A Spatial Diorama: The Act of the Interior

Timeframe: 2017

We propose that interior design should be presented more as a transitional act or staged performance than a static spatial practice. Stage design and the dramaturgy of performance utilise many temporal and spatial place-making techniques that enrich the deployment of narrative experience. We advocate a new theatrical consideration of interior mobility through the exploration of spatial location and fluidity of performance in relation to site. Whilst recognising the lithe flexibility that interior design can offer, there are deeper, more human instincts that can be learnt from stagecraft and its performative and interpretive narrative. This spatio-performative nexus will empower the interior, draw together the sequential dynamics of performance structure and craft new interpretations of spatial enclosure where future interior experience will be found. Using the compositional methodology of theatrical performance, the interior will be considered as a series of permeable and semi-permeable scenes defined by the membranes of the built environment; which cohere the interior narrative. These spatial arenas form as a series of spatial ‘acts’ that seal, protect and build experience in the interior. This will encourage interiors to become more transient, portable and interchangeable; building the moments of the interior journey through the performance of interior participation. We define a new compositional theory for the interior, supported by diagrammatic and photographic scenarios which demonstrate the sequential interior narrative of the five-act play.