Cha pter 7

Assem bling Architecture

Kim Dovey

The concept of'assemblage' emerges in the wo rk ofDeleuze and Guattari

(1987), primarily in A Thousand Plateaus, and has been deve loped by
DeLanda (2005) and others into a mo re transparen t and practica l socia l
theo ry. T his chapter explores the appl ication of assemblage thinking to
architecture and urbanism. In parallel wirh words like ' design', 'housing'
and 'building', 'assemblage' is at once verb and noun . An assemblage
is a whole rhar is formed from rhe inrerconnecrivity and flows between
constiruenr parts - a socio-spa tia l cluster of interconnections wherein the
identities and functions of borh parts and wholes emerge from the flows
between rhem . Assemblage is at once material and represen rational, it
defies any reduction co essence, co textu al ana lysis or co materiality. It
is also multi-scalar with s ma ller assemblages (rooms, fam ilies, events)
en meshed in larger ones (cities , socieries, sta tes) wirhour reduction of rhe
smaller to the larger. Assemblage is a usefu l way of rerhinking rheories of
'place' in rerms of process, idenriry formarion and becoming, bur wirhou r
rhe Heideggerian essen rialism. A building or a place is neirher objecr nor
a co llection of parts - rather it is an assemblage of socio-spa tial flows an d
intersections. Assemblage. thinking has a capacity to move a rchitectu re
away from a focus on fixed form cowards process and transfor matio n;
from an expression o f architect ure as Being-i n-the-world cowa rds a mo re
Deleuzia n becom ing-in-the-world. While appear ing abstract and o ften
opaque, the co nceptual apparatus o f assemblage thin ki ng is eminently
pragmatic in terms of both design and research . This will be illustrarcd
through a discussion of the design of new schoo l buildings where adaptable learning environmen ts are in demand to house complex, con tes ted
and unpred icta ble practices. Archirects are engaged with the tas k of
ho using a transformation in the field o f ed uca tio n from d isc iplina ry
technologies towards student-centred learni ng where creative an d critica l
ca paciries rarher rhan socia l reproducrion become key.

132 Deleuze and Arch itecture

There are no easy entry po ints into A Thousand Plateaus or assem blage thinking because one needs to think in a d ifferen t way in order to
unders tand - it is the deep end wherever you dive in. In the translaror's
in troduction tvlassumi sugges ts that one approach the work like music
- so me pa rts yo u will like wh ile others leave you co ld . It can also be
explo red like a strange city or a neighbourhood - a lmost any chapter
can serve as an introduction and you ca n fo ll ow the connections from
there: 'The Smoo th and Striated ', 'Of the Refrain' and 'Micropo litics and
Segmenta rity' may be the mos t engaging for a rchi tects. Anothe r place co
scare is che index - fi nd the concepts you are particu la rly interesred in
and follow the threads through the text. For Dcleuzc, ph ilosophy is the
invention of concepts as too ls for thinking. A Thousand Plateaus can be
seen as a strange toolbox where the application of the tools is up to us.
A too l is something we use to ach ieve a desired end; it media tes a process
of p roduction. Wha t is a t sta ke is not truth but usefu lness - how does it
enable us to thi nk ? The usefulness of some t0o ls and/or concepts will not
be apparent as we rummage through the conceptual toolbox; we may
also see uses that were never intended. As with any toolkit, the ways
we see each concept will depend on our desires. If we are researchers
conducting fieldwork, producing papers and concepts, then we will seek
analytic, methodologica l or explanatory too ls that help these tasks. If
we a re designers engaged in transforming the worl d then we will see and
see k our t0ols in a d ifferen t way. In either case ou r goa ls are practical.
I have argued elsew here th at assemblage ca n be approached as a
theory o f 'place' where it ca n he lp us engage wi th the socio-spacia licy of
the everyday world and therefore with the soc ia l d imens ions of architecture (Dovey 2010). Assemblage theory offers an approach ro theories
of p lace without the reductionism and essen tia lism that have weighed
down such d iscourse fo r so long. It is empirical w ithout the reductionism of empirical science; it gives p riority to experience and sen~a tion
withou t reduc tio n to essence; and ic seeks co understa nd the social construction of real ity without reduction tO text.

Assemblage
The concept of 'assemblage' is translated from the French agencement
mean ing 'layo ut', 'arrangement' o r 'al ignme nt' - both a dynamic process
and a socio-spatial formation. W hile there are always deba tes over
transla tion, this seems the best English word with its mix of noun!verb,
sta bility/cha nge, structure/agency. The French word , however, a lso connotes the no tion of 'a lignment' indicating tha t the various parts of an

Assembling Architecture

133

asse mblage a re nor simply connected but share a certa in directio n and
synergy. Beyond any definition, however, assemblage e merges from the
work and is better defined by its use than its meaning - as Deleuze pu ts
it, 'don't ask wha t it means, ask how it works' (qu oted in Buchanan
and Marks 2000: 294 ). T he ques tion becomes one o f how bu ild ings and
places are assembled and how the)' work.
M)' in te rests here a lso have to do wi th the larger project of understanding the ways arch itectu re is en meshed in practices of power. Power
is much too la rge an issue tO deal with here in any com prehensive way.
It is impor tant, however, tO understand and to si tuate che work of
Dcleuze and that of Foucau lt (from which much assemblage thinking is
constructed) in relation to the long-stand ing distinction between power
to and powe r over - power as the capacity to achieve an end (empowermen t) and power exercised through control of o thers (au thority,
fo rce, violence, coercion, manipu la tio n, seduction) (Dovey 2008). T he
revol ution in thinking about power that Foucaul t initia ted can be seen
as a re thinking of the ways in which power to becomes harnessed to
practices of power over. With Foucault, however, power retains a bad
odour - the critique of the architecture/power nexus rema ins a critique
of the production of disc ipline and norma lised subjectivity; the lin ks
with oppression a lways seems more potent than those with liberation.
W hile Foucault opens up o ur thin king to ways of understanding power
as capaci ty, as empowerment, it is o nly co descr ibe ou r subjection to
moder n regimes of power over.
Architecture is always an d everywhere implicated in practices of
power; chis is the cond ition of arc hitecture. The des ire for an archirecm re rhar mighr esca pe such pracrices is n fren implicared in such
practices. The task for architecture is to embrace such an engagement
because th at is where the ema ncipa tory potential of arch itectu re lies.
In everyday life a rchitecture is taken for granted and its potency lies
precisely in this capaci ty tO escape contemplatio n. \Vhile th e roots of
asse mblage th in king are in the Fouca uldian no:io n of che 'apparatus'
(dispositif), assemblage moves beyo nd instrumentality and pessi mi sm.
Ir enlarges ou r capacity co understand the implica tions o f Foucau lt's
insight in to power as a p rodu ction of subjectivity and it enables us to
understand the ke)' link of power to des ire.
Fo r Deleuze, desire is the primary force of life, immanent to everyday
life and no t limited to the human world . Desire does not exist prefo rmed b ut is a process of connection an d of becom ing . Far from thi nking of the world as a collection of beings who then ha ve desires, Deleuze
insists rha t life begins from flows of becoming or desi re, wh ich then

134 Deleuz e and Architecture

produce rela tive points o f stab ility (Co lebrook 2002 : 66). Arc hi tecture,
as both process and form, can be understood as the resu lt of a mul tiplicity of desires - for shel ter, security, privacy and boundary control; for
status, identity and reputation; for profi t, amhoriry and political power;
for change or stab ility; for order o r chaos. Assemblage is both verb and
nou n, agency and structu re, change and stasis, process and product.
Flows o f des ire are the p rim ary forces of assemblage (as a verb) - the
formation of connec tions th at beco me the assembl age (as a noun).
An asse mblage diffe rs from an 'o rga nisation' in that the relations
betwee n pa rts a re 'machin ic' rather tha n 'orga nic'. As Colebroo k (2002:
xxii) pucs it: 'Des ire is "machinic" precisely because it docs not originate
from closed organisms or selves; it is the productive process of life that
p rod uces organisms and se lves.' From this perspective assemblages of
cities and citizens, neighbourhoods and neighbou rs, houses and homes,
schools an d classrooms, insti tutions and states are produced by des ires.
W'hen used as a noun, assemblages are 'w ho les whose properties emerge
from the interactions between pans' (DeLanda 2006: 5 ). Bu t the assemblage is nor a thing nor a collection of things. Buildings, rooms, trees,
cars, ga tes, people and s igns all connect in certain ways and it is rhe connections between them tha t make an assemblage.
Assemblage has a fourfo ld (o r tetrava lent) structu re fo rmed from the
intersections of two p rimary axes (Deleuze and Guattari 1987: 88-9).
T he fi rst o f these axes opposes and connects ma ter ial ity co for mal
express ion; it both d istingu ishes a nd co nnects flows a nd interactions of
bod ies and things in space to express ions o f mean ing through language
and representa tion. To see architec tu re as assemblage is co recon figure
the rela tion of form to func tion and avoid a reduction ro either text or
materia l condttions. Th is axis is construed as horizontal - neither sid e
has p rio rity - and is a lso described as fo rm versus content.
T he second ax is, construed as vertica l, in vo lves a n oppos ition and
moveme nt between the formation and erasu re o f te rritory - fro m territorialisa tio n to deterrit0 ria lisa tion and reterrito ria lisation. Th is is what
we know in everyday te rms as the appropriation a nd/or exprop ria tio n
of space. In terms of representatio n it involves the inscr iption/erasure/
reinscription of ter ritorial boundaries and identities; in material terms
it involves the cons tr uction, penetra tion and enforcement of material
bo undary contro l. W hile territories are not necessa rily spatia l, this is
what esta blishes assem blage as rhe most arch itectura l of concep ts in the
Deleuzian lexicon.
Territ0 ria lisarion mediates the degree to wh ich an assem blage is stabilised o r desta bilised. The co ncept of territ0ry here is broa d enough

Assembling Architecture

137

Yet to perceive place as static is to misrecognise it as a th in g rather than

a n assemblage of differences. As De leuze (2006: 179) pucs it:
An assemblage is first and foremost what keeps very heterogeneous elemencs together: [. .. ] both natura l and artificial elements [...] The problem
is one of 'consistency' or 'coherence' [...) How do things take on consistency? How do they cohere? Even amo ng very different things, an intensive
continuity can be fou nd. We have borrowed t he word 'platea u' from
Bateson precisely to designate t hese zones of intensive continuity.
Yet assem bl age theory is noc a theo ry o f p lace so muc h as an intel lectua l too lkit for understanding how p laces work. To what degree and
in what manner is space segmented and terriroria lised? To w hat degree
and how a re materia l spatial practices and representa tional narratives
deployed in these assemblages an d to what ends? What coal itio ns of
desire drive a rch itectu ra l and urban development processes? We need to
know a lo t more about how arc hitectu re is assembled; t his is the yaw ning
gap in so much of the research applying Deleuzian theory to built form
- the actua l mechanisms that operate at and across different scales of
room, building, neighbourhood, landscape, city and nation (DeLanda
2006: 31). One of the key tasks here lies in the practice of mapping. For
Dcleuzc and Guattari (1987: 12- 13) mapp ing is a creative act that they
d istinguish from a simple mimetic t racing: '\Vhat distinguishes the map
from the t rac ing is cha t it is e ntirely o riented coward a n exper imentation
in contact with the real.' Th e map is more than a simple 'tracing' o f an
existing for m because it is infused with a desire co understand how the
place might be conceptualised, navigated or c hanged. Maps reveal the
workings of assemblages; they are at once concrete (grounded in a materia l sta te of affairs) and abstract (because they canno t show everything,
they selec t and extract la yers o f da ta). JVl aps mecia te between the rea l
and t he virtu al, between past and future, between history and design.
One o f the mo re obscu re concepts invented by Deleuze and Guattari
is t he 'a bstract mac hin e' or 'diagram' o f the forces co mprising an
asse mblage - at once embodied in t he assemb lage and productive of it.
According to Deleuze (1988: 36), ' the diagram or abstract mac hi ne is
the map of relations between forces (...) that is co-extensive with the
whole social field' . One example Deleuze (2006: 123) gives is Foucau lt's
notion of the panopticon - a socio-spatial diagram of one-wa )' visibility
wherein practices and su bjectivities are produced tO meet the anony
mous gaze of authority. This diagram of seeing wi th out being seen is
evident in t he many disc iplinary technologies of the priso n, factory,
school, hospita l and CCTV network withou t beii:g determined in each

138 Deleuze and Arch itecture

particu lar insta nce. Ir is an abstraction because an abstract set of re latio ns are evident in a ll concrete examples, and it is a 'machine' because
it is productive of subjectivity. The abs tract machine 'is neither an infrastrucmre that is determining in the las t instance nor a transcendenta l
Idea t hat is determ ining in the supreme instance . Rather it plays a p ilo ting role' (Deleuze and G ua tta ri 19 87: 142).
A d iagram is literally a graphic represen tation o f co nnections between
things, a pattern t hat connects a wide range of assembled ou tcomes. In
many cases the d iagram is an image th at drives design practices without
ever being written down. A stack of serviced floo r-pla tes with a view is
a diagram of the immanent forces pro ducing the corporate rower. The
flows of desire embodied in this diagram and ultimately this building
type include desires for flexibility, the commanding view, corporate
identity and profi t (Dovey 2008: ch. 8) . The diagram of pedestrian paths
connecting 'magnet' stores shows how flows of co nsumer desire are
captured in the private shopping ma ll. Here des ires for a safe, clean and
cool or warm environment mix with desires for products, for a fan tasy
world and an anonymous sense of community. The diagram i; no t a
transcendent ideal but a conceptual understand ing of the immanent
forces of similar place types.
A fina l word on the rather fundamenta l connection of design to
desire - recall that fo r Dele uze desire is the prima ry force of life and
of a ll fo rms of assemblage. Design is always based in flows of desire.
A publ ic transport plan is based on a mu ltipl ic ity of desi res cc gee co
work, to shop and co visi t fr iends. A schoo l des ign is based on desires
for particu lar modes of teaching and learning, but also often conflicting
desires for discipline and liberation. Assemblage thinking enables us to
overcome simplistic divis ions between materia lity and meaning, architecture and p lanning, form and function, subject and objec t. It enables
us tO see bu ildings and cities as embodying twofo ld concepts such as
rhizome/tree, d ifference/identity and open/closed. It enab les us to break
with sta tic, fixed, closed and essen tialist no tions of place, replacing the
Heideggerian notion of being-in-the-world with becoming-in-t he-world.
It enables a rep lace ment of bina ry parad igms suc h as people + environment with the dyna mic interconnectivity of the socio-spatial assemblage.

Open Planning
I now want to indica te how assemblage thinkin g might be applied in a
particu lar research project. As with any tool kit, the ultimate tes: lies in
practice - what new ways of thinking about architecture does it open

Assembling Architecture

139

up? T his p rojecr, u nderta ken with educationist Kenn Fisher, is a study
of innova rive spatia l planning in schoo l classroo ms. Th e rraditiona l
classroom is a rypical case of wha t Foucault (1979, 1980) rerms a dis ciplinary technology where the gaze of authoriry works ro produce a
normalised and disciplined subject. A one-way flow of info rmation is
orchestra ted from a privileged posi tion tha t also ma in ta ins a con tro lling
gaze over a class o f s ubjec ts. Classrooms a re assembled inro schools with
corridor access; learning is clea rly demarked in space a nd time fro m
'play' o r 'recess'. Since the early twentieth cen tu ry we have seen a range
o f arc hi tectura l experi me ntation on the school classroom that has been
loose ly labelled open planning. Such changes have been generally driven
by pedagogica l theory so urced ro people like Dewey ((1916] 1966),
Vygotsky (1978) and others who sugges t a m ultipl ic ity of ways in which
stu dents learn - didactic teach:ng being just one. There is no t scope
here ro describe this shift in de:a il but it enta ils a move fro m singula r
and static mo des of teaching and learni ng towa rds mu ltip le group sizes
and activity types over time; from a separa tion of learning from play to
learning thro ugh play; from reacher-cenrred ro studen t-centred wirh a
demand for a range of place types and adaptability.
It has long been clear that sm dcnt-ccntred pedagogics a rc serious ly
constrained by rraditiona l classrooms. Through the mid-twentieth
cenruq there was cons iderable archirectura l innovarion (Blundell -Jones
1995; Herrzberger 2008) an d 1n rhe 1970s the so-ca lled 'open pla n'
school bega n t o prol iferate in the developed wo rld, a move t hat was
large ly aba ndoned by the 1980s when many such open p la ns became
re-segmented in to traditiona l classroom cel ls. There were many reasons
for this failure; among rhem are tha t designs were often driven by ideology or economy more than pedagogy. In the new cenrnry we are seeing a
su bstan tia l re -emergence of student-centred pedagogy in all educational
sectors . So how does a rchi tec ture respond to such changing pedagogy
and how a re underlying issues of power, con tro l and disc ipline played
o ut? Assemblage theory offers a framework for understanding th is shift,
but a lso for understand ing why it is tha t so many open p la ns have fai led.
As part o f a larger project en titled Smart Green Schools, we ana lysed a range of awa rd-winnir.g and innovative middle-schoo l plans
drawn from organ isations promoting new pedagogies and new learning
spaces. 1 These plans are replete with spatial catego ries such as 'genera l
learn ing area', 'learning commons', 'learning street', 'open learning',
' lo unge', 'colla bo rative learning', 'studio', 'meeting', 'activity area',
' heartspace' a nd 'brea kout'. Each of these can mea n many things but
our key question is how has space been segmented and assembled? Tbe

140 Deleuze and Arch itecture

a nalysis suggests th at there are many d ifferent ki nds o f open plann ing .
\Vhe n conceived as socio-spatial assemblages of both people and buildings , plans and pedagogies, we begin to expose an extraord inary complexity of activities and spa tia l types where the potentia l for any space
depends fundamen tally on its interconnections wi th o ther spaces.
The focus here is on spa tia l segmen tarity with the task tO d iscrimina te
between differen t kinds of openness a nd closu re. To understand the
emerging pl ans, a diagrammatic mapping tec hniq ue has been developed
resp ond ing tO a need tO simu lta neous ly represe nt segmentarity (open vs
closed), interpe netratio n (overlappi ng), co nnectivity (adjace ncy, syntax,
through paths) and adaptab ility (o?cnability, closeability). A typology of
five primary p lan rypes eme rged ranging from the tra ditiona l classroom
cluster to the fully open p lan . This is illustra ted in an indicative manner
in Figure 7.1, which shows d iagrams of the generic spatial assemblages
for each type. T ype 1 is essentially a trad itional class room cl uster where
the inclusion of open learning areas occu rs at the level of the sc hool
rather than the classroom. Type 2 involves the inclusion of a learn ing
's treet' as the en try space for a cluster of traditional closed c lassrooms.
Type 3 incorpora tes plans where classrooms within a traditiona l cluster
can be converted through movcal:lc walls to become common learning
space and vice versa . Type 4 is where an assemblage of traditional classrooms and lea rning streets can be converted from closed to open o r the
reve rse. T ype 5 is the ded icated open pla n that ca nno t be co nverted tO
closed classroo ms.
W hile there a re man y kinds :if adaptabi lity within these assemblages tha t involve the moving of furn iture and c hanges ro governance,
pedagogy, spatia l practice or timetables, our focus is on the flexibil ities
enabled by the architectural shell, and it is crucia l here ro make a distinction between two kinds o f flexibility. First there is the reversi ble
convertibility from closed classroom co open lea rning areas, des igned co
enable conversion from trad itio na l to student-centred pedagogies and
the reve rse. Seco nd there is the ways the bu ilding enabl es flexi ble flows
from one activity type co a nother with in a multip licitous pedagogy.
These two kinds o f a dapta ti on, that may be ter med 'convertibility' and
'fl uidity', operate on different time cycles and rhythms, and at different
scales of control.
Plan types 1 and 2 a re essentially non-convertible; the discipl inary
techno logy of the classroom is maintained and progressive design is
conta ined to a higher level of the spatial assemblage. It is interesting tO
note th at while this is no t a quan titative study, a lmost ha lf o f o ur sample
of bui ldings se lec ted as p romo ting progressive pedagogies belonged ro

Assembling Architecture

.......

14 1

CLOSED DISCIPLINE
(Foucault)

co~ ~

TYPE 1: CLOSED ClASSAOOMS

~SSROOMS

lYPE

COMMONS

COMMONS

:::::::)

CORRIDOR

------CORRIOOR

TYPE 3: CONVERTIBLE ClASSAOOMS

COMMONS

:::::::)

SfREETSPACE

STREETSPACE

TYPE 4: CONVER'llBLE CLASSROOMS & STREETSPACE

(Oeleuze}

OPEN CONTROL

Tl

ONS

Figure 7 . 1 Typology of segmenrarity.

these types . Analysis needs to pay particular attention to the ways in

which the par:s a rc formed from their connections with the whole and
to connections between diffe rent scales of the spatial assemb lage. The
d istinction between 'streetspace' and 'com mons' is based not on size o r
supposed function but on the existence or absence of through traffic.
'Streetspace' is a th oroughfare tha t generates socia l in teraction but also
loses the acoustic co ntr.ol an d privacy necessary for man y learn in g func tions; 'commons' is open bu t not exposed to through traffic. Since it is
exposed to prospective paren rs and visitors, streets pace has become the
vis ible face of new pedagogies - it signifies student-centred learning.
Thus we find the emergence of type 2 where strcerspace is added to bur

144 Deleuze and Arch itecture

of power are no r erad ica ted, rather th ey become more subtle as we move
fro m regimes of discipline ro th ose of control (Deleuze 1992).
A word is in order about the diagrams in Figure 7.1 , which may
appear to be reducrionisr. They are nothing more than conce ptu al
rools, tO be judged on their usefulness rather th an claims tO tru th.
The diagrams have impo rtant precedents in Alexander et a l.'s (1977)
pattern language and Hillier an d Hanson's (1984) spatial syntax. I
acknowledge the importance of th is wo rk but point ou r so me key di ffe re'.lces. Alexander is in ma ny ways a n assemblage thin ke r who wrote
th e semina l paper 'A City Is Not a Tree' (Alexa nde r 1965) an d argued
that a building is not a 'th ing' bur the resu lt of a set of forces (Alexander
1964). A 'pattern' is at once a se t of social, spatial, aesthetic and materia l vect0 rs or fo rces in a given situation and a diagram that resolves
rher.1. T he key d ifference fro m assemblage theory lies in the essentialism
of Alexander's approach, which is organic rather than machinic, transcendent rather than immanent. Hill ier and Hanson's (1984) approach,
while also demonstrating much in common with assemblage theory, has
a pcsitivisr and red uctionist character that is biased towards the ma terial
pole of the assemblage.
The diagrams in Figure 7.1 have two key func tions, one practical and
one theoretical. The practical function is to identify similarities and differeJces in plan structure ar an abstract level that both des igners and
educatO rs can understand. The di agrams embody a spatia l la nguage
that ca n di stinguish, for instan ce, between 'streets pace' a nd 'commons',
between interpenetra tion an d opena biliry, between 'reversibi lity' and
'fluid ity'. They have the po tential co lift the des ign process our of the
simplistic categories of open versus closed and into a discourse of
mu ltiple plan types. For architects, who universally loathe being given
tem?la te plans tO com ply with, this leaves scope for both creative adaptation within p lan types and the invention o f new types. The theoretical
function of che generic d iagrams is th at they revea l the immanent productive forces o f assembl age , the ways th at flows o f desire co ngea l int0
certain soc io-spacial patterns. Each o f rhe cells in che diagrams is a form
of territory chat may be more or less rigid ly inscribed in bo th material
and expressive terms. 'Vilhat I have described as adaptation, reversibiliry
and flu id ity can be seen as the processes of de territoria lisation and reterritoria lisarion where one practice or pedagogr is erased and another is
enacted. T he current p lans mos tly revea l co ntradictory des ires for buildings that will suppo rt bo th traditiona l and student-centred pedagogies the bui lding is an outcome of the assemb led des ires of teachers, students,
principa ls, fundi ng agencies, architects and pa rents .

Assemblin g Arch itecture

145

Open Thinking
The open p lan school is just one small example where assemblage thinking m ight be applied to architecture, and while the focus here has been
o n spa tia l segmentar iry, there a re many d imensions of assem blage. 2 Jn
more genera l ter ms assemblage chinking e nables a ra nge of approac hes
to arc hi cecw re in terms of both theory an d practice. Ir provides a frame work within which we might ger rigorous abour a focus on con nectivity
and flow rarher than objec t and form. It embodies a focus on betweencond itions rhat privilege the both/and over rhe either/or. Assemblage
theory enables a more rigo rous critique of t he ways in which a rchi tecture works to produce or constrain spatial practices and subjectivities. It
ena bles us co exp lore the myriad ways in which build ings a re produced
by flows of des ire and ar~ p roductive of further flows. Assemblage thi nking focuses accencion on mu ltiple sca les of asse mblage an d o n t he c rucial
co nnections between them.
I argued earlier against any front to back reading of A Thousand
Plateaus because it is not organ ised like a tree, and rhe fi rst chapter
'Rhizome' m akes clear the p rivileging of rh izomic over arborescen t
thought. This conceptua l contrast finds a par allel in the penultima te
chap ter on str iated and smooth space (Dele uze and Gua ttari 1987).
The 's mooth', with its absence of boundaries and slipperiness, is easy
to identify with open planning, while 'st riated', with its links to 'strict'
and 'stringen t', is easy ro identify wirh Foucauldian disciplinary technologies . The smooth resonates with the rhizomic and ne tworked
while striation resonates with the arborcsccnr and hierarch ica l (Patton
2000). While the rhizomic and smooth arc consis tently and impl icitly
privileged, rhis p riority needs to be read critically as a reversa l of trad itiona l fo rms of thinking that see the world in terms of pre-existing
unities. T hese are not different types o f space so much as properties of
all spaces; as Deleuze a nd Gua ttari put it, 'No thing is ever done wirh:
smooth space allows irself to be stria ted, and striated space reimparrs
a smooth space [ ...) all progress is made by and in striated space, but
all becoming occurs in smooth space' (Deleuze and Guarrari 1987:

486).
What shou ld we make of t he idea that ' all progress is made by an d
in striated space'? I read this as a recognition that terrirorialisa tio n,
o rganisacion, stab ilisatio ns of iden tities an d practices are fundamental
to the ways we live. Whi le a rch itects can have a significant impact on
the ways in which rhe sm ooch/stria ted rwofold plays ouc, t he ac t of
design is primari ly one of striatio n - of stabilising t he forms of buildings,

146 Deleuze and Arch itecture

the construction o f walls, the inscriptio n o f mea ning - and the idea of
designing a s moo th space ca n be a dangerous illusion.
The conceptual opposition between smooth and striated, between
lines of fligh t and points of stability, between 'w ings and roots' to add
another metaphor, makes it te mpting co add the conceptua l oppos ition
of space versus place and tO identify space with freedom and m ovement
in contrast with the sta bility a nd roo tedness o f place. I think t his is a
ser ious m istake an d that p lace is best conceived as the assem bled mix.
The concept of place has been widely misrecognised as a n o rganic treelike concept t ha t orga nises spatia l meanings around a n essen tia li sed
stem. This view of place is understandable since it meets a p rimary
human des ire for a sense of home and identity. Place can be identified
with the axis of territorialisation along which assemblages become stabilised . Yet the wholesale identification of place with being, stability
and striation, with singu lar mo des o f rooted sedentary dwelling and
sta bilised ide ntities, is a narrow, self-decep tive and insular view. Place
is an assemblage that stabilises dwelling but also encompasses lines
ol movemen t and processes of becoming. The immanence of place
is a field of differences within which tree-like stabilised identities are
plan reel.
In a ll of these senses places can be constr ued as assemblages in continuous states of change. Such an approach to place runs counter to
Heideggerian notions of place as grounded in an o ncology of 'bei ng'
rather tha n 'becoming'. Some o f those who adopt a Deleuzian approac h
to bu ilt form see the need to ove rturn the Heideggerian notio n of a
si;atiall y grounded on tology. For Rajchman (1998: 86) the 'grounding'
ol dwelling in place is a source of fa lse naturalism and a constrain t on
freedom : 'we need to get away from the picrnre [ ...) tha t the life -world
is in the first instance a grou nded world.' From t his view, the gravitas
and heavi ness o f the earth is to be overcome in a Nietzschean spirit of
freedom; place is an anc ho r which weighs us down. As Rajchman ( 1998:
88) puts it: 'Once we give up the belief that our life-world is rooted in
the ground, we may t hu s come co a poin t where ungroundedness is no
longer experienced as existential anxiety and despai r bur as a freedom
and lighrness thar finally allow us to move.' There is here a privileging of
movement over stasis, of 'wings' over 'roots', which is understandable,
but the idea l of sever ing buildings from the ground on which they stand
is wishfu l thinking that suggests architecture can escape the constraints
ol dwelling. This invo lves a den ial o f t he materiality of the assemb lage
and, ultimately, a reduction of arc hitectu re tO tex t. The task is not tO
decide between an architecture of roots or wings but to understa nd that

148 Deleuze and Arch itecture

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