Back in August last year, The British Council put out an open call for entries to curate the British Pavilion at the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale. Citing the Biennale’s Artistic Director, Chilean architect Alejandro Aravena (winner of the 2016 Pritzker Prize), the British Council reflected on the theme Aravena had set, “Reporting from the Front”. The provokation: to improve living conditions at large and present works “that by balancing intelligence and intuition are able to escape the status quo.” The British Council also added their own proviso to that of Aravena’s: they were looking for proposals that “contribute an acute observation of contemporary British architecture.”

Designers/critics Jack Self and Shumi Bose, of the charitable foundation Real Estate Architecture Laboratory (REAL), and teacher, writer and curator, Finn Williams, the “architect-turned-planner” founder of Common Office, responded to the callout and in November were informed that their entry, entitled “Home Economics”, had won favour with the judges and that the trio would be the British Pavilion’s youngest ever curators.

Curating an exhibition that seeks to provide “an acute observation of contemporary British architecture” is something of a regular practice for Bose and Self, whose mission at REAL is to “conduct original research to promote innovation in the built environment.” The duo are also in the process of launching a bi-monthly magazine about architecture and spatial practice, the Real Review. Williams’ work has been exhibited at the 10th Venice Architecture Biennale, Tate Modern, Berlage Institute, Architecture Foundation, and more.

Their union will interrogate and observe British culture through an architectural lens. Together the curatorial team aims to bring bring tackle the current housing crisis afresh by reevaluating domestic life as it is today.

The curators chose to divide their exhibition up into five rooms that correspond to measurement of time; hours, days, months, years and decades. Bose, Self and Williams then selected other art, architecture and urbanist practices to develop each time measurement: art collective Åyr will handle days, publisher Black Square and urban architect and design consultancy Dogma will cover months, sole practitioner Julia King (winner of the AJ 2014 Emerging Woman Architect of the Year and known for her work questioning the need for architecture in the developing world) will take on years, and architectural practice Hesselbrand will work on decades. Bose, Self and Williams will take on the first room dealing in hours.

I spoke with the curators about "Home Economics" and their motivation to bring domestic architecture, economic realities and socio-cultural concerns together for the Biennale.we wanted to approach those practitioners who would be prepared to question the very notion of ‘home’ itself, rather than foregrounding particular built projects.

Putting Home Economics together as an exhibition:

You propose five new models for domestic life, segmented by time—based on this criteria, what was your process in selecting artists for the exhibition? Did you select artists before or after an overarching agenda was set?

Shumi Bose: If I recall correctly, we first came up with the “lens” of time in order to interrogate the critical subject of viable, future-facing models for British domestic architecture. We were looking for something universal and internationally legible in order to look at this topic, and to challenge the notion of “home” at large, not only in Britain. Having done this, we drew up a shortlist of practitioners whom we would ideally love to work with, on the basis of their work within and on the edges of architectural practice. As housing is an urgent topic at the “front line” of British architectural culture at the moment, there are many offices designing and delivering innovative schemes within the constraints and pressures of the present moment. However, rather than highlighting the existing work of particular practices, we wanted to approach those practitioners who would be prepared to question the very notion of "home" itself, rather than foregrounding particular built projects. For "Home Economics", we wanted a challenging, internationally diverse and critically ambitious group of collaborators, bolstered by industry advisers and partners. And we are delighted to report that everybody we approached happily accepted our invitation to work with us.

Background to "Home Economics":

What are the common attributes and goals between REAL Foundation and the thrust and representation of concepts for "Home Economics"?

Jack Self: There is nothing natural about “tradition” and nothing “normal” about social norms. A hundred years ago the mortgage was only for the rich. Fifty years ago cooking was a menial chore, not an elitist pleasure. Ten years ago we didn’t have the iPhone or mobile internet access. Architects will understand how these developments are reflected in the design and financing of the home, and also how these things shape social ideas about normality. We can say that the design of the home is the design of the family, and thus society.

One important ambition of this exhibition is to remind architects of their power to shape the world through models of housing, as well as bring this idea to the broadest audience possible. Many people are oblivious to the fact their opinions and lifestyles are a product of their home. By proposing radical alternatives to the status quo, we hope to influence popular attitudes to housing. The REAL foundation is an institutional partner with the project, so it is closely tied, and "Home Economics" stems from the same interests.

Can you explain a little about working as a team of curators—what does each member bring to the team?

Shumi Bose: We all share many common concerns and interests in terms of domestic architecture, economic realities and socio-cultural concerns while at the same time possessing individual expertise and varied experiences. Finn's work within the British public sector, through his roles in local and city government, has been fundamental for us in understanding the gritty processes and political concerns behind delivering housing, and in negotiating relationships with developers and other industry professionals. In addition, he is an architectural designer with extensive experience in commenting on the quality and viability of domestic architecture both in London and abroad.

Jack’s skills are remarkable in terms of combining rigorous intellectual and theoretical critique with his talent and ambition as a young architectural designer. His commitment to projecting moral values through, or rather as, architectural propositions, has been fundamental in shaping and tuning not only his own design contributions but also those of the other participants. In addition, his practical design skills, in collaboration with our exhibition and graphic designers, have enabled the delivery of the exhibition to a large extent.

Finally, my own contribution is probably in two parts; firstly, my roles in studying and teaching the history and theory of architecture, with a particular research focus on the impact of economic and financial conditions in the UK. Secondly, having previously worked as a curator at the Venice Biennale (2012) as well as other venues, I have some experience in convening, conceptualising and collaboratively delivering architectural exhibitions, events and publications at this scale, to broad international audiences.Perhaps the most important spatial sensibility is the treatment of the interiors as 1:1 “models”—full-scale domestic settings, but abstracted to their essence.

What architectural / spatial sensibilities have been brought to bear in the design of this exhibition?

Jack Self: Perhaps the most important spatial sensibility is the treatment of the interiors as 1:1 “models”—full-scale domestic settings, but abstracted to their essence. When we look at design imagery today it is often hard to separate “lifestyle” from the architecture. It all blends together. But when we make models—out of grey card, for example—we don’t put in every tiny detail. That looks kitsch. We only make the architecture, and we are forced to think about the core message of the project. That is what we have done in "Home Economics".

Finn Williams: This process of shrinking down then scaling back up has been an important way for us to distil quite complex ideas in a short space of time. We’re well aware that visitors will approach the pavilion with different levels of knowledge and interest. Some will only be there for seconds, some for minutes, and some for hours. Our architectural approach has been about trying to maintain what we’ve been calling an “economy of attention”.

On the global scope of "Home Economics":

You often speak of “precise regionalism”, does this exhibition speak solely of a British phenomenon?

Finn Williams: Today it’s not possible, or relevant, to talk about phenomena affecting the British home in isolation from the rest of Europe, or the world. Many of these forces are the result of a blurring of national boundaries—whether that is through global financial investment in residential developments in the UK, a new transnational population who are equally at home in New York, Berlin, Stockholm or London, or our responsibilities to house asylum seekers. We are trying to understand these phenomena through a particularly British lens—for example in relation to the cultural history of the British home or present trends in London’s development. That hopefully means the exhibition has a relevance beyond the UK.

Jack Self: Finn is exactly right. One good way to think about it is through neoliberalism. In a sense, there is no such thing: it is very different in the US from the UK, or Chile, or China, or Singapore. And because it always takes a different form, it is only when we really understand our own context that we can compare, grasp the global process and thus the core of the ideology.

Shumi Bose: And yet, there is a relationship to the home, especially on the level of individual status and the issue of home ownership (that is to say, linking the idea of dwelling to economics through the notion of private property), which is a particularly British phenomenon. While Finn and Jack are completely right in linking our theme to global trends of neoliberalism, there is a historical specificity to the idea of the home which is rooted in British culture—the home as castle, as a symbol of security and status, which exaggerates these conditions.

What’s the ideal audience for this exhibition in terms of “getting things done?”

Finn Williams: We have worked closely with the development industry in the UK—housebuilders, housing associations, local authorities and estate agents—to develop our proposals. And some of these partnerships are already resulting in live projects that have a good chance of being built. We’re also planning to hold events throughout the six months of the exhibition that continue this wider dialogue with the industry.

At the same time, of course, we realise that the primary audience of the Venice Architecture Biennale is architects, and we want to challenge assumptions about the limits of an architect’s power to determine how things happen on the ground. We’re interested in the influence of bureaucratic apparatus like the Terms & Conditions of Airbnb, the semantics of a mortgage, or the lifespan of product warranties, on the design of the home. But rather than seeing these as constraints, we want to show these as fields where architecture can expand its agency.the housing crisis is really what anyone wants to make of it. It’s being used as a convenient justification for a myriad of agendas.

Architecture and politics within the UK's housing crisis:

Is this exhibition suggesting that we need to reach beyond capitalist politics and feudal landownership in the UK in order to resolve “crisis”?

Finn Williams: If you're talking about a housing crisis in the UK, you have to start by asking “whose crisis?” For tenants and first-time buyers, it's a crisis in affordability. For the current government, it's a crisis in ownership. For housebuilders, it's a crisis in viability. Architects might say it's a crisis in quality while many housing charities would say it's a crisis of inequality. The cliché is that in every crisis there is an opportunity—so the housing crisis is really what anyone wants to make of it. It’s being used as a convenient justification for a myriad of agendas.

For us, too much of this debate uses the shorthand of housing numbers, without questioning what is really happening to the home itself. We use words like “units” and “products” and talk in terms of supply and demand. But it can't be right for anyone to assume that the solution is simply quantity when the way we are living is changing so fundamentally.

Does architecture need to lose some of its “mystique” in the eyes of the public in order to fully succeed in communicating its worth as a humanitarian and social good?

Finn Williams: I’m not sure architecture has much “mystique” left in the eyes of the public in the UK. You could see that as the result of past generations’ attempts at building housing as a humanitarian good failing, for a number of reasons, to live up to their social aspirations.

If you look at how architecture is presented in the public eye today, it’s through TV programmes like Grand Designs, £100k House, or Building Dream Homes. The minority of architects who tend to exhibit to other architects at exhibitions like the Venice Biennale might like to think the profession still has some mystique. But for the majority of the British public, architecture has been reduced to the role of increasing the value of private property. Of course, we want to change this. But that means taking a different political stance that challenges the role architecture is expected to play in the built environment.

After the Biennale, where in the UK might this exhibition head for maximum impact?

Finn Williams: We’re still in discussions about the afterlife of "Home Economics", and where it could go next. We can see benefits in hosting it at an institution with a large public audience, as well as taking it out into the city and, for example, presenting it as an alternative marketing suite or showhome. At this stage, we’re open to suggestions.

Shumi Bose, Finn Williams and Jack Self, thank you.

This interview is part of Archinect's special May 2016 theme, Help. How can architecture create more equitable societies? Our open call for humanitarian design work ends May 22 – click here to submit.