Tallinn, Estonia
Work will become increasingly decentralised as emerging economies, networks and organisations disrupt the status quo, demanding alternatives to both traditional work spaces and the housing models that support them. The distinction between the home and the office will become ever more indeterminate, and this future requires not just domestic spaces that double as work spaces, but an architecture that can enable a multitude of tenants and uses to coexist.
Domestic Work envisions the transformation of an urban area in Tallinn to establish an architecture that can be continually optimised for these new paradigms. Occupying a blurred boundary between ownership and rent, and between living and working, Domestic Work creates a network of spaces that can be adapted to evolving needs without being restricted by conventional city zoning or building planning.
Investing Domestic Workers will purchase a share of the district rather than an individual property, providing the initial capital for construction while incentivising communal stewardship of the area as a whole. A highly adaptable plan will provide a multitude of possibilities for living and working, from micro-apartments to family homes, co-working spaces to studios, all organised around a central spine of double-height shared spaces that mediate between tenants of all kinds. Private units may be small, but provide access to a much larger set of spaces that occupy a gradient from private to public. Additional liminal spaces can be rented on a short term basis, reinjecting revenue into the district as a whole.
Domestic Work captures value in the district as a whole rather than in specific properties, providing the benefits of the sharing economy without the reliance on a committed and active community. The project redefines an architecture of both Domesticity and Work, by enhancing the liminal space between them.
