A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems.Schoenauer, Norbert (2000). 6,000 Years of Housing (rev. ed.) (New York: W.W. Norton & Company). Houses use a range of different systems to keep precipitation such as rain from getting into the dwelling space. Houses generally have or locks to secure the dwelling space and protect its inhabitants and contents from or other trespassers. Most conventional modern houses in Western cultures will contain one or more and , a kitchen or cooking area, and a living room. A house may have a separate dining room, or the eating area may be integrated into the kitchen or another room. Some large houses in North America have a recreation room. In traditional agriculture-oriented societies, domestic animals such as chickens or larger livestock (like cattle) may share part of the house with humans.
The social unit that lives in a house is known as a household. Most commonly, a household is a family unit of some kind, although households may also have other social groups, such as or, in a rooming house, unconnected individuals, that typically use a house as their home. Some houses only have a dwelling space for one family or similar-sized group; larger houses called or may contain numerous family dwellings in the same structure. A house may be accompanied by outbuildings, such as a garage for vehicles or a shed for gardening equipment and tools. A house may have a backyard, a front yard or both, which serve as additional areas where inhabitants can relax, eat, or exercise.
The square footage of a house in the United States reports the area of "living space", excluding the garage and other non-living spaces. The "square metres" figure of a house in Europe reports the area of the walls enclosing the home, and thus includes any attached garage and non-living spaces.
The number of floors or levels making up the house can affect the square footage of a home.Humans often build houses for domestic or Wildlife, often resembling smaller versions of human domiciles. Familiar animal houses built by humans include , henhouse and doghouse, while housed agricultural animals more often live in and .
During the 15th and 16th centuries, the Italian Renaissance Palazzo consisted of plentiful rooms of connectivity. Unlike the qualities and uses of the Manor Houses, most rooms of the palazzo contained no purpose, yet were given several doors. These doors adjoined rooms in which Robin Evans describes as a "matrix of discrete but thoroughly interconnected chambers."Evans, Robin "Translations from Drawing to Building: Figures, Doors and Passages" London: Architectural Associations Publications 2005 The layout allowed occupants to freely walk room to room from one door to another, thus breaking the boundaries of privacy.
An early example of the segregation of rooms and consequent enhancement of privacy may be found in 1597 at the Beaufort House built in Chelsea, London. It was designed by English architect John Thorpe who wrote on his plans, "A Long Entry through all".Summerson, John "The Book Of Architecture of John Thorpe in Sir John Soane's museum: 40th Volume of the Walpole Society" England: The Society 1964 The separation of the passageway from the room developed the function of the corridor. This new extension was revolutionary at the time, allowing the integration of one door per room, in which all universally connected to the same corridor. English people architect Sir Roger Pratt states "the common way in the middle through the whole length of the house, avoids the offices from one molesting the other by continual passing through them."Pratt, Sir Roger "Sir R. Pratt on Architecture" 1928 Social hierarchies within the 17th century were highly regarded, as architecture was able to epitomize the servants and the upper class. More privacy is offered to the occupant as Pratt further claims, "the ordinary servants may never publicly appear in passing to and fro for their occasions there." This social divide between rich and poor favored the physical integration of the corridor into housing by the 19th century.
Sociologist Witold Rybczynski wrote, "the subdivision of the house into day and night uses, and into formal and informal areas, had begun."
Rooms were changed from public to private as single entryways forced notions of entering a room with a specific purpose.
By the end of the 17th century, the house layout was transformed to become employment-free, enforcing these ideas for the future. This came in favour for the Industrial Revolution, gaining large-scale factory production and workers.
Technology and electronic systems have caused privacy issues and issues with segregating personal life from remote work. Technological advances in surveillance and Internet allow insight into personal habits and private lives. As a result, the "private becomes ever more public, and the desire for a protective home life increases, fuelled by the very media that undermine it," writes Jonathan Hill. Work has been altered by the increase of communications. The "deluge of information" has expressed the efforts of work conveniently gaining access inside the house. Although commuting is reduced, the desire to separate working and living remains apparent. On the other hand, some architects have designed homes in which eating, working and living are brought together.
In the United States, modern house construction techniques include light-frame construction (in areas with access to supplies of wood) and adobe or sometimes Rammed earth (in arid regions with scarce wood-resources). Some areas use brick almost exclusively, and quarried stone has long provided foundations and walls. To some extent, aluminum and steel have displaced some traditional building materials. Increasingly popular alternative construction materials include insulating concrete forms (foam forms filled with concrete), structural insulated panels (foam panels faced with oriented strand board or fiber cement), light-gauge steel, and Steel frame. More generally, people often build houses out of the nearest available material, and often tradition or culture govern construction-materials, so whole towns, areas, counties or even states/countries may be built out of one main type of material. For example, a large portion of American houses use wood, while most British and many European houses use stone, brick, or mud.
In the early 20th century, some house designers started using prefabrication. Sears, Roebuck & Co. first marketed their Sears Catalog Homes to the general public in 1908. Prefab techniques became popular after World War II. First small inside rooms framing, then later, whole walls were prefabricated and carried to the Construction. The original impetus was to use the labor force inside a shelter during inclement weather. More recently, builders have begun to collaborate with structural engineers who use finite element analysis to design prefabricated steel-framed homes with known resistance to high Wind engineering and seismic forces. These newer products provide labor savings, more consistent quality, and possibly accelerated construction processes.
Lesser-used construction methods have gained (or regained) popularity in recent years. Though not in wide use, these methods frequently appeal to homeowners who may become actively involved in the construction process. They include:
In the developed world, energy-conservation has grown in importance in house design. Housing produces a major proportion of carbon emissions (studies have shown that it is 30% of the total in the United Kingdom).
Development of a number of low-energy building types and techniques continues. They include the zero-energy house, the passive solar house, the autonomous buildings, the Superinsulation and houses built to the Passive house standard.
Houses may express the circumstances or opinions of their builders or their inhabitants. Thus, a vast and elaborate house may serve as a sign of conspicuous wealth whereas a low-profile house built of recycled materials may indicate support of energy conservation. Houses of particular historical significance (former residences of the famous, for example, or even just very old houses) may gain a protected status in town planning as examples of built heritage or of streetscape. Commemorative plaques may mark such structures. Home ownership provides a common measure of prosperity in economics. Contrast the importance of house-destruction, tent dwelling and house rebuilding in the wake of many .
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