In 1914, Le Corbusier’s Dom-Ino House proposed a two-way liberation of the load-bearing column from the wall. This moment marked a new structural scheme, allowing isolated examination of elements, with program becoming one of them. From Sullivan and Le Corbusier to Tschumi and Koolhaas, the role of program has constantly been tested. From its role as the software of architecture, program has developed into a force that defines its shape. This paradigmatic change ignited a discourse on function, purpose, and form and established new modes of architectural legibility.
As with architecture, objects imply their function through form. Their purpose is asserted by an “irrepressible programmatic figure” – an inherent physical quality directly linked to their pattern of use. The essence of objects allows them to take on the responsibilities of form and program as small-scale architectural theses. As an object of use, the Dinner Table functions not only according to a prescribed purpose but also as a site of use in itself. It structures and facilitates the program of a feast, while the program informs the table’s aesthetics and physical properties.
The table is made of a single sheet of metal, bent into a washing basin, an elongated surface, and a bathtub. It is anchored by two faucets, making water an infrastructural, load-bearing, and programmatic element at once. While seeking unification, the Dinner Table defines a conflict between its changing program and its scheduled form. The proposed reversal of the Corbusian scheme produces a singular object whose unified nature re-examines the 20th-century modernist paradigm of separation, while holding the role of a producer of events, a place of hygiene, and a site for the female figure to reclaim a seat at the table and redefine her inhabitancy.