Illustrated perspective of a large planted courtyard enclosed by a curved, perforated shell, with people playing, sitting and walking.

Theater of Everyday Life

Greg Lynn Studio, University of Applied Arts Vienna

A housing and mixed-use proposal for Madrid that treats identity as performance — courtyards and clusters stage the relationship between residents and visitors.

Year
2019
Type
Render
Role
Co-author
Location
Madrid, ES

This project rethinks dwelling through the notion of identity as performance in everyday life. Taking advantage of the visual connections between housing and mixed uses, it explores the relationship between spectator and performer at different scales and in different realms of social activity.

We created a hierarchy of mixed uses, communal spaces and family units. Each represents a different degree of privacy versus exposure, and a different relationship — between visitors and residents, neighbours and family members — from masterplan to courtyard, courtyard to cluster, and finally cluster to the micro-community of the family.

Two illustrated figures: a performer with a megaphone and a spectator, under the line “We aim to rethink dwelling through the notion of identity as performance in everyday life”.
01 Concept — performer and spectator.
Diagram linking public space, communal facilities and family spaces, with illustrated scenes of people at each level.
02 Hierarchy, from public to private.
Plans showing how mixed use, communal and private spaces are distributed across the building’s levels.
03 Plan distribution.
Courtyard plan with gardens, playground and open-air theatre, and a column of programme labels.
04 Courtyard plan.
Long section through the building: housing floors with red and white façades above a mixed-use base, set in its street.
05 Long section.
Illustrated interior: glass-walled rooms where people meet, read and talk.
06 Interior — semi-public rooms.
Illustrated view from inside a home past a red curtain towards the courtyard shell.
07 Looking out — the home as a seat in the theatre.