So you want a new kitchen. You have options: you can build one from scratch using materials from the DIY suppliers, get a local craftsman to build you one, ask a kitchens-and-bathrooms specialist to configure one, or you can go to your nearest Ikea store, fill your hatchback with cardboard boxes of bits and build your own. In our last house I built our first kitchen from pine. After about twenty years we got a cabinet maker to build one from birch ply. In our new house we started down the third route and decided it wasn't working for us so took the last option. Turns out the Ikea option is a) cheapest and b) best.
Now this post is not an advert for Ikea nor is it about kitchens. It's about housing. The Ikea kitchen is serving as a kind of metaphor. Here's how....
Park Hill flats were built in Sheffield when I was about 15 years old and beginning to think about architecture as a career path. Quite simply one of the world's best housing schemes, it is has in recent years been rescued from years of neglect, listed, and brilliantly restored and rejuvenated. As the world becomes increasingly urbanised with a majority of people living in cities, the apartment block has superseded the hut, the cottage, the farmhouse, the villa, the suburban house, the terrace, the mansion to become the predominant housing form of our time. What all apartment blocks have in common is that they stack and repeat a limited set of units. Repetition and standardisation have always been features of everyday housing, whether cottages, regency terraces or suburban semis, but it they are taken to the extreme in the apartment block.
Some apartment blocks look ugly, monotonous, dystopian, depressing; some look welcoming, interesting, delightful. It depends on the architect, the client, the budget, the sociopolitical environment, but they all repeat a few similar and complex units - the apartments.
As an architecture student I was obsessive about industrialised or system building - my final year was spent designing a housing system and a scheme using it. But more than fifty years later, system building is the exception rather than the rule, even for apartment blocks or hotels where it's all about repetition. Vast schemes involving hundreds of identical homes are still built using the same techniques and materials as would be employed for a one-off house. An apartment is both simple and complicated. It is a few simple spaces - living/dining area, kitchen, bedrooms, kitchen - but beneath that simple arrangement of walls, floors and ceilings is complexity: wiring, water pipes, drainage, heating, cooling and ventilation systems, lighting, solar control, kitchen and bathroom equipment,... the list goes on. The materials and components used are all industrialised - factory made - but often timber is cut and joined, doors hung, lights, switches and power sockets fixed in place, bricks laid, wires and pipes threaded on site, often outdoors, in baking heat or freezing cold, without shelter from rain of wind, and all by hand, when so much could be done in controlled factory conditions, maybe aided by robots, faster, more economically and with fewer mistakes.
Back to our Ikea kitchen. It is standard. It is inexpensive. It is unique. The units are standard, from a vast range of cabinets, cupboards, drawers, inserts and fittings. everything works well, is well thought out, thoroughly tested, easy to assemble, manufactured by the thousands, and affordable.No DIY enthusiast or even a craftsman could achieve the same combination of ease, economy and efficiency. The worktop and drawer fronts though, are custom made of laminate and plywood. We used Ikea cabinets, drawers and a range of inserts and accessories for their functionality and economy - easily available, easily assembled, well designed, reliable fittings providing craftsman-like results at DIY prices.
We could have gone the full Ikea route with their worktops, doors and drawer fronts and handles but we chose to have purpose-made worktop to exactly fit our kitchen and doors and drawer fronts to our own design following the standard Ikea pattern. Using birch ply and CNC router machining this approach achieved a unique 'designer' look for minimal extra cost.
But the kitchen is a metaphor. What this is really about is housing and the need to quickly build large numbers of affordable homes. We can be sure there is going to be a lot of repetition of similar plans, fittings and installations. We can also say that a wide variety of options will be needed to meet the needs of different family sizes, ages, life-styles, tastes and budgets. And homes, with their kitchens and bathrooms, climate control, lighting, power and communications are always complicated. So far we have a metaphor for the Ikea kitchen system: repetition, economy, variety and options, complexity. Homes, whether row houses or apartment blocks, do not though exist in isolation. They have to fit into a context - a site with its urban or suburban setting, ground conditions, slope, orientation, climate, surrounding buildings, available access, public transport, services and utilities,... Our metaphor is complete: the homes are assembled using a wide range of complex but economically produced repeated units selected by the designers to suit the needs and profiles of the occupants but with custom features and finishes (our kitchen's worktop and drawer fronts) to suit the context - the local environment, urban or suburban aesthetic, flood risk, climate and other factors.
It would be possible to craft an Ikea-style kitchen on site, cutting board to size, drilling fixing holes, screwing on drawer slides and hinges from a DIY store, but why would you? It would take longer, cost more and be lower quality than the Ikea kitchen. So why build homes this way? It makes so much more sense to assemble them from factory-made units - pre-finished and insulated wall or floor panels with integral wiring harnesses, room-sized modules, or kitchen or bathroom assemblies complete with pre-fitted plumbing and fittings. These units could be made faster, more economically and to a better standard in factory conditions and quickly assembled on site to build more homes in less time.
The architect would select and configure units to suit the brief, comply with planning rules and building regulations, take account of the site conditions, terrain, sun, wind and rain, and access and privacy issues, and design or select wall and roof finishes and elements such as lifts and stairs, balconies, brise soleil, plant rooms, bike racks and bin stores to optimise each building and give it character and style. I see this as the best route to high-quality, low-cost, architect-designed social and affordable housing to address the current housing crisis.
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