Lately I’ve been perusing the home floor-plan websites, dreaming. I really like Christopher Alexander’s ideas on house design, especially the progression of intimacy. In brief, there are parts of the home that are more public (living room, kitchen) and parts that are more private (bedroom, bathroom). A good home layout provides a smooth transition between those spaces or along that continuum. That approach just makes a ton of sense to me. Some floor-plans follow that, and those tend to be the ones I’m drawn to more than others.
Beyond the progression of intimacy, there are some features that I realize I want after all the houses I’ve lived in. I don’t mean fireplace, gas stove, and big kitchen, I mean features more in the sense of software use cases. One of the floor plans I looked at had all the bedrooms clustered together on one side of the house. That’s fine, they’re more private and have a similar level of intimacy. But the laundry room was on the opposite side of the house, near the garage. I primarily use the laundry machines for washing clothes and bedding which are both near the bedrooms! So a useful feature for me is to have the laundry machines near the things that need to be laundered.
I’ll grant that there might be other considerations for the placement of the laundry machines, such as noise, access to plumbing and sewer lines, and so forth. But to me, those are implementation details. And as with software, implementation can influence design, but it shouldn’t override design and usability. It may not be possible to make laundry machines quiet, but you can probably sound-proof the room, or find another solution. Yes, the constraints of good UI make design more difficult, but you’ll end up with a better product.
The other consideration is that not everyone has the same requirements or use cases for a home. It may be that in a house full of young kids, you want them to deposit dirty clothes near the washing machine before they track dirt all the way back to their bedroom. I can appreciate that use case, but it’s not one that I have.
Christopher Alexander was adamant in one of his books that people should design their own houses because only they know how they use a house. I’m certainly finding that true for us: we almost never want fancy sit-down meals, so a separate dining room doesn’t make a lot of sense for us. But, when the weather is nice, I really prefer to eat outside, so a big deck or patio would see a lot of use. We’re both allergic to dust mites, so the ability to clean the house thoroughly is also a consideration. I’m allergic to mold, so the fewer damp corners in the bathroom, the better.
Now, if only I’d had these realizations before we bought a house. But because dreaming about a new house is free, I can consider all the use cases and requirements I have on the functionality and maintainability of a house all I want. And who knows, maybe someday we’ll find an architect who’s willing to work with our requirements and turn my dreaming into reality.