The COVID-19 health crisis has brought about a different consciousness to our understanding of ‘normality’ which has affected all strata of society. And whereas most refer to it as a health, and consequently a financial crisis, it is worth tracing the etymological meaning of ‘crisis’ which defines the word in a vaster sense and is certainly more applicable today than ever.
Coming from the Latinised form of the Greek krisis, it refers to the decisive point or state of things in the progress of a disease, or a point at which change must come, for better or for worse. It is in such moments of crisis where the meaning of ‘essential’ changes. But the question is, essential from whose perspective?
Historically, the built environment has never been separate from public health. For instance, the bubonic plague that began in China in 1855 and, later on, the cholera outbreak pushed urban planners to rethink the urban environment. This changed the design of more things than we can fathom; from drainpipes to door thresholds and building foundations, in the war against rodents.
The aesthetic of modernism was partly a result of tuberculosis, with light-flooded sanatoriums inspiring an era of...
