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Yanhua YAO; Sai MA

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This paper investigates how contemporary lifestyles are materially expressed through the design of home interiors across nine global cities. We employ a dual computational framework to analyze large-scale Airbnb imagery, integrating Visual AI, object detection, and Grad-CAM saliency mapping with graph-based object co-occurrence network analysis. This methodology reveals how local uniqueness is constituted within domestic spaces. Our results indicate that the historical development of a city—shaped by its architecture, policies, and economies—has a tangible impact on the configuration of micro-spaces and the everyday practices they support. Furthermore, we identify a growing functional integration between the living room, dining room, and kitchen, reflecting a shift in the contemporary concept of the “living space” away from a television-centered model toward decentralized activities facilitated by digital and portable devices. Within this new paradigm, the dining room and kitchen have emerged as pivotal hubs for family social life. While acknowledging the potential biases inherent in Airbnb data—such as its tendency to represent curated, tourism-oriented interiors rather than everyday domestic environments—this study provides a methodological foundation for integrating computational analysis with design research. These findings contribute to design and urban studies by positioning domestic interiors as a critical domain of material culture, with implications for understanding human behavior and informing future design.

Keywords:

Interior Design, Urban home, Visual AI, Design Studies, Material Culture