Design by grammar: an interpretation and generation of vernacular hayat houses in contemporary context

Abstract

This paper explores the application of an informal shape grammar whose purpose is to generate new house designs in the hayat style. The hayat is a large shaded gallery open to the garden. It occupies the most important place in the composition of the house. The study is based on a corpus of eight hayat houses designed in the classic Ottoman style in the 18th and 19th centuries in Sarajevo. In this paper, the emphasis is on the generation of new houses. The informal grammar does not explain the designs in detail but rather generates new house designs by transferring some knowledge embedded in original designs. The generation of a new house type within the grammar proceeds in three steps: (1) primitive hayat house generation, (2) subhouse generation, and (3) house variations.