Middle-class housing as a cross-cultural and multi-disciplinary project. Rethinking critical, interpretative, and methodological frameworks

After the two 2022-issues of the Docomomo Journal, number 66 on ‘Modern Plastic Heritage’ and number 67 on ‘Multiple Modernisms in Ukraine,’ this issue reveals another chapter of an often and diversely described theme of Modern Movement and a pressing subject worldwide: Housing. Docomomo International has published continuously on housing issues, and the bi-annual international Docomomo conferences (IDC) have also addressed the topic of housing in many different ways. In 2000, Docomomo Journal 221 highlighted some of the iconic ‘Modern Houses,’ and in 2008, an overview of ‘Postwar Mass Housing’ as a “building type afflicted by large-scale redundancy and unpopularity” (Glendinning 2008, 5) was presented in Docomomo Journal 392. More recent editions, such as Docomomo Journals 64 and 65 (2021)3 entitled ‘Modern Houses’ and ‘Housing for All’ took on a different perspective, discussing the house as “the place of home, the world and container of the everyday individual and family life” (Noelle and Torrent 2021, 4). And finally, Docomomo Journal 51 (2014)4 on ‘Modern Housing. Patrimonio Vivo’ and Docomomo Journal 54 (2016)5 on ‘Housing Reloaded’ discussed the heritage values and the “progressive shift towards the practice of maintenance” (Graf and Marino 2016, 5), dealing with the conservation and rehabilitation of large housing estates.