Samuel Bensemann and Gavyn Wilson, “Practice Domestic Architectures: A Survey and Speculation on Subversive Spaces”
Mentor: Samantha Schuermann, Architecture, Architecture & Urban Planning (School of)
Poster #72
This research aims to investigate a curious architectural type nearly lost to history and susceptible to being forgotten by posterity: the practice cottage. There exists little documentation considering its ubiquity in the early-mid 20th century. How can this type, originating from the home economics (HE) movement, be documented, celebrated, preserved, and recontextualized using architectural analysis? By challenging preconceived notions of HE as sexist, regressionist, and disabling, this analysis attempts to reposition HE and the practice cottage as sites of both gender and racial subversion. In 1919, the term “practice cottage” was first used in the annual report of the Federal Bureau for Vocational Education (FBVE), funded by the Smith Hughes Act of 1917. After the passage of this act, dozens of single-family homes were constructed on college campuses for HE departments. They were described as “fitted up as an average home… in which the vocational students carry on all of their work.” Cohorts of young women, led by female faculty, would live and work at the house, a 1:1 laboratory for care work skills. These buildings subverted the typical understanding of a heteronormative, single-family home, becoming a space for and by women, without male oversight. Under the guise of preparation for the ultimate, stereotypical female role–homemaker–these buildings supported unconventional relationships, communal living, and higher education for women, a type of quiet liberation. This research proposes a cohesive survey of the practice cottage, utilizing archival architectural documentation along with relevant government reports. The project will produce a congruent drawing collection, 3-d digital models, and written analysis, uncovering latent social and spatial relationships. This research suggests that looking towards a radical past might provide insights into potential futures. In our increasingly complex contemporary context how might the field reconsider “practice” domestic architectures as sites of subversion and liberation?