The Changing World of the Single Family Home

Mia Birdsong, in Pacific Standard, argues for a reexamination of the single-family home as an idea, an aspiration and an object. "As people, with Millennials in the lead, continue to push the boundaries of family formation, we would do well to look to the communities that have histories of creating family outside the constraints of the nuclear family for inspiration, guidance, and perspective."

The article suggests that we should build for the world we live in, and not the fantasy of white America in the '50s might have wanted the world to be. Birdsong says, "We may resist the social pressure to either marry or raise kids and seek to create a close-knit community. We may expand our families with the addition of friends or neighbors." These varied lifestyles require more variation in accommodations.