Abstract
With recent advances in technology, fundamental changes have occurred in architectural flexibility methods, a great deal of experience has been gained, and many strategies and tactics have been developed in this field. However, a convergence is lacking in these experiences, methods, and tactics, which raises a need for providing a convergent approach in this regard. In this paper, it is going to propose such a model of flexibility. To do this, it is first reviewed the general concepts of flexibility, and provide a short review of its history and its main executional tactics. It is then divided its main tactics into eight main groups of: ‘open plan’, ‘pre-fabricated modules’, ‘similar spaces’, ‘extendable unit᾽, ‘attachment and detachment of adjacent units’, ‘common space between adjacent units’, ‘portable walls’, and ‘retractable furniture in a multifunctional space’. Analyzing these tactics, it is extracted the three fundamental principles of flexibility: ‘soft connection’, ‘diversity and multiplicity of spaces’, and ‘multifunctional space’. Accordingly, this paper proposes a concise rule for flexibility as: ‘soft connections between spaces’ which implies to the three principles if some special attentions are paid. Although the rule seems to be simple, the paper argumentations show that paying attention to what it implies, can produce much more flexible spaces than what is created generally. At the same time, new creative ideas along supported by new emerging technologies can enrich these simple solutions extensively.
Highlights
Flexibility is nature’s fundamental way of adapting to changing circumstances
The study of flexible samples shows the below relationships between principles and tactics:
–– The first principle, ‘soft connection’, has the properties that are applied in tactic 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, as well as traditional samples
Summary
Flexibility is nature’s fundamental way of adapting to changing circumstances. Regarding the continual changing of human life and the occupant needs, flexibility has long been considered in architecture. The multiplicity of approaches to this subject has made a kind of confusion about it Sometimes it seems that reaching flexibility in architecture is an ambiguous and complicated process. This paper believes that the proposed problems have come up partially due to the ambiguity of the subject as well as the multiplicity of applied methods This multiplicity raises a need for providing a convergent approach in this regard. This paper believes that these three principles cover different features of architectural flexibility and can be a suitable base for proposing a comprehensive model in this relation. The main approach of the research is based on qualitative analysis It tries to take advantage of interpretiveanalytic methods to study basic historical and contemporary discussions about flexibility along with analyzing 33 case studies (presented, 1b, and 1c) in order to extract new categorizations. The main tactics of gathering information are evidential and librarybased studies
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