Housing Solutions through Design: two chapters by Studio 12 tutor Luis Diaz.
Following last year’s housing conference in Liverpool, ‘Government and Housing in a Time of Crisis’, the organisers AMPS (Architecture Media Politics Society) have published a book of selected essays, Housing Solutions through Design. The book features two chapters by studio 12 tutor Luis Diaz alongside essays by Herman Hertzberger, Habitat for Humanity and UK architectural practice Shedkm. The first of the two chapters, ‘Coming Home: Forms of spatial and social identity in British housing’, outlines the historical and theoretical framework for an alternative history of British Housing. This is based on an examination of the entry sequences into housing estates as an arena where the identities of both places and individuals are mutually established. The second chapter, ‘Studio 12: The Quiet Revolution’ focuses on student work produced in 2015-16. Projects by Reuben Harris, Alfie Peacock, Angus Taylor, and Nick Woodward are used to show how the conceptual framework described in the first chapter is applied in studio. An introductory text by Diaz is followed by project descriptions written by the individual students.