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Document Type

Article

Abstract

ABSTRACT

Soft Korsi: An Embodied Spatial Interior System for Communal Warmth reconceptualizes the historic Iranian Korsi as an innovative textile-based interior system. Traditionally, the Korsi functioned not only as a heating device but also as a spatial, material, cultural, and embodied system, which brought people together around a shared warm focal point. The integration of a heat source, textile coverings, floor seating arrangements, closeness of bodies, and domestic traditions related to warmth made possible a collective experience, rather than an individual or environmental one.

This design project seeks to address the disappearance of the Korsi from contemporary domestic environments as well as the shift toward more contemporary heating systems that regulate an entire space. It is argued here that such a shift entails a loss of an important aspect of domesticity: a sense of communal warmth, soft enclosure, physical proximity, and ritualistic assembly. This is supported by historical research, visual analysis, theories of material culture, theories of embodied space, textile design studies, local comfort studies, and research-through-design. This combination of research methods allows the translation of the logic behind the historic Korsi into design criteria and prototype studies. As a result of theoretical and empirical research, the key aspects of the Korsi logic have been determined and translated into design language: a shared central position, a boundary defined by textile, a localized micro-climate, floor seating arrangement, cultural tradition, and communal use.

In turn, the design prototype, Soft Korsi, develops the logic of the Korsi as a speculative textile spatial interior. Using the method of folding, cutting, layering, and geometric refinement, Soft Korsi explores the possibilities of a spatial interior that would gather people, symbolize warmth, and create an interior within the interior space. While not claiming to provide a complete design of a heating product, the project seeks to contribute to interior design by reconsidering the roles that textiles can play in shaping interior space and by approaching comfort as cultural, spatial, social, and embodied.

Publication Date

Summer 6-22-2026

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