Ghost in the shell

摘要

The ideas behind alma-nac's House Within a House stem from a line of investigation begun by its infill Slim House of 2012 and developed in its In-Betweeny House (2017) and Wedge House (2018). The premise is that small housing projects on awkward infill sites can seed big ideas, introducing experimental ways of using space and therefore new typologies that will eventually be explored at larger scale-as demonstrated in the practice's recent retrofit of Paxton House in Croydon to create43flats. Domestic infill projects, the argument goes, offer a better chance for architectural experimentation simply because-in contrasttothe risk-averse development sector- money-making is not always the opening objective.