THE COMMON BATH
Fall 2022
Academic
GSD 1317_Sustainable Commons: The Function of Housing and Urban Mining
Harvard Graduate School of Design
Instructor: Farshid Moussavi
Academic
GSD 1317_Sustainable Commons: The Function of Housing and Urban Mining
Harvard Graduate School of Design
Instructor: Farshid Moussavi
Throughout history, bathing has been understood as a communal, social, and productive activity. Perhaps the most well-known among countless historical precedents is the Roman bath. To the Romans, the bath was more than just what we consider a bath. It was a social and cultural center, integral to the city. A place for not only hygiene but an exchange of information, for exercise, and the mixing of different social classes (entrance was free or cheap). The city of Arles, France, even has its own ruin of a Roman bath, Les Thermes de Constantin. This project seeks to reintroduce, what is in contemporary times considered the very private and personal act of bathing, into a shared and celebrated activity and space, and reinstate a millennia-old social and cultural ritual.
As part of the Fall 2022 Arles, France, options studio abroad, we were tasked with providing a communal living arrangement for 250 people with diverse needs. The housing was to accommodate long-term (families, senior citizens, etc.), medium term (i.e. students, seasonal workers), and short term (i.e. tourists) residents. Through providing a variety of forms of the public bath, it can be an amenity that can accommodate a diverse range of tenants, while connecting this building back to the context. The definition of bathing extends beyond just how we understand bathing, as in hygiene, but includes recreation, health, nature, and more. And with the need for all people to bathe, it is the perfect activity that can accommodate for long term, short term, or medium term tenants, from all ages and walks of life. In this contemporary context where modes of living are continually changing, where the idea of the nuclear family is being challenged, how do you design a collective bath? |