Muna Mohamed Yassin Hagos, Home. More than a house. [×]

Home – more than a house is a research project seeking to understand the notion of home through a sense of belonging. My curiosity started as a personal inquiry into the meaning of a home, being with home and being at home. My current understanding of 'home' is as time, space and imagination that carries individual memories and hopes for the future. It is also a site that can accentuate connections between people. I therefore pose the question, how can interior design promote qualities of home and belonging – outside the context of the house – to create spaces for sharing and exchange between diverse cultures?
This design project seeks to establish a sense of ‘home’ outside of the house for fostering the celebration of diverse cultures within a community. Studies show that cultural celebration is particularly important for people displaced from their original homes through migration. This project focuses on the large and diverse population of people who have immigrated to Melbourne. Naturally we have a need to belong to the people around us and to be able to meaningfully contribute our local community. It is this need for cultural expression that this design project hopes to establish through the design of a restaurant.
The design centres around food as a means to bring a people together but also as a way to establish a shared ‘home’ and sense of belonging. Rather than a traditional hospitality model of patrons and service staff this restaurant seeks to involve everyone in the process. From arranging tables, preparing and cooking food, serving and eating together each stage of the meal creates opportunities for appreciating and celebrating cultural difference.