ARCHITECTURE

DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE

Format: MS WORD |  Chapter: 1-5 |  Pages: 65-80 |  .

DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE

ABSTRACT

The culture of people determines and shapes the domestic space in their domestic architecture. Subsequent modifications of the  idea have focused on more precise  revelations of how the spatial  arrangements of material culture are culturally patterned.  Through a topological analysis of house plans and patterns, collected from the City of Benin, this study detects a  transformation  in the house-type  aspired and developed by people  during the last five centuries.  A group of 1054 houses, located  in four residential zones  in Benin City, Nigeria, has been analysed by means of  frequency distribution,  Space Syntax categories  and factor analysis. The research is determined  to find out how the use, organization and meaning of space in Benin have changed and whether or not there are continuities over the years across the entire City.   The Space Syntax approach is used to measure the varying degree of change at each stage of the evolution. Here, the space-activity interaction is the main idea that enables us to see what underlies the process. As the old  spaces  take different names and functions in the new  design, they bring about the recombination of their activities, and when this occurs repeatedly at each stage, it leaves behind „topological paths from which the direction of the evolution can be measured.  Further examinations reveal that the  space-activity interaction arises both at each partitioned  space and at the collective  space that is closely  related. The analysis of the attitudes and responses of the residents using factor analysis revealed that both socio-economic and socio-cultural factors are responsible for the change and continuity in the domestic space.