Title: Rethinking Our Social Housing: An intersectional feminist analysis of UK social housing design

Author: Saorla Hanley

Year: 2024

Abstract: Facing the 2024 Labour government’s new housing targets, this dissertation seeks to investigate how architects can design social housing to better suit the needs of women in the UK through an intersectional feminist lens. Beginning by exploring the problems posed by the current housing crisis, the dissertation homes in on the specific problems faced by women in this context. Following analysis of historical and contemporary approaches to women-centred design, the study then evaluates two case studies: the pioneering Goldsmith Street in Norwich and Brook House in Ealing, the first purpose-built women-only social housing in the UK. This aims to examine current design processes and outcomes, addressing women’s issues that are neglected in housing design. Two interviews with industry professionals (one an architect based in Glasgow and the other a social housing governance assistant in Newcastle) about the issue of feminist design and the challenges faced by social housing architects then embed the study within practice. This culminates in an ‘alternative design guide’ which recommends the employment of participatory methods, iterative design and active advocation for intersectional feminist ethos in the next wave of social housing in the UK.