COSINESS

Our each collection is based on a certain theme, that was proposed by a person who we started the collection with. Based on those themes we publish posts in various formats that explore the given topic in depth. Each post is a dive into unknown and is open for contribution from your side.

The current digest is written by our friend Bruce as a part of Skyscraper collection that was started by Olya. 

The more still we are, the more personal our spaces get. Our bedrooms are one of the most private environments, they are the most inviting rooms we have. Our guest rooms, however, suppose a higher dynamism of the body which is better supported by light colours in the environment.

Finding the right degree of "invitingness" for the dynamism a space suggests is the key for making a "cosy" space.

Wood

Wood is one of the closest to us materials to create buildings from. We take it from nature to make spoons and plates, furniture and boats, buildings and matches. Wood touches our lives on various scales.

How often are we aware that our table was once a tree? That it was planted by someone for future usage or was grown in the wild and was someone's home. Our lives depend on trees, be it their trunks, the fruits they bare or the oxygen they produce. Our close relationship with trees should be honoured and respected, it is our closest companion and from that comes its warmth.

It also comes from its colours, which are numerous in their own range. It's important not too have too much of wood in a room. In case it's one of the main materials, wood shouldn't make more than 50% of the space. The darker the wood the stronger it's "inviting" our senses, the lesser of it there should be in a space.

It should always be balanced with a lot of light or light-coloured materials, otherwise the material takes over the space, invisibly but strongly asking for attention, creating a very isolated encapsulating space.

Light brings necessary lightness to the heavy material, air to give the space necessary dynamism and flexibility , which will allow it to embrace both rest and intense activity.

Openness and colour

Building a house isn't just about separating some space from its surroundings. One of the best spaces are those that are built keeping in mind that in reality everything is permeable (the Japanese noticed this and used it in their architecture long time ago, read more about it in our previous architectural post ). A wall separates only on a certain level, on a deeper level it is just a filter. Real separation does not exist. Absolute separation means non-existence.

A room that has all of its vertical surfaces transparent, or they are at all absent, requires a special balance. Such space focuses us more on its surroundings. Its floor and ceiling should balance out its openness by being of colours that are opposite to white. Otherwise the dynamism of that whiteness will be pushing outside everything that's inside. Darker colours however will bring a sense of grounding, protection and warmth that only underlines vast outside space.

Height and Width

Stretching a room vertically, making it too high relative to its width, will bring a certain sense of recollection and restrict it to only one kind of activity. You'd rather find yourself leaving those rooms if you want to change your activity. Usually we are not aware that our rooms even have ceilings. We know about them, but we don't notice those surfaces when we are in a room.

Unless it's too high or too low. When low ceilings are pushing us out of a room, high ceilings entice us to go inside. Paradoxically the large "empty" space above your head becomes as heavy as does little space above your head. Maybe that's due to the fact that being much higher than human's height they direct our minds on verticality - hierarchy. Shaping the atmosphere to be purposeful, aimed at giving everyone who's inside the same goal.

Rooms at some universities may have disproportionally high ceilings due to the need of bringing a lot of light, staff rooms at factories are like that because they usually are just part of an enormous space that should fit different machines. European churches are a result of a very strong unifying force as well.

On the other hand making a room with a ceiling that is not too high, not too low allow our minds go where they want to go. It can embrace all people, it doesn't care much about what they should or should not do.

We feel relaxed in a cafe which is more wide than it is high. If we allow ourselves we can stay at it for a long time doing different things: reading, talking to a friend, seeing a family member or just observing other people.

Colour of floor and ceiling.

The darker a surface is, the more it makes us drown in it. The brighter it is the more flashing and distinctive it is and the more it makes us aware of the space around.

White coloured floors make rooms in which it seems more fit to walk than sit. However colours that are "reflective" can be balanced out by "soft" materials. So the softness of white wooden floor can balance out the colour and make that space fit for leisure as well.

Similarly, if a space with white-coloured floor has an area for leisure, that area may be underlined with a darker colour. It can be just changing the colour of the same floor material or putting there a rug.

Metal

A fixed molecular structure of a metal makes its state independent from changes in its surroundings, until a certain level of course. Amorphous materials, on the other hand, are more responsive to changes in its environment.

Being in a room with metallic surfaces gives us a certain feeling of focus and calmness. As do light colours, metal makes us more aware of the space itself and our bodies in it.

It is more fit to stand by a metallic table rather than sit by it. Its fixed structure almost directs a person by it towards accomplishment and achievement. With calmness and with no ambition. It doesn't support wondering or exploring unknown without a reason, as a wooden table would.Where high ceilings might impose a task with domination, metal only supports tasks that you agreed on.

Yellow metallic surfaces, unlike silver ones, bring some warmness to the created focus, however it doesn't allow to forget oneself completely in that space.

Industrial spaces, places where they cut meat, similarly surgeries are extreme examples, they might seem "dead" or sterile, but they are in fact the opposite. They support our lives. Interestingly, honeycomb shape is similar to the crystal structure of quartz.

Maybe that's the deliberation and the focus on now that metals bring makes luxury spaces disseminate them in their interior spaces. However one should alway think of balance and not use too much of it, the focus it brings doesn't go well with relaxation that cosiness brings.

Squared, Round, Heterogeneous

A squared room is similar to a body centred cubic crystal structure. We are so used to rectangular shape of our rooms that we don't notice the effect it brings on us.

Rectangular shape is a natural extension of the way we are used to build our buildings. Also allowing us to easily segment a room into deferent spaces, and use its corners. Would it be as comfortable to be next to a wall in a round room, or would it push us to its center driving off from its edges?

We rarely have our rooms' perimeters heterogeneously shaped, although that would be more close to spaces nature creates. Cages are cavities in stone and earth and they would be one of the first places you would go in the wild if you'd need to protect yourself from the forces of nature.

A heterogeneous shape also would mean that you create a space that is more responsive to the environment around the building, and more responsive to the functions the space you are building should have. A building's shape becomes a consequence of the present forces and the forces you need to have.

Maybe the future of architecture is based on using heterogeneous forms.

Stone

In old times your walls were most likely made of stone. Good stone wall isn't just an isolation from the outside. It's more of a membrane that creates a proper communication between inner and outer spaces. Today we would call it «smart».

Shell rock, for instance, thanks for its porosity is in tune with nature. It can protect you from harmful substances from the outside (even radiation!), create a proper heat exchange, it doesn't burn and it's very good at absorbing sound. The stone has many more amazing properties and none of the modern materials is able to replicate even half of them in terms of being such a good filter.

It is also very friendly to people who build with it. It is very light and can be easily shaped with just an axe. For sure, it also has its disadvantages, but the main word to describe this stone would be friendly. It is like a warm wool coat for your house.

Nowdays a stone wall would be covered by primer and than painted, but sometimes we leave the stone raw naked. Even though it protects us from natural forces, being in such place gives a curtain feel of coldness and a wish for having a fireplace naturally arises. A covered painted wall wouldn't ask for that. But how cosy it is to sit by the fire in a winter night. This connection with nature is something many people have lost living in cities, and something we really need even though we are not much aware of it.

Read more about light, sounds, outside spaces and fullness of space in the next article about cosiness.

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Read our previous post on architecture here.