The Berlage Master of Science in Architecture and Urban Design

Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment

Delft University of Technology

Thesis Project
Plan

The Berlage.
PERSONAL INFORMATION

Name Pratyusha Suryakant

Student number 4519965
Mobile number 0633663778
Private email address pratyusha.suryakant@gmail.com
TU Delft email address P.suryakant@student.tudelft.nl

ABOUT THE THESIS PROJECT

Thesis project title The (mis)mannered manor.

Thesis advisor 1 [name]
Thesis advisor 2 [name]
Thesis project description

The project intends to design new tools for collective living through the lens of propriety.
It assumes the inherent property of elements such as doors, windows, screens, corners, closets, and passages,
to possess qualities of control and emancipation from moral scenarios.
Thesis project site

Old Oak Common, London. An existing Co-Living project by a real estate agency, The Collective Partners LLP.

Thesis project outcome

1:10 detailed sectional perspectives of instances re-staging the motives of P.G. Wodehouse and resetting them
in contemporary situations, and other absurd moments that occur in collective living environments.
Accompanied by a provocative essay/stories establishing events that render the project.

Relevance
In typical contemporary cities boundaries and gradations determine the nature of social interactions. How we
live together in increasingly dense environments is put into question. Since “a good life” is often seen as one
that is led in the company of many, social demeanour then becomes a topical subject. Good manners and bad
manners are still used to discuss social relationships. just as inside outside, upstairs downstairs, are used to
discuss architectural relationships. Architectural thresholds, in these situations, are not very different from moral
thresholds. Social structures and codes of design methods give rise to Hedonophobia and inherent curiosity is
inhibited. Elements such as doors, windows, screens, corners, closets, and passages, that lie between rooms
have qualities that allow them to control or liberate from these social structures. The (mis) mannered manor,
plays on this inherent schizophrenic, contradictory qualities of social etiquette in the public realm.

At medieval feasts, space was at a premium for people looking to dine with lords and ladies, and the long tables
were packed to capacity. In such settings, there was simply no way to prop up your elbows without invading
your neighbour’s space. Additionally, hunching over your plate of food, with your elbows up, made you seem
too eager to eat, like a hungry peasant and not a well-fed member of society. The simple etiquette of keeping
your elbows off the table is an exemplary of the relationship between man, his social status, the space he
currently is in and the ergonomics of that space. The words propriety, proper and property are not as different
as they appear. They all come from the latin root “propreitas”, the etymology thus already establishing a certain
relationship between them. The project will continue to delve into this association and illustrate its architectural
consequences in communal places.

Collective spaces continue to be designed with dimensions of life such as space, light, and pleasures of subtle
kinds of anonymity with a glut of material conveniences and not moral considerations. In contemporary cities
such as London, this is evident in the most generic high-rises. As J.G. Ballard in High-rise notes “a fundamental
premise of collective living is that a new architecture can transform the moral and sentimental lives of human
beings and high-rise was a huge machine designed to see not the collective body of tenants but the individual
resident in isolation”. In attempts of colonising the sky, the appeal of contemporary co-living proposals lie in the
fact that this is an environment built not for man but for man’s absence.

As a myriad of clichés, such as that of The Collective LLP Partners in London, continue to become a reality
there is no provision for the growing atmosphere of collision and hostility that will occur in situations of living
together of allegedly like-minded folks. The urgency of incorporating propriety into the design of these spaces
then becomes a relevant deliberation.As Robin Evans makes a plea for “another kind of architecture that
recognises passion, carnality and sociality, after claiming that, by its very nature, limits the horizon of
experience by veiling embarrassment and closeting indecency” in his essay Figures, Doors and Passages. Can
architecture then redefine mannerism and provide the possibility of expression? Can there be a new propriety
set on interaction with these new contemporary collective spaces?

To problematise this further one need not look too far away in other lands. The fixation with manners and the
incredibly profuse literature of manners are really what has defined the English. While morals are
communicated best through stories, P.G. Wodehouse wrote extensively about Victorian morals that his aunts
and architecture imposed on society. The Blanding’s Castle saga is a flippant light-hearted satire on the
“manor” living harping on absurd moments of conflict and altercations that occur when many types of people
live under one roof. The project will aim to transpose this fictitious model into the new immediate models of co-
living. By re-staging these absurd moments, new anachronistic projections will be made by redesigning
architectural thresholds such as doors, windows, passages for the “manor” of the twenty-first century.
Bibliography of literature, precedents, and references
Bastide, Jean-François De, and Anthony Vidler. The Little House: An Architectural Seduction. Translated by
Rodolphe El-Khoury. New York: Princeton Architectual Press, 1996.

Young, Paul J. “Looking Inside: The Ambiguous Interiors of Le Petite Maison.” In Seducing the Eighteenth-
century French Reader: Reading, Writing, and the Question of Pleasure, 55-83. Aldershot, England: Ashgate
Publishing, 2008.

Evans, Robin. “Figures, Doors and Passages.” In Translations from Drawing to Building and Other Essays, 55-
93. London: Janet Evans and Architectural Association Publications,1997.

Rear Window. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Performed by James Stewart and Grace Kelly. United States:
Paramount Pictures, 1954. Film.

Colomina, Beatriz. "The Split Wall: Domestic Voyeurism." In Sexuality and Space, edited by Beatriz Colomina,
73-131. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1992.

Burgin, Victor. “Perverse Space" In Sexuality and Space, edited by Beatriz Colomina, 219-241. New York:
Princeton Architectural Press, 1992.

Urbach, Henry. “Closets, Clothes, Disclosure” in Assemblage, No. 30, 62-73, The MIT Press, Accessed May
25,2016. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3171458.

Teyssot, Georges. “ The Disease of the Domicile” in Assemblage, No. 6, 72-97, The MIT Press, Accessed May
25,2016. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3171046

Wodehouse, P. G. Blandings Castle. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran, 1935.

Loos, Adolf. "Poor Little Rich Man." In Spoken into the Void: Collected Essays, 1897-1900. Cambridge, MA:
Published for the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Chicago, Ill., and the Institute for
Architecture and Urban Studies, New York, N.Y., by MIT Press, 1982.

Veblen, Thorstein, and Stuart Chase. The Theory of the Leisure Class; an Economic Study of Institutions. New
York: Modern Library, 1934.

Huysmans, J.-K, and Havelock Ellis. Against the Grain (A Rebours). New York: Three Sirens Press, 1931.

Manfredo, Tafuri. L’Architecture dans le Boudoir: The Language of Criticism and the Criticism of Language.
Oppositions 3. Princeton UNiversity. May 1974.

Service, Alastair. 1975. Edwardian Architecture and Its Origins. London: Architectural Press.

Brown, R. Allen. 1976. English Castles. 3rd rev. ed. London: Batsford.

Pugin, Augustus Welby Northmore. Contrasts: Or, A Parallel between the Noble Edifices of the Middle Ages
and Corresponding Buildings of the Present Day. C. Dolman publishers. London. 1841

Tanizaki, Junichirō, Charles Moore, and Thomas J. Harper. 2001. In Praise of Shadows. London: Vintage
Books.

Ballard, J. G. High-rise. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1977.

Structure and method

Wodehouse cleverly uses satire on the country house or manor to demonstrate the role of architecture as a
form of control and escape. The project will try and approach the un-designed live-work/ co-living millennial
communes with this attitude to add more meaning to the spaces and design these ordinary pieces of
architecture.
First the existing information about the co-living building in London will be processed to identify and catalog the
current generic approach to collective living. The images and studies will then be used to re-stage absurd
events and the redesign of the architectural elements to incorporate these moments. Tom Hunter’s ‘Woman
Reading A Possession Order’ will be an inspiration for the method for the re-staging. These will then form a new
set of architectural rules for propriety and impropriety for living collectively.
Preliminary schedule and time planning

WK 35
Compulsory kick-off workshop

WK 36
Compulsory presentation

WK 37
meet/contact experts, continue researching on the bibliography. Reflection and research on questions that come up with
tutors regarding relevance and final product. Also continue to precisely define relation between propriety, proper and property.
case studies/architectural precedents catalog and drawings that show how architects address propriety through architectural
elements.
Rewrite project brief.

WK 38
revisit remaining bibliography for any more references to precisely define the project.
continue designing absurdist architectural events. (such as glass handle if on on turning brings the whole house down.)
define new scenarios/write stories for behaviour or misbehaviour.

WK 39
feed in exert opinions into visualised evidence and new scenarios.

WK 40
develop formal drawings i.e plans sections perspectives.
storyboard for showing the set of house-rules

WK 41
work on text and stories. what should the format of video be? if it is a story? continue finalising drawing elements.
Meet/contact experts for another opinion.

WK 42
Compulsory midterm presentation

WK 43
Reflection and research on conversation with tutors regarding relevance and final product. changes in approach or drawing
style will be addressed again. Revisit case studies and bibliography.

WK 44
Continue developing new narratives and project drawings in tandem.
Deliberate over format of narrative.

WK 45
Continue developing new narratives and project drawings in tandem.

WK 46
Project drawings - with captions, video, subtitles, written declaration of project, any other final products.

WK 47
Project drawings - with captions, video, subtitles, written declaration of project, any other final products.

WK 48
Dress rehearsal

WK 49
E2

WK 50
Presentation postproduction workshop

WK 51
Presentation postproduction workshop

WK 2
Presentation postproduction workshop

WK 3
Presentation postproduction workshop

WK 4
Presentation postproduction workshop
WK 5
E3