Kulttuurien kohtaamisia asuinympäristössä: Arjen kulttuurisen monimuotoisuuden huomioiminen kaupunkiasumisen suunnittelussa

Housing as a phenomenon connects us to the social and material world around us. Housing is not confined to the dwelling, rather it is localised in the broader context of the various spaces, services, actors, and communities in the living environment. From an operational point of view, housing takes the form of various everyday practices and the solutions designed to achieve them. In addition to the physical factors in the living environment, there are cultural factors that give housing an essential dimension of meanings: what the different spaces and the activities they perform mean to us as individuals and communities. In the sphere of housing design, we are still lacking sufficient understanding of how these cultural factors should be considered in design. Finnish housing design has had a strong ideal of universality and equality, which has been implemented particularly through the functional dimensioning of apartment space, following the tradition of functionalism. Today, the cultural diversity of everyday life, which is increasing in urban housing contexts, is challenging these ideals and their implementation in a significant way. Residential areas can be said to have become arenas of cultural encounters, where both segregation as a negative phenomenon related to diversity, and the potentials for community and integration – seen as a positive – are located.

This study examines the consideration of cultural diversity in everyday life in residential areas as part of urban housing design. On the one hand, the analysis focuses on renewal projects implemented in Finnish multicultural neighbourhoods, their objectives, planning processes and solutions, especially from the point of view of residents' rights. On the other hand, the focus is on shared spaces enabling encounters in the living environment and their potential to integrate a diversity of residents and prevent segregation. Research methods include interviews, workshops, participatory observation, spatio-functional analysis, and interdisciplinary interpretation of experience-based data.

The results highlight two key definitions, a politically informed interpretive de- sign, and an expanded understanding of housing needs, which respond to the identified needs for reform in design thinking. The results also include new concrete means of taking cultural diversity into account in the design and research of urban housing.