Using Old Stuff and Thinking in a New Way: Material Culture, Conservation and Fashion in Architecture

While play is usually marginalized as apart from the real, paradoxically it is also an essential part of human reality. The dominant notion of play as frivolous and opposed to serious work misleads us from appreciating that “play is an essential element of our ontological makeup” ( Fink 1968 ). In fact, the open field of free play is the site of human creativity. Play has long been linked with human culture and the Dutch cultural historian Johan Huizinga, beginning in 1903 and in book form in 1938, described play as culture-building. Huizinga asserted that architecture lacks the play element because of its functional necessities, but by allowing for the ludic in some elements such as the building of tall towers, ultimately he reserves a place for architectural play ( Huizinga 1955 : 167–172). More broadly, by constructing fantastic temporary realms within the mundane, play contributes to cultural life in the architectural game of world-building. The presence of play in architectural design will be explored through Le Corbusier&s;s Maison Domino.