Darkhouses is the joint venture of Darkhouse Development and French Pistol Properties. Aimed at finding the surefire solution to the housing crisis and other mishaps, this glorious partnership seeks to shed light on patterns in construction and housing to exploit and implement their worth within a focused tunnel of extreme success - a little bit like miners in a mine, mining for the truth.
Preliminary meetings first began in early 2014 between the project development company and the estate agent at a studio in Holbeck, Leeds, UK. The realisation emerged that if one was to turn off all the lights in a house and close all of the curtains, ideally with a staple gun and duct tape, then it would become dark and new possibilities could be imagined. Thus, Darkhouses.
Temporary prototypes were created. Permanent structures were developed the next year following meetings between the two companies in Armley, another area in the South of Leeds. Over 2015 and 2016, further structures were completed using unwanted building materials based on research carried out in cities, towns and villages in the UK, Ireland, and other places across Western and Eastern Europe. The research has more recently expanded to Asia, so far in Vietnam and China.
As the project unravels new ludicrous conundrums, more and more challenges present themselves. From the painful beauty of an unfinished home in an abandoned somewhere, part-suburb part-wasteland - to the ready-made sets of wooden staircases that just sit there outside outer ring-road shops, detached and forlorn, waiting for their time; it’s the important questions that really get answered. It can almost be said that good living will one day finally be had by all. Onward!
Preliminary meetings first began in early 2014 between the project development company and the estate agent at a studio in Holbeck, Leeds, UK. The realisation emerged that if one was to turn off all the lights in a house and close all of the curtains, ideally with a staple gun and duct tape, then it would become dark and new possibilities could be imagined. Thus, Darkhouses.
Temporary prototypes were created. Permanent structures were developed the next year following meetings between the two companies in Armley, another area in the South of Leeds. Over 2015 and 2016, further structures were completed using unwanted building materials based on research carried out in cities, towns and villages in the UK, Ireland, and other places across Western and Eastern Europe. The research has more recently expanded to Asia, so far in Vietnam and China.
As the project unravels new ludicrous conundrums, more and more challenges present themselves. From the painful beauty of an unfinished home in an abandoned somewhere, part-suburb part-wasteland - to the ready-made sets of wooden staircases that just sit there outside outer ring-road shops, detached and forlorn, waiting for their time; it’s the important questions that really get answered. It can almost be said that good living will one day finally be had by all. Onward!
