The Home as an Experience: Studies in the Design of a Developer-Built Apartment Residence

The developer-built apartments in Mumbai are advertized as ultimate symbols of iconic lifestyles. Referred to by evocative names, these are self-sufficient, gated microcosms. These advertisements claim uniqueness in terms of amenities; each attempting to outdo the other by projecting a more exclusive lifestyle. They declare: Purchase houses, acquire lifestyles. This paper intends to examine the relationship between lifestyle conception and house composition. A case-study of the design process of an apartment-housing project in Mumbai offers insights into this lifestyle-architecture combination at the moment of conception. The assumption here is that the space and moment of design allow unselfconscious forms to become apparent and be subjected to interrogation. Also, design itself might offer critical positions to view the relationship between where we live and how we live. The results of the case-study analysis point to how new lifestyles require the incorporation of other diverse spaces usually never associated with urban residences. The shape of this lifestyle emerges in the form of the super-built-up space, beyond the individual dwelling unit; the value-addition space that belongs to all and none in particular. A particular lifestyle-architecture configuration also seems to posit specific relations between the individual dwelling unit, the collective apartment and the urban neighborhood. Also brought forth is the underlying assumption of aesthetic congruence between lifestyle and house design.