When we talk about space, what does this mean? The first thing that comes to my mind is the space in which our planet earth resides in. In relative terms the Universe as we know it is 99.99% space. Even the atoms that make up matter in the Universe are filled with space. When you think about this its pretty hard to imagine what a space this large is really like, and remember, its still expanding.
For me the word space is large area, at its extreme its infinite. For this reason we need an adjective to quantify this. A sports pitch has boundaries, say a football pitch, a rugby, a tennis court, the mind can size this. The game is bounded by lines restricting the game. How about a parking space, again it has boundaries that a car should be placed in, or preferably parked.
An even smaller space is called personal space. It has no clear boundaries but most of us understand the size of it and if uninvited entry can cause distress and reaction. A packed tube train can put this to the test.
Space needs to be sized in some way for the mind to try and understand it. The more we think about space in which our planet inhabits then larger the space gets and the smaller we feel.
How about a house, we try to size this by the number of bedrooms it may have, is it detached or attached? The front elevation may give an impression of a small house but its very deep and walking into it can be surprising. We like to discover space, a garden viewed in one glance is perhaps not as fun as one that needs to be discovered moving along paths where views are hidden by plants and trees and space may not be seen until turning a corner.
The space in rooms serve a purpose, but they are not always matched to that purpose. Its perhaps hard to get a balance as everyones view of the space allocated to each room may be different.
How about a kitchen, most would like this fairly large and modern families now enjoy a host of appliances that need to fit. In fact the idea and use of utility rooms is in fact a kitchen overflow. A living room, a dinning room, a combined lounge diner. Some may like small and cosy, so may like large and functional. In all these cases the space is firmly bounded and for most we feel secure within its boundaries.
We have much to thank or dislike about designers of houses. I can recall my parents 3 bed semi, all its rooms and the functions of each and how we used them, I have 3 brothers. Modern houses seem to be designed better but they feel smaller, gardens certainly are in new builds.
I live in the Forest of Dean, and I am surrounded by space, for the most part this is unbounded.
However we have one room in our house, it will only fit one person and each using it will regard it as there personal space. It has a door, we feel more comfortable with it closed but we use it on a regular basis. In our house its the smallest room we all use, its functional but its small. I'm glad that its small as it allows more space to be allocated to other rooms.
My challenge is creating an image that allows you to see this room but to make the image interesting and to hold your gaze for more than a fleeting moment. My challenge is also to show you how it works but the image I show will make this obvious, everything to be used is within the image and needs no explanation.....well this is what I try to do. Its called many names but its function remains the same. Did you guess the space and function to which I described?
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