From Prototyping to Allotyping

Abstract

The chapter analyses the invention and the form of the discourse on building conversion as one particular instance of redefining what a technology is and how it operates. I describe a shift from expert defined closure to lay based openness and tinkering as a shift from prototyping to allotyping: Since the early 1970s, change of use and building conversion have become a central and fashionable discourse among architects and architectural theorists. Before the 1970s, buildings were understood as technologies, as 'society made durable'. The notion of building type was central to link a building to a given use. A bank was a bank because architects applied existing templates, prototypes, to turn a building into a bank. In the 1970s, suddenly buildings became flexible -discursively, since building conversion always existed: 'Building type' no longer was a meaningful link between a building and its use. A bank should not stay a bank, but become a hotel, a theatre or a flat, in short: an allotype. The chapter elucidate this central shift in thinking about buildings and reflects on the special case of allotyping buildings and how it continues to vex thinking about buildings.

POE in Pessac Oral Experiences: modelo para la comparación sistemática de casos de evaluación post-ocupacional en vivienda

“…Los trabajos que referencian el texto de Boudon, Pessac de Le Corbusier o su traducción al inglés Lived-In Architecture, se acercan a este desde ángulos muy diversos. La mayoría de estos hacen hincapié en las transformaciones de la edificación realizadas por los usuarios a lo largo del tiempo (Guggenheim, 2014;Kostourou, 2021Kostourou, , 2022Eloy y Vermaas, 2022), otros tantos lo citan en cuanto al conflicto entre la arquitectura "pura" y lo "coloquial" (Scott, 2008;Mota, 2014;Gosseye, Steady Van der Plaat, 2019;Block, 2020;Benton, 2004), llegando a utilizar el texto como apoyo en la reflexión de lo icónico de la arquitectura (Sklair, 2006). Algunos autores vinculan el texto con las teorías de la arquitectura abierta (open-building), reflexionando por un lado sobre la dualidad entre seriación e individualidad (Mota, 2014) y por otro, sobre la necesidad de que la arquitectura habitacional se transforme y crezca con el paso del tiempo (Benton, 2004).…”

Practicing Sovereignty

“…This orientation draws on a growing body of literature in sociology, anthropology, design research and science and technology studies(STS)thatexpandsthenotionofprototypingbeyondsimply atechnicalprocessforthedevelopmentanddesignoftechnological objects5 (Guggenheim 2014;Jimenez 2014;Kelty 2010;Lezaun and Calvillo2014;Marcus2014;Suchman2000).Researchinthesefields delvesintothesocialandpoliticalroleofprototyping,ortechnologyin-the-making, for developing material forms of participation and democraticpractices.…”