To dwell in the house of god: The self-production and self-consumption of space

Contemporary architectural discourse often prioritizes material permanence and formal completion, overlooking how spatial meaning dynamically emerges through lived events. Challenging this paradigm, this study employs a tripartite hermeneutic/phenomenological methodologyvisual deconstruction, mythological-historical criticism, and ethnographic hermeneutics to argue that architectural space materializes through event-based dwelling rather than static structures. Analyzing four cases, we demonstrate how spaces self-produce through curated incompleteness, while ideological completion destroys their capacity to be dwelt in. Behzads Beggar at the Mosque Gate (1489) redefines sacred space through insurgent dwellingby ignoring ablution rites and prayer times, the beggar exposes architecture as an existential negotiation rather than a ritual container. Conversely, the Tower of Babels geometrically perfected ziggurat precluded dwelling by reducing human agency to mechanical execution, while Constants New Babylon became undwellable through its frictionless abstraction, erasing resistance essential to lived space. The Great Mosque of Djenn, however, sanctifies imperfection via annual crepissagea communal plastering ritual where decay and renewal coalesce, embodying Heideggers fourfold (earth, sky, mortals, divinities) through cyclical labor. Our findings reveal that spaces thrive as mnemonic ecosystems when embracing the Zeigarnik Effect: Djenns unfinished walls and Behzads open-ended visual narrative compel engagement, whereas Babel and New Babylons ideological completeness fossilizes meaning. This duality challenges contemporary preservationUnited Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizations mummification severs Djenns chain of memory, while its ritual adaptation sustains resilience through collective dwelling-in-decay. We conclude that spatial vitality depends on architecture as event, where meaning arises through harmony with transience (mud, cracks, erosion), epistemic humility (resisting ideological finality), and embodied acts (plastering, transgressing, storytelling). For contemporary spatial production, Djenns modelspaces that breathe, bleed, and are rebornoffers an antidote to Western permanence fetishes: To dwell is to participate in imperfection; to build is to surrender to time. Future practice must cultivate dwellable spaces through events, not monuments.