Service House

The Full Service House

By John Taylor; 27 October, 2005

We think it a little thing but failure to take time for silent
reflection and actively engage in disinterested consultation has big
consequences. I do not hold with conspiracy theories for modern ills,
they are nothing more than neglect, insidious sins of omission. Lack
of spiritual courage, spiritual solitude, and spiritual planning, add
up in no time to horrors, blatant tragedies that the mind cannot
otherwise comprehend. A startling historical example is the phenomenon
of genocide. One of the first modern genocides was the destruction of
the Indians of California. Nobody said, "Hey, let us go and wipe them
out." They did not have to, the usual neglect of essentials,
neglecting understanding of common humanity, neglecting to prosecute
those who wronged and enslaved the Indians, that was all it took to
have them virtually wiped off the face of the earth in less than a
decade.

Neglect is a more than adequate explanation of how this architectural
jungle we call the modern city came into being. Experts too
specialized in ivory towers forgot how to consult with other mavens
and the public at large. Buildings and districts split up and a horrid
spatial reductionism divided and conquered our humanity. Neighborhoods
segregated, subdivided off from the rest of the city. Formerly diverse
and vital communities cut off into disparate residential districts,
offices, industrial areas, commercial zones, etc. As a result industry
felt free to pollute as much as was convenient and the health of
suburban residents declined as labor saving devices gave them no
reason ever to use their hands to do anything or their legs to get
anywhere.

In the 1960's there was a massive, worldwide youth movement rebelling
against the "machine," hierarchical, monolithic power structures
implicated in the Cold War. Unfortunately a ready made, networked,
egalitarian alternative was not in the offing. Eventually abuse of
drugs, violence and other excesses by student revolutionaries led many
to seek out alternatives. Some sought retreat by going "back to
nature." People changed how they dressed and how they ate. Many went
off into the wilderness to live as hermits; others followed in the
footsteps of religious monastics by experimenting with communal
living. Their ideal was a leaderless community run by common consent,
a true democracy. Needless to say, not many communes survived an
initial burst of enthusiasm. Those few that did had strong leaders,
often more autocratic than old-style leaders in the society at large.

The inheritors of the commune movement turned out to be Danes and
other Scandinavian architects and planners, who erected entire housing
blocks using communal principles. Indeed, the evolution of communal
dwellings, known as the Kolletivhus, had already started going in the
early 1950's. In his history of housing, Norbert Schoenauer writes,

"One of the first postwar Danish collective houses, Hoje Soborg (1951)
designed by architects P. E. Hoff and B. Windinge, was built in a
Copenhagen suburb, Gladaxe. The 120 dwellings of this five-story
elevator serviced building ranged in size from one to four rooms.
Apart from a doorman, collective services included a common dining
room with central kitchen catering, housekeeping services, a
children's center serving all age groups, two guest rooms for tenant's
visitors, and, at the roof level, common party and meeting rooms with
access to a terrace garden." (6000 years of housing, by Norbert
Schoenauer, WW Norton & Co., New York, 2000, p. 460)

The evolution of collective or communal housing continued until by the
late 1970's an improved version was now called a "service house." One
in development in Stockholm was so popular that it had a waiting list
of 13,000 names. Schoenauer writes,

"Collective habitation is an attractive proposition to many families
and households. A young working couple would find it very convenient
to move into an apartment building where food catering and
housecleaning is available on request. Similarly, a new family,
transferred from their hometown to an unfamiliar city, would find
security in a collective house. Working single parents with preschool
children would benefit greatly from using the in-house day-care and
kindergarten. Elderly couples and retired people too can benefit from
collective services offered in these buildings. In particular, single
people: whether young, middle-aged, or elderly, divorced, or widowed:
are all potential collective house residents who want to live in
comfort without sacrificing their privacy." (Id.)

As a result of the high demand many of these Scandinavian projects
were built too high and large and became overly institutionalized; it
was difficult to maintain a homey atmosphere in a high-rise. In North
America there was little effort to see that these in home services
reached one jot or title further than a tiny minority who could afford
them.

"If Otto Fick were alive today, and he visited an American family
living in a luxury apartment complex like Chicago's River city, a
building with 24 hour doorman service and amenities such as swimming
pool, sauna, exercise room, rooftop party room, and roof gardens as
well as food delivery from an in-house restaurant, he would insist the
River city is a Kollektivhus, although in reality it is a mixed-use
development. In fact, most American luxury apartment buildings offer
services to the residents that are similar to those of collective
habitation. But Fick's original intention of making similar services
accessible to moderate or lower income groups remains just a dream."
(Ib., 460-462)

This dream I share with Fick; I long to see a collective or service
house attractive to both rich and poor. Every service house in every
part of the world should have the same facilities built in and offer
the same range of collective services, such as communal gardens,
kitchens, dining and childcare, cleaning services delivered the home,
and closely available, participatory education and entertainment. Such
flexibility and universality should be the goal of the structure of
mound architecture. The chief problem so far with service houses is
how to maintain both unity of thought and economic viability. As for
the latter, Schoenauer writes,

"Experience shows that moderate sized collective house, with 60 to 100
dwellings and collective services limited exclusively to residents,
may be desirable from a social point of view but unrealistic
economically. Moderate sized collective habitation is only viable if
the residents are willing to operate it communally, as is the case in
low-rise communal houses such as Bofaellesskaber, in Denmark, or in a
mixed-use apartment building where collective services are provided by
in-house commercial outlets." (Ib., 460)

I see no reason not to have both communal services and commercial
enterprises operating simultaneously in what is being called
"co-opetition" (cooperative competition, where rivals participate in
agreeing upon common standards, a phenomenon now restricted to the
world of high technology corporations). It would be easy to tweak
residency rules to enforce economic and racial diversity, and give
various credits and funding to those who find ways to contribute.

A rich or employed resident might pay cash for services in order to
save time and effort, for example to have a fresh salad served each
day. Meanwhile the poorer residents of a service house might
participate full time in the growing, preparing or serving of that
salad. The essential is that everyone have not only equal access to a
standard, high quality diet with all proper nutrients -- that is, a
salad with every meal -- but also all should have their own
productivity increased by having access to all the time saving devices
and services presently available only for the very rich.

In a healthy service house neighborhood there would not be as hard a
division between employment and unemployment, between working and
being retired or disabled. A person who loses his or her job would
make ends meet just by spending more time in neighborhood collective
gardens, kitchens, shops or other facilities. Subsistence living in
cooperative services would be a last resort for the skilled and a way
to enter into the community for the interloper and immigrant. service
houses so that all would have access.

The big wrench in the works for communal housing is political; it is
very hard for a group of varied opinions and outlooks to arrive at a
democratic decision. The few communal projects that have endured have
very little diversity. Schoenauer points out:

"Communal housing groups seem to function best, and with less
friction, if their members share similar values and have similar
backgrounds. This is one of the reasons they are so successful in
Denmark, a country with a culturally homogeneous population. It is
tempting to compare the members of communal housing to a large
extended family or a clan, but there are two basic distinctions: (1)
membership is voluntary, and (2) there is no patriarch or leader and
all important decisions are made democratically." (Ibid., 466)

While everybody likes the ideal of a full participatory democracy, in
practice consulting is slow drudgery, consuming much time and energy
and -- let us face it -- it is extremely boring for most people most
of the time. Participants who try to spice up the deliberations only
stir up contention, which tears away the roots of the whole tree. This
is a huge problem, one that has to be approached from several angles.
My point is only that we cannot neglect it, as the poor Californian
Indians were neglected. Indeed, aboriginal peoples and their
traditions of small informal consultation may make them a great
resource for learning to love democratic problem solving. This is a
point that Schoenauer refers to in summing up the educational
advantages of one experiment in communal housing, Bofaellesskaber.
Here,

"First, individuals have the option at all times either to enjoy the
privacy of their own homes or to engage in social activities the
community's common areas. Second, these residential communities foster
voluntary social interaction as well as social and environmental
responsibility; most communities practice composting and recycling.
Last, but not least, they foster first-hand experience in harmonious
communal living: not unlike members of band-type food gathering
societies, they learn to compromise after realizing that what is good
for the individual may not always be in the best interests of the
community." (Ib., 466)

--
John Taylor

badijet@gmail.com