Ajami : spaces between the street and the privacy of home

Abstract

The thesis investigates, by research and design, spaces which are located between the street and the privacy of home, focusing on the case-study of Ajami; a mixed Palestinian-Israeli and Jewish-Israeli neighborhood in Jaffa, lying on the seashore of the Mediterranean. The houses in Ajami are separated from the street with a sequence of semi-inside spaces, steps and turns in which the privacy of the house is reached gradually as the in-between spaces unfold. While these spaces separate the house from the street they also open, at points, a space for communication between the private and the public. The houses in Ajami reflect a long process of additions, modifications and subdivisions of a once one-family villa surrounded by a courtyard-garden and a wall. The qualities of spaces and movement within the existent buildings were used in the thesis to inspire a building type that was employed in the design of two houses, comprising of thirteen units overall. Behind the relatively simple envelopes of the buildings a variety of in-between spaces are interweaved in the design to form each unit its distinct story of arrival and inhabitation.