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MAIO is currently building a five-story building with 40 social housing units in the Sant Feliu de Llobregat district, Barcelona. The project design urban connectivity, social equity, and sustainability. As the winner of a two-phase competition, the building will house hierarchyless, generic, flexible spaces to fit the inhabitants' needs.
“Designing a house for trees”, as he puts it, Stefano Boeri is working across the planet, exporting his approach with trees from Mexico to Shenzhen. Building a whole ecosystem, rather than just a green facade, the architect understands the need to redefine our relationship with nature, especially in cities.
ArchDaily’s Christele Harrouk had the chance to interview the architect in Eindhoven, during the inauguration of the Trudo Tower, Stefano Boeri’s first social housing project, in collaboration with Francesca Cesa Bianchi, his partner at Stefano Boeri Architetti, Laura Gatti, botanist and plantation consultant, and Paolo Russo, Project leader. Discussing mainly his approach with nature, the environmental quality, and his exported perspective around the world, the conversation also tackled the 4 ongoing vertical forests in West Europe: A first that has just started in Utrecht, a second in Brussels, a ready to go building in Eindhoven and a last one in Antwerp.
Following the Second World War, United States veterans and citizens were seeking a fresh start, a rightful place to live out their modern American dream. With a significant housing shortage looming around and fast-growing families, solutions had to be found to provide equitable living means for all. The development of new construction techniques and propagation of easy building materials promised an age of prosperity.
Saskia Sassen, the Robert S. Lynd Professor of Sociology at Columbia University, predicts in her co-authored book “The Quito Papers and the New Urban Agenda” that, in the future cities will become our crucial battlefield as we continue to fight against gentrification and growing degree of isolation in our communities. Sassen argues that, “Cities should be an inclusive space for both the affluent and the poor. Nevertheless, in reality our cities never achieved equality for all, because our cities were never designed that way. Still cities ought not to be a place that tolerates inequality or injustice”.
San Francisco is a city defined by its relationship to housing. Since the 90s it has faced an affordable housing shortage, and now, has some of the highest rents of any major US city. As planners and policy makers work to move beyond the city's past and find new paths forward, architects and designers are testing out diverse housing models. From dense residential towers to multi-unit developments, modern housing aims to strike a balance between economy and urbanity.
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Choice of building materials and the inherent continuous reflection about the reach and capabilities of architecture are an interesting alternative way to approach this issue. The materials used in social housing should address local and economic possibilities and the real needs for access to housing in the contemporary context.
In this article, we analyze different projects published on our site to identify some of the predominant materials used in social housing, both for the formation of structures or enclosures. The intentions of this are two-fold: firstly, to create a worldwide panorama of different case studies with different construction styles from a range of geographical locations, and secondly, to provide inspiration and tools to architects to make better social housing.
Below we present 15 social housing projects and their diverse materials and construction styles.
This article was originally published on Common Edge.
In this week's reprint, author Walter Jaegerhaus explores the U.S. housing challenge, drawing a timeline of the evolution of different architectural solutions, from around the world. Seeking to "inspire designers today to create new housing options", and hoping "that the U.S can again embrace its experimental origins and try out new ideas and methods", the article highlights examples from Europe and the Americas.
The introduction of new techniques and materials, along with innovations in indoor plumbing systems, resulting from the industrial revolution, paved the way for vertical living. Investigating specifically a period of time where a flux of population was driven to cities, and social class divisions were being questioned, this article looks back at the evolution of the house plan in Europe between 1760 and 1939.
Tackling the transformation of the housing unit during the industrial revolution all the way to the interwar period, this feature highlights four prominent examples that rethought traditional layouts and responded to the challenges of their time. Still influential today, the mentioned models, restored for use, happen to be part of the 21st-century urban fabric. Located in London, Paris, Amsterdam, and Moscow, the plans showcase the ever-changing interior wellbeing standards, directly linked to a broader metamorphosis, equalizing and providing for growing urban populations. Discover the evolution of living units from the Back to Back Houses to the Garden Cities of England; the Haussmannien Block, a Vertical Living for a Modern Bourgeoisie; the Extension of Amsterdam, from Alcove Housing to Social Housing Blocks; and the Transition Type House in Russia.
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Between 1945 and 1966, the Case Study Houses program, following the Weißenhof-siedlung exposition, commissioned a study of economic, easy-to-build houses. The study included the creation of 36 prototypes that were to be built leading up to post-war residential development. The initiative by John Entenza, editor of Arts & Architecture magazine, brought a team to Los Angeles that featured some of the biggest names in architecture at the time, including Richard Neutra, Charles & Ray Eames, Pierre Koenig, and Eero Saarinen, among others.
The program's experiment not only defined the modern home and set it apart from its predecessors, but it also pioneered new construction materials and methods in residential development that continue to influence international architecture to this day. Take a detailed look at some of the program's most emblematic work together with recommendations for facing contemporary challenges.
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Renowned photographer Laurian Ghinitoiu has shared with ArchDaily a series of photos of one of the most influential projects of recent Pritzker Laureates, Anne Lacaton, and Jean-Philippe Vassal. The Transformation of the 530 dwellings in Bordeaux, 3 modernist residential buildings, reflect Lacaton & Vassal's sensitivity towards understanding existing structures. It also highlights how with minimal interventions, radical changes can be made to the habitability and usability of a modernist building -knowing that in Europe, the majority of these structures have ended up being demolished-. This approach was enough to select this transformation as the winner of the EU Mies 2019 Award, for the best contemporary architecture in Europe.
The Corviale housing complex, located in the south-western periphery of Rome, was designed in the 1970s as a solution to the growing number of dormitory districts in the Roman suburbs, caused by the significant population increase between the 1950s and 1970s - when the population grew from approximately 1.6 million to 2.7 million inhabitants - followed by suburban sprawl.
The project, also known as Serpentone because of its huge proportions, was developed by a team of architects under the leadership of Mario Fiorentino between 1972 and 1974. Construction took place between 1973 and 1982, but the original plan to use the fourth floor of the main building for commercial uses, services, and common areas, was dropped because the contractor went bankrupt. The floor was eventually taken over by informal settlements, and this event is considered to be the root of the problems with this emblematic project in the history of housing in Italy.
Launched by the Goethe Institut, Habiter Dakar (Living in Dakar) is a virtual exhibition tackling Housing in the Senegalese capital. The study was led by Nzinga Mboup and Caroline Geffriaud, both Architects based in Dakar. They noticed that the current housing offer in the city was particularly far off the needs of its inhabitants, whether on the cultural, societal or environmental level.
The architects analyzed the progression through which the Senegalese capital's Urban Landscape and Housing development had passed, starting from the traditional compound living type to today’s international housing models which seem to be disconnected from the daily reality of most of the city’s inhabitants. The study is concentrated on Housing which is an essential part of the formation and evolution of Dakar and suggests important theoretical and concrete reflections for the future development of the African metropolis.
Curl la Tourelle Head Architecture received the green light to move forward with its latest “socially focused mixed-use scheme” that includes council homes, an adult education center, and affordable workspaces. Entitled Morland Gardens, the new project located in the London Borough of Brent, one of the district’s most deprived areas, is scheduled to start in the fall of 2020.
When considering “How Will We Live Together”, it is important to note the projective and future tense of the phrase. The idea not only encompasses ways we already share our built environment but targets the anticipated issues that are to be tackled to facilitate communal and mutually beneficial ways of living.
The series of articles developed by Nikos A. Salingaros, David Brain, Andrés M. Duany, Michael W. Mehaffy and Ernesto Philibert-Petit researches the peculiarities of social housing in Latin America. This time, examples of strategies and planning in their construction are reviewed, such as the importance of collaborative social processes and the specific sequences of stages.
In the 1920s, work was completed on the Cité Frugès housing complex in Pessac, France. The project, meant to house Pessac's industrial workers, would be one of seventeen Le Corbusier works on UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites.
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SANAA’s recently completed social housing complex in Paris was captured by the Architecture and Photography studio of Vincent Hecht. Part of Paris habitat, France’s largest public utility social housing company, the project comprises four buildings accommodating more than 100 social housing units in total.
Dense cities mean small homes. With more and more frequency we are forced to adapt to spaces within which some elements simply do not fit. As architects, these restrictions actually provide us with opportunities and remind us that our goal is to give precise solutions to specific problems. Designing with infinite number square meters and/or an unlimited budget is practically unheard of.
What's the key to accommodating everything? Let's review some effective storage solutions for minimum, tight spaces.
.jpg?1633431403 "Palazzo Verde . Image © Stefano Boeri Architetti")
.jpg?1633431510 "Palazzo Verde . Image © Stefano Boeri Architetti")
.jpg "Residential houses \"Eigen Haard\", Spaarndammerplantsoen, Amsterdam, Original state, 1915. Image Courtesy of Wikimedia")
.jpg?1615817428 "© Laurian Ghinitoiu")
.jpg?1615817448 "© Laurian Ghinitoiu")
.jpg?1615817463 "© Laurian Ghinitoiu")
.jpg?1615817414 "© Laurian Ghinitoiu")
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.jpg?1584528322 "© Vincent Hecht")
.jpg?1584528452 "© Vincent Hecht")
.jpg?1584528126 "© Vincent Hecht")
.jpg?1584528246 "© Vincent Hecht")
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.jpg?1552337492 "Bazillion / YCL Studio. Image © Leonas Garbačauskas")
