Abstract-ish

This thesis examines State houses and their inhabitants as subjects of social ideologies and hegemony actuated by a middle class that once longed for a state house of their own. This shift of both the role of state housing in New Zealand and consequentially society, since its conception at the end of the nineteenth century, preludes the present issues.

State houses evoke more than an architectural typology; they pertain beyond to social signs and stigmas of place and class inciting a unique relationship with its inhabitants. State houses are designed along a guideline based process composed of identified standards assumed from, as defined by the government, a ‘decent home’. This leads one to question the limits of what is encompassed by this term.

This thesis proposes that the formation of a ‘decent home’ is concerned not only with the space within a State house but rather with the social ideologies that exist/form outside of the boundaries of the property and how the relationship between the space within the State house and the social ideologies exists, is formed, and predominantly how they inform each other. It will critique and challenge the current rule-based design process that leads to the production of the stereotyp[olog]ical State house and the corresponding negative social ideologies. It will question the role of architecture in the social practice of State housing from an agent of social change to a language capable of signifying cultural meaning.

It investigates the design process for remodelling/building State houses that will result in the creation of ‘decent homes’ that are both desirable and sustainable to all, negating negative social ideologies generated by the current State house stereotyp[ologi]es. The bulk State housing found in such areas as South Auckland and Porirua, and is neither desirable nor sustainable; this thesis will demonstrate the flaws in the current rule-based process which have resulted in establishment of large state house ghetto-like communities lacking diversity, poor quality construction, standardisation and replication of design. It proposes a new ‘innovative’ design process for the procurement of State houses, this innovative design process challenges the existing rule-based process with the integration of a new ‘agent’ of change into the design process. This agent is the unique physical/built context of site and as an active component in the design process it instates change to the design outcome. This enables the production of unique design outcomes avoiding stereotyp]ologi]es. Additionally it proposes a revision of the role of State housing in New Zealand with regard to the free market and challenges current social ideologies towards State housing.