen, once the hub for meal prep is now the hand-washing and package disinfecting station. And can we ever think of the bedroom as the retreat that calls to us at the end of the day when it’s become the “quiet place” for conference calls?
So what can we anticipate? Several designers and architects have weighed in on whether we will continue with the open concepts that have been so popular since the ‘70’s, or if we will see a reorganization of the home layout to offer more privacy when multiple occupants are there at the same time. Some argue that is it easier for a parent to be on a conference call or tapping at the laptop while being able to keep a watchful eye on the children doing schoolwork. Others have countered that open spaces aren’t function specific enough and that the concept of devoted rooms makes more sense. JJ Acuna, founder and creative director of Hong Kong based design studio predicts a shift to the latter, saying “people are going to invest in proper spaces where they can operate businesses from home, to really forge a live-work environment that won’t be disrupted when the next pandemic arrives”.
In addition to changes in layout, I’ve wondered what “amenities” the home of the future may have that are born out of the health, convenience and sanitary practices we’re employing today. Online shopping has made it easier to avoid stores and many of us receive weekly, if not daily, deliveries. Instead of rogue packages being left at our unattended doors, perhaps we will have secure package acceptance chambers (complete with built in UV light sanitation) built into the home. And how about the return of the vestibule, where a discreet hand washing station (and maybe body temp scanner?) can reduce the risk of involuntary infection by guests? Perhaps our washers and dryers will have mask baskets to keep our PPE clean and at the ready?
If these ideas seem far-fetched, consider that the many of the design features in our homes today were integrated as a result of past pandemics and outbreaks. Did you know that closets were an innovation to replace free-standing armoires and reduce dust, which was thought to carry hazardous germs? Did you know the powder room was an attempt to keep delivery people or other guests (who may have been in a contagious home prior to coming to yours) from being able to potentially spread germs to the family bathroom? And never could a sick maid or nurse at the turn of the last century ever have imagined that subway tiles, used to keep walls sterile and easy to clean, would become a decorative staple in our modern day kitchens and bathrooms.
The home of the future is always an attempt to improve the home of the present. We humans are constantly changing and adapting and our houses eventually acknowledge our shifts. In that way, they become records of history and the journey of mankind. Perhaps that relationship is so symbiotic that, whether we realize it or not, we are all participating in the creation of what comes next.
