Indah Widiastuti Susilo 1 The Living Culture and Typo-Morphology of Vernacular-Traditional Houses in Kerala Indah Widiastuti Susilo Introduction The term “vernacular architecture” stands for the art of constructing buildings and shelters which is spontaneous, environment-oriented, community-based; it acknowledges no architect or treaty and reflects the technology and culture of the indigenous society and environment (Rudofsky 1964: 4). Vernacular architecture is the opposite of high traditional architecture which belongs to the grand tradition (e.g. palace, fortress, villa, etc.) and requires special skills and expertise which an architect must have knowledge of and for which he enjoys a special position (Rapoport 1969). This paper is a chronicle of observations of traditional vernacular houses in the whole region of Kerala done within nine months The research methods used include observation and photography-documentation of more than 50 traditional-vernacular houses in Kerala State and 30 more random places in other states for comparison. Experts and builders were also interviewed. The object of study is to find patterns and sources of settlement, buildings, living cultures and local indigenous knowledge. Location of samples are in the districts of Shoranur, Pattambi, Pallipuram, Calicut, Palghat, Aranmula, Chenganur, Tiruvalla, Kottayam, Ernakulam-Cochin, Tripunitura, Perumbavur, Mulanthuruti, Piravom, Trivandrum, Kanyakumari, Attapadi, and Parapanangadi. From these places, 52 samples of traditional- vernacular residential architecture of Kerala were observed. These samples cover ordinary commoner houses, the traditional courtyard house and the single mass house, as well as the non- Kerala vernacular houses and houses with colonial vernacular architecture. The research method utilized is the Typo-morphology analysis (Argan 1965, Moneo 1978) which examines existing types of residential houses and their complementary. Typo- morphology mapping has been done to identify all possible factors that espouse the conceptualization of forms and space of the houses. Using Vernacular Matrix (Papanek 1995), the analytic categorization of types would be cross-checked with other aspects such as culture, history, social, geography to acknowledge driving forces which are embedded in the formation of Kerala’s traditional-vernacular houses and living culture.