ABSTRACT
Architecting homes requires the involvement of families/residents during the design stage in considering the home as a mental idea and notion of life, before constructing it physically. Architecture as a practice tends to focus on the search for the optimum way to attend to people's needs. Architecture remains as a field of exploration and inquiry through individual experiences. This chapter offers the work of three architects representing different social and cultural contexts in three chronologically ordered attempts at socio-spatial architecture in the twentieth century: Hassan Fathy, Christopher Alexander, and Peter Hubner. Hassan Fathy's central argument that architecture has been associated with people's culture and customs is apparent in his book, Architecture for the Poor. In Mexicali, the government asked Alexander to run a project for low-cost housing and every group of five families was given a collective plot of land.
