Houses in the cultural landscape of the western black sea coast

Abstract

The house is a fundamental fragment of our cultural landscape. This paper aims to shed light on the Western Black Sea Coast architectural tradition. The questions we are asking here are: Who built the dwellings and lived there? How? Why? How does a house transmit these peoples’ culture? What are the cross-cultural patterns and relationships and how do we recognize them? My method combines field observation, measured architectural drawing and anthropological research. I make use of contemporary and old maps, plans and documents as well as architectural examination of photographs and drawings. In this paper I present my handmade drawings complete with some historical notes and my personal remarks. It was very interesting to compare traditional stone houses according to their architectural qualities – proportions, openness, materials used and decorations. For me it was very important to compare actual dimensions of buildings-their height and width. This is the reason I did all my final drawings at same scale of 1:50, adding small figures. They represent personalities and other living creatures-animals and birds. It helped me to understand the basic and ephemeral material particulars of our cultural landscape and how complicated in fact they are. Building a home is dependent on current technology, money and materials available. But a house always represents one’s personal identity, lifestyle and culture. Here, on the Black Sea Western coast we can observe a remarkable cross cultural and human exchange which became apparent when exploring houses around us.