ABSTRACT
Chapter 9 explores individual dwellings that were purpose-designed as healthy or ‘healthful’ homes. Following ideas of environmental reform, the domestic sanitation movement of the nineteenth century focussed much attention on living conditions, initially of the poor and working class, but later, on all individual dwellings. Into the twentieth century, scientific and hygienic living could be found on the agenda of professions including medicine, architecture, engineering and domestic science, with the role of women as household managers also seen to be key. Public exhibitions, model houses, books, posters and pamphlets were all used to educate the public on healthy living, with the concerns covering sanitation, dirt, germ control, dust removal, air quality, and healthy bodies and minds expressed architecturally through plumbing, sewerage, hygienic surfaces, kitchens and bathrooms, window design, ventilation systems, sun terraces and exercise areas. This chapter includes houses designed specifically for health from model cottages of the Victorian era to architect-designed modernist houses for individual clients.
