Paper published on proceedings of [in]arch International Conference 2018

Ramadhani, W. A., & Evanindya, F. (2018). Spatial Transition and Segmentation: Speculating Strategies for Post-Antibiotic Future. The Stories of Interior: Multiple Perspectives on Interiority, 243–254. Jakarta: Department of Architecture Faculty of Engineering Universitas Indonesia.

ABSTRACT

Post-antibiotic future is approaching. The overuse of antibiotics, which revolutionized medicine in the 20thcentury, has led to its resistance. Marching along with antibiotics resistance is the rapid degradation of environmental quality. Thus, humans are more vulnerable to bacterial infections, and mechanisms of medication are becoming less reliable. When preventive care is on the front line, the built environment should serve as the threshold of defense in between environmental threats and the human body.

This paper aims to examine the idea of the “dangerous” outdoors and the state of indoors as the antidote. It will continue to explore the current practice of preserving indoor hygiene and speculate responses to future spatial shifts. Forms of segmentation and transitional mechanism in between outside -inside will be the key approach to explore the role of the built environment in guarding human health. In addition, this paper will also look back to the pre-antibiotic era before the 20thcentury, and study the approaches in responding the air and water pollution from the industrial revolution.

A study on different practices of transitional space rituals and segmentations in hospitals will be conducted. Hospitals have different spatial functions with distinguished steps of transitional cleaning rituals in between, depending on the type of threats and the required rate of hygiene. The examination will proceed with speculations of domestic spaces in the future. Will houses in the future need to resemble hospitals’ hygiene requirements? Will there be shifts and additions to spatial programs of a house in response to the post-antibiotic future? Keywords: hygiene, safety, inside-outside, transition, segmentation

Read the full paper here.