Houses come in all kinds of manners and styles, which vary in cultures in pre-modern times, and are likely to vary even in individuals in our time. But when viewed as a formal configuration, beyond the shapes and dimensions, housing throughout the history, surprisingly, can be classified in a few limited patterns. They include, namely, the courtyard pattern, the inter-connected room matrix pattern, and the pattern of terminal rooms open to a common corridor. This course aims to explore the human relations that are materialized, and indeed animated through these patterns, and the ways in which modern housing is understood against such historical background.

This course introduces various analytical approaches drawn from the nineteenth-century development of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, modern anthropology as well as historical studies to enable students to gain an overview of housing history in both Europe and Asia from antiquity to the twenty-first century. By offering focused and in-depth studies of selected cases in housing history, it complements the courses in architectural history and housing design studios that have been previously taught in the degree of B. Arch Studies. It is assumed that students undertaking this elective have completed previous studies in Architecture.