A house is a building or structure for human habitation. Houses come in a wide variety of styles and layouts depending on culture and location. Traditionally, houses have rooms for functions like sleeping, eating, and washing. Over time, houses have incorporated new technologies and construction methods. Houses are also built to withstand natural hazards like earthquakes. Legal issues can arise regarding historical houses or new housing developments.

1. House

2. House
A traditional house in Novosibirsk, Siberia, Russia

3. House
A ranch-style house in Salinas, California, US

4. House
"Terem" – Traditional house in European Russia

5. House
A mongolian yurt near the Gurvan Saikhan Mountains
(in the background); part of Gobi Gurvansaikhan
National Park

6. House
A house is a building or structure that has the
ability to be occupied for habitation by humans or
other creatures.[1][2] The term house includes many
kinds of dwellings ranging from rudimentary huts
of nomadic tribes to complex structures composed
of many systems. English-speaking people generally
call any building they routinely occupy "home".

7. House
The social unit that lives in a house is known as a
household. Most commonly, a household is a family
unit of some kind, though households may be other
social groups, organizations or individuals.

8. Etymology
The English word house derives directly from Old
English Hus meaning "dwelling, shelter, home,
house," which in turn derives from Proto-Germanic
Khusan (reconstructed by etymological analysis)
which is of unknown origin.[4] The house itself gave
rise to the letter 'B' through an early Proto-Semitic
hieroglyphic symbol depicting a house. The symbol
was called "bayt", "bet" or "beth" in various related
languages, and became beta, the Greek letter, before
it was used by the Romans.

9. Inside the house
Layout
Example of an early Victorian "Gingerbread House" in Connecticut, United States, built in
1855

10. Inside the house
Ideally, architects of houses design rooms to meet
the needs of the people who will live in the house.
Such designing, known as "interior design", has
become a popular subject in universities. Feng shui,
originally a Chinese method of moving houses
according to such factors as rain and micro-
climates, has recently expanded its scope to address
the design of interior spaces with a view to
promoting harmonious effects on the people living
inside the house. Feng shui can also mean the
"aura" in or around a dwelling. Compare the real-
estate sales concept of "indoor-outdoor flow".

11. Inside the house
The square footage of a house in the United States
reports the area of "living space", excluding the
garage and other non-living spaces. The "square
meters" figure of a house in Europe reports the area
of the walls enclosing the home, and thus includes
any attached garage and non-living spaces. How
many floors, or levels, the home is will play a big
role in determining the square footage of a home.

12. Parts
Plan
Floor plan of a "foursquare" house

13. Parts
Many houses have several large rooms with
specialized functions and several very small rooms
for other various reasons. These may include a
living/eating area, a sleeping area, and (if suitable
facilities and services exist) washing and lavatory
areas. Additionally, spa room, indoor pool, indoor
basketball goal, and so forth. In traditional
agriculture-oriented societies, domestic animals
such as chickens or larger livestock (like cattle)
often share part of the house with human beings.

14. Parts
Most conventional modern houses will at least
contain a bedroom, bathroom, kitchen or cooking
area, and a living room. A typical "foursquare
house" (as pictured) occurred commonly in the
early history of the US where they were mainly
built, with a staircase in the center of the house,
surrounded by four rooms, and connected to other
sections of the home (including in more recent eras
a garage).

15. Parts
The names of parts of a house often echo the names of parts of other buildings, but could
typically include:
 Atrium
 Attic
 Alcove
 Basement/cellar
 Bathroom (in various senses of the word)
 Bath/shower
 Toilet

16. Parts
The names of parts of a house often echo the names of parts of other buildings, but could
typically include:
 Bedroom (or nursery, for infants or small children)
 Box-room / storage room
 Conservatory
 Dining room
 Family room or den
 Fireplace (for warmth during winter; generally not
found in warmer climates)

17. Parts
The names of parts of a house often echo the names of parts of other buildings, but could
typically include:
 Foyer
 Front room (in various senses of the phrase)
 Garage
 Hallway / passage / Vestibule

18. Parts
The names of parts of a house often echo the names of parts of other buildings, but could
typically include:
 Hearth – often an important symbolic focus of
family togetherness
 Kitchen
 Larder
 Laundry room
 Library
 Living room
 Loft
 Nook
 Window

19. Parts
The names of parts of a house often echo the names of parts of other buildings, but could
typically include:
 Office or study
 Pantry
 Parlour
 Pew/porch
 Recreation room / rumpus room / television room

20. Parts
The names of parts of a house often echo the names of parts of other buildings, but could
typically include:
 Shrines to serve the religious functions associated
with a family
 Stairwell
 Sunroom
 Workshop
 Some houses have a pool in the backyard, or a
trampoline, or a playground.

21. History of the interior
Room (architecture)
It is unknown of the complete origin of the house
and its interior, but it can be traced back to the most
simplest form of shelters. Roman architect
Vitruvius' theories have claimed the first form of
architecture as a frame of timber branches finished
in mud, also known as the primitive hut. Philip
Tabor later states the contribution of 17th century
Dutch houses as the foundation of houses today.

22. History of the interior
Room (architecture)
"As far as the idea of the home is concerned, the
home of the home is the Netherlands. This idea's
crystallization might be dated to the first three-
quarters of the seventeenth century, when the
Dutch Netherlands amassed the unprecedented and
unrivalled accumulation of capital, and emptied
their purses into domestic space.

23. Communal rooms
In the Middle Ages, the Manor Houses facilitated
different activities and events. Furthermore, the
houses accommodated numerous people, including
the likes of the family, relatives, employees, servants
and their guests. Their lifestyles were largely
communal, as areas such as the Great Hall enforced
the custom of dining and meetings and the Solar
intended for shared sleeping beds.

24. Interconnecting rooms
During the 15th and 16th centuries, the Italian
Renaissance Palazzo consisted of plentiful rooms of
connectivity. Unlike the qualities and uses of the
Manor Houses, most rooms of the palazzo
contained no purpose, yet were given several doors.
These doors adjoined rooms in which Robin Evans
describes as a "matrix of discrete but thoroughly
interconnected chambers." The layout allowed
occupants to freely walk room

25. Interconnecting rooms
"Once inside it is necessary to pass from on room to
the next, then to the next to traverse the building.
Where passages and staircases are used, as
inevitably they are, they nearly always connect just
one space to another and never serve as general
distributors of movement. Thus, despite the precise
architectural containment offered by the addition of
room upon room, the villa was, in terms of
occupation, an open plan, relatively permeable to
the numerous members of the household."

26. Interconnecting rooms
Although very public,
the open plan however
encouraged sociality and
connectivity for all
inhabitants.

27. Corridor
It is believed that the segregation of rooms and the
initiation of privacy may have been first founded in
1597, England at the Beaufort House, Chelsea.
Designed by English architect John Thorpe, he
writes on his plans, "A Long Entry through all". The
separation of the passageway from the room
developed the function of the corridor. This new
extension was revolutionary at the time, allowing
the integration of one door per room, in which all
universally connected to the same corridor.

28. Corridor
English-German architect Sir Roger Pratt states "the
common way in the middle through the whole length of
the house, [avoids] the offices from one molesting the
other by continual passing through them." Social
hierarchies within the 17th century was highly
regarded, as architecture was able epitomize the
servants and the upper class. More privacy is offered to
the occupant as Pratt further claims, "the ordinary
servants may never publicly appear in passing to and
fro for their occasions there." These prejudices between
rich and poor soon influenced the integration of the
corridor in housing by the 19th century.

29. Corridor
Sociologist Witold Rybczynski wrote, "the
subdivision of the house into day and night uses,
and into formal and informal areas, had begun."
Rooms were changed from public to private as
single entryways forced notions of entering a room
with a specific purpose.

30. Work-free house
Compared to the large scaled houses in England and the
Renaissance, the 17th Century Dutch house was smaller,
and was only inhabited by up to four to five members.
This was due to their embracement of "self-reliance",
distinguishing the dependence on servants and
encompassing lifestyles surrounded by family. It was
important for the Dutch to separate work from
domesticity, as the home became an escape and a place
of comfort. This way of living and the home is noted to
be highly similar to the contemporary family and their
inhabitations. House layouts also possessed the idea of
the corridor as well as the importance of function and
privacy.

31. Work-free house
By the end of the 17th Century, the house layout
was soon transformed to become work-free,
enforcing these ideas within the long future. This
came in favour for the industrial revolution, gaining
large-scale factory production and workers. The
house layout of the Dutch and its functions are still
relevant today.

32. Technology and privacy
The introduction of technology and electronic
systems within the house has questioned the
impressions of privacy as well as the segregation of
work from home. Technological advances of
surveillance and communications allow insight of
personal habits and private lives.[6] As a result, the
"private becomes ever more public, [and] the desire
for a protective home life increases, fuelled by the
very media that undermine it" writes Hill.[6] Work
also, has been altered due to the increase of
communications.

33. Technology and privacy
The "deluge of information", has expressed the
efforts of work, conveniently gaining access inside
the house. Although commuting is reduced, "the
desire to separate working and living remains
apparent." In Jonathan Hill's book Immature
Architecture, he identifies this new invasion of
privacy as Electromagnetic Weather. Natural or
man-made weather remains concurrent inside or
outside the house, yet the electromagnetic weather
is able to generate within both positions.

34. Construction

35. Construction
In the United States, modern house-construction
techniques include light-frame construction (in areas
with access to supplies of wood) and adobe or
sometimes rammed-earth construction (in arid regions
with scarce wood-resources). Some areas use brick
almost exclusively, and quarried stone has long
provided walling. To some extent, aluminum and steel
have displaced some traditional building materials.
Increasingly popular alternative construction materials
include insulating concrete forms (foam forms filled
with concrete), structural insulated panels (foam panels
faced with oriented strand board or fiber cement), and
light-gauge steel framing and heavy-gauge steel framing.

36. Construction
Home
The Saitta House, Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, New York, United States built in 1899 is made
of and decorated in wood.[13]

37. Construction
More generally, people often build houses out of the
nearest available material, and often tradition
and/or culture govern construction-materials, so
whole towns, areas, counties or even
states/countries may be built out of one main type
of material. For example, a large fraction of
American houses use wood, while most British and
many European houses utilize stone or brick.

38. Construction
In the 1900s, some house designers started using
prefabrication. Sears, Roebuck & Co. first marketed their
Sears Catalog Homes to the general public in 1908.
Prefab techniques became popular after World War II.
First small inside rooms framing, then later, whole walls
were prefabricated and carried to the construction site.
The original impetus was to use the labor force inside a
shelter during inclement weather. More recently
builders have begun to collaborate with structural
engineers who use computers and finite element
analysis to design prefabricated steel-framed homes
with known resistance to high wind-loads and seismic
forces. These newer products provide labor savings,
more consistent quality, and possibly accelerated
construction processes.

39. Construction
Lesser-used construction methods have gained (or
regained) popularity in recent years. Though not in
wide use, these methods frequently appeal to
homeowners who may become actively involved in
the construction process. They include:
 Cannabrick construction
 Cordwood construction
 Geodesic domes
 Straw-bale construction
 Wattle and daub

40. Construction
A view
Thermographic comparison of traditional (left) and "passivhaus" (right) buildings.

41. Energy efficiency
 In the developed world, energy-conservation has
grown in importance in house-design. Housing
produces a major proportion of carbon emissions
(30% of the total in the UK, for example).
 Development of a number of low-energy building
types and techniques continues. They include the
zero-energy house, the passive solar house, the
autonomous buildings, the superinsulated and
houses built to the Passivhaus standard.

42. Earthquake protection
One tool of earthquake engineering is base
isolation which is increasingly used for earthquake
protection. Base isolation is a collection of
structural elements of a building that should
substantially decouple it from the shaking ground
thus protecting the building's integrity and
enhancing its seismic performance. This technology,
which is a kind of seismic vibration control, can be
applied both to a newly designed building and to
seismic upgrading of existing structures.

43. Earthquake protection
Normally, excavations are made around the building
and the building is separated from the foundations.
Steel or reinforced concrete beams replace the
connections to the foundations, while under these, the
isolating pads, or base isolators, replace the material
removed. While the base isolation tends to restrict
transmission of the ground motion to the building, it
also keeps the building positioned properly over the
foundation. Careful attention to detail is required where
the building interfaces with the ground, especially at
entrances, stairways and ramps, to ensure sufficient
relative motion of those structural elements.

44. Legal issues
Buildings with
historical importance
have restrictions.

45. United Kingdom
New houses in the UK are not covered by the Sale
of Goods Act. When purchasing a new house the
buyer has less legal protection than when buying a
new car. New houses in the UK may be covered by a
NHBC guarantee but some people feel that it would
be more useful to put new houses on the same legal
footing as other products.

46. United States and Canada
In the US and Canada, many new houses are built in
housing tracts, which provide homeowners a sense of
"belonging" and the feeling they have "made the best
use" of their money. However, these houses are
sometimes built as cheaply and quickly as possible by
large builders seeking to maximize profits. Many
environmental health issues may be ignored or
minimized in the construction of these structures. In
one case in Benicia, California, a housing tract was built
over an old landfill. Home buyers were never told, and
only found out when some began having reactions to
high levels of lead and chromium.

47. Identifying houses
With the growth of dense settlement, humans
designed ways of identifying houses and/or parcels
of land. Individual houses sometimes acquire
proper names; and those names may acquire in
their turn considerable emotional connotations: see
for example the house of Howards End or the castle
of Brideshead Revisited. A more systematic and
general approach to identifying houses may use
various methods of house numbering.

48. Animal houses
Humans often build "houses" for domestic or wild
animals, often resembling smaller versions of
human domiciles. Familiar animal houses built by
humans include bird-houses, hen-houses/chicken-
coops and doghouses (kennels); while housed
agricultural animals more often live in barns and
stables. However, human interest in building houses
for animals does not stop at the domestic pet.
People build bat-houses, nesting-sites for wild
ducks and other birds, bee houses, giraffe houses,
kangaroo houses, worm houses, hermit crab
houses, as well as shelters for many other animals.

49. Shelter
Australia
A modern-style house in Canberra, Australia.

50. Shelter
Italy
A mountain house in Barzio, Italy.

51. Shelter
Forms of (relatively) simple shelter may include:
 Bus stop
 Camper
 Chalet
 Cottage
 Dugout (shelter)
 Gazebo
 Hangar
 Houseboat
 Hut

52. Shelter
Forms of (relatively) simple shelter may include:
 Izba
 Lean-to
 Log cabin
 Nuclear bunker
 Shack
 Tent (see also Campsite)
 Travel trailer
 Umbrella
 Yaodong

53. Houses and symbolism
Houses may express the
circumstances or opinions of their
builders or their inhabitants. Thus a
vast and elaborate house may serve
as a sign of conspicuous wealth,
whereas a low-profile house built of
recycled materials may indicate
support of energy conservation.

54. Houses and symbolism
Houses of particular historical significance (former
residences of the famous, for example, or even just
very old houses) may gain a protected status in
town planning as examples of built heritage and/or
of streetscape values. Commemorative plaques may
mark such structures.

55. Houses and symbolism
Home ownership provides a
common measure of prosperity
in economics. Contrast the
importance of house-destruction,
tent dwelling and house
rebuilding in the wake of many
natural disasters.

56. Houses and symbolism
Peter Olshavsky's "House for the Dance of Death"
provides a 'pataphysical variation on the house.

57. Thank you