THE CURTAIN HOUSE

DATE: 12/15/2022 LOCATION: KENSINGTON MARKET WORK: ACADEMIC displaying the splitting between commercial and domestic through the central circulation. Circulation acting as a mediator between the two programs, a space of congregation, not divide

Situated within Kensington Market, the prompt this particular project was to design a “Tower House,” in the sense that we were tasked with designing a house within a relatively small plot of 5x11m, that must not only act as a domestic living space, but also a commercial one, forcing us to build upwards.

Situated within a unique zone of transition within Kensington where commercial blends into residential, my house has a direct split of domestic and commercial space, but with the unique characteristic of trying to assimilate the domestic to be a part of the commercial experience.

The commercial space being a house plant store, the logic was to assemble a series of glass boxes, all offset from one another which divides up the space into private-domestic or commercial while still having a continuity of volumes, and creating stricter divides through an act of “curtaining” over these volumes to create moments of pure transparency or pure privacy.