A typically modern Norwegian mountain 'village', here at Aurdal in Southern Norway. Photo: Egil Heggen, Avisa Valdres
Taking the Norwegian context as a starting point, the main argument of this article is that the growth in second homes must be seen as part of a broader change within the prevailing residential culture. As such, second homes must be understood in relation to primary places of residence. Understandings of both arenas are however continuously changing, and a discussion of policies and planning strategies must take these changes into account.
The home has, in Nordic culture at least, traditionally been understood as the centre of life – a castle or a fortress – a place to return to rest and gain the strength to go back out into the world. To be settled somewhere geographically has been a notion often connected to building a home with ones own hands. In Norway, the detached house has until recently been regarded as the ultimate goal for in any family's housing career: The 'real' home.
The majority of Norwegians still regard detached houses as the 'ideal' home, but there are now numerous signs of changes in attitudes taking place. The single family house is no longer the ultimate goal but is rather the goal for a particular period in life: Living as a nuclear family with two parents and children. This group is however diminishing, having declined, according to Norwegian statistics, from around 42 % in 1960 to some 23 % in 2006. Four out of ten households now consist of one person while 66% of residents in the inner-city areas of Oslo live alone.
Following on from the fact that the nature of families is changing, the notion of 'family' itself may have altered or at least changed in significance in respect of peoples lives. Life projects are certainly becoming more diverse. The result is that the typical one-size-fits-all 'ideal home' no longer exists in popular consciousness with instead a great variety of more or less ideal solutions existing for different household groups and different life phases.
We also seem to have become less attached to one place. Home is not so much about 'belonging' and investing oneself in one place and, as such, has instead become about connecting to different arenas with complementary meanings and practices. Quinn (2004) argues that there is a need to consider how the meaning people attach to different places informs the decision to become a second home owner. Drawing on several earlier studies, she discusses how, for many of us, circulation between different places has become a normal part of contemporary lifestyles. It seems to be possible, and perhaps also both natural and desirable, to feel at home in more than one place at the same time.
Following these newly emerging everyday life patterns is an evolution in the notion of domesticity. Women no longer spend most of their time at home with children. They are at work and have equal opportunities to develop their talents in both the public and private spheres. Children are in day-care centres from before the age of one, so they also spend most of their everyday lives outside the home. As such, arenas other than the private home are becoming ever more important for personal identification and development.
New communications technologies and a more flexible working status, particularly among so-called 'knowledge workers', have changed the boundaries between work and leisure time as well as those between the workplace and the diverse home arenas. Work-life is dislocated and people often move the 'office' home.
The transition between work and leisure time thus becomes increasingly blurred. Even though these changes do not necessarily bring about physical changes in houses and apartments, they undoubtedly influence the ways in which our homes are used, and also how we are attached to them and understand them.
While the meaning of home is based on individual and household perceptions, home culture is also strongly affected by politics, planning regimes and economic structures. The liberalization of the housing marked is an issue that has in this respect had significant implications on the architectural qualities, social equity and life qualities, of urban areas in Norwegian cities and towns as well as many other places. As such it also affects our attitudes towards everyday life and to our home environments.
A market-driven housing sector, together with the fact that the public planning authorities have encouraged the densification of urban areas, and that more people tend to prefer living in central urban areas, has led to an enormous increase in house prices over the last decade or so. One result of this is the rise in segregated urban areas according to life phase, age and income, followed by the marginalization of some groups.
Following the residential groups in urban areas, as well as price trends, new housing typologies have evolved. Concepts like "Compact living" and "Easy living" being examples, indicating active daily lives, high mobility and loose neighbourhood ties.
Homes become 'commodities', promoted as lifestyle images rather than places for everyday life, and may easily be written off as merely speculative building. However, seen in the light of the idea of home as multiple places, these typologies may attain a meaning not directly captured by the traditional professions' judgments of housing quality. In addition, they are increasingly part of the context within which the development of second homes must be understood.
New meanings of second homes
Much of the international research already undertaken on second homes has dealt with the meaning of, and the motives behind, second home ownership. Bjerke et al (2006:89) point to six main motives drawn from the literature: Removal or inversion from everyday life, the experience of informality and relaxed everyday lifestyles, a 'return' to nature, as an investment, as associating with ideas or ideologies about 'rurality' and finally as an expression of personal identity.
The literature states that second homes are strongly related to urban life and that one of the driving forces in their acquisition is the wish to escape, albeit temporarily, from a stressful everyday life in the city. Still it seems that the relationship between primary and secondary homes cannot merely be described as a 'simple' duality where the quiet cottage in spacious natural surroundings complements the compact urban apartment in busy and noisy environments.
Modern second homes are no longer so typically characterized by the simple life, quietness and closeness to nature as indeed they used to be. Very few cottages are built out 'in the wilds of nature' far away from neighbours.
Second homes are often located in villages or even apartment buildings close to downhill slopes, hotels, shops, 'after ski' entertainment, restaurants, and busy nightlife. It seems that many second home owners lead a more active social life in their cottage residences than they do in their urban home because working days tend to be too busy. And with modern technology it is possible to bring work to the cottage and thus extend its period of use beyond holidays and weekends (Perkins & Thorns, 2006).
On the other hand, an increasing number of rural residents probably own apartments in the city to enable them to 'escape' from the rigours of real country life and enjoy instead the recreational facilities that urban areas usually have to offer.
All of these tendencies underline the fact that second home culture is no longer about one single trend, but now encompasses many such trends with each, in its own way, telling a story about how this plays a part in a paticular contemporary dwelling can entail.
More integrated research approaches
There is undoubtedly then a need to think along several lines in order to achieve a more sustainable future, and to change the current, extensive, consumption patterns prevailing in western countries. Second homes are not simply connected to leisure time and holidays, however, but include situations where people live and work in different places, rural residents have 'urban cottages', couples living partly together and partly in separate flats, children sharing their time between the homes of their divorced parents etc.
A necessary rethinking of strategies and policies towards more sustainable buildings, regions and urban areas must then be based on a comprehensive understanding of socio-cultural shifts in home cultures as well as on the recent physical transformations of urban living.
By Eli Støa, Researcher at Norwegian Institute of Science and Technology
References
Bjerke, T et al (2006): "Cabin Life: Restorative and Affective Aspects" in McIntyre N. et al (eds) (2006): Multiple dwelling and Tourism: Negotiating Place, Home and identity.
Wallingford : CABI Müller D (2007): "Second homes in the Nordic Countries: Between Common Heritage and Exclusive Commodity" in Scandinavian Journal of Hospitality and Tourism, Vol. 7, No.3
Nysted, J (2006): "bolig 1, bolig 2, bolig 3..." Interview with Bjørn Erik Øye in PLAN 6/2006
Perkins H C & D C Thorns (2006):
"Home Away from Home: the Primary/Second-home Relationship" in McIntyre N. et al (eds) (2006): Multiple dwelling and Tourism: Negotiating Place, Home and identity.
Wallingford : CABI Quinn, B (2004): "Dwelling Through Multiple Places: A Case Study of Second Home Ownership in Ireland" in C. M. Hall & D K Müller (eds) (2004): Tourism, Mobility and Second Homes. Between Elite Landscape and Common Ground Channel View Publications