Continent: Europe

Experimental Public Housing

0

Experimental Public Housing

Policies and regulations
Financing
Urban Design
Ownership and tenure

Main objectives of the project

Our time strives for the environmental quality of buildings and their energy frugality. In a social perspective of housing history, such collective pleas have lead to creating housing schemes, garden cities and even Bastides. In our turn, aware of this issue, which architectural expression will our generation convey?

Date

  • 2013: Rehabilitación

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Marc Reynaud
  • Architect: Armand Nouvet
  • Architect: Thibaud Babled

Location

Continent: Europe
City: Paris
Country/Region: France

Description

This small experimental building was an opportunity to look into sustainable construction. Very low energy consumption goals are achieved exclusively through architectural means. That is, without relying on technological accessories, but using definitely low-tech displays and devices (orientation, windows, piers, verandas, curtains) and involving inhabitants gestures and use of their home. Therefore the façade geometry is ever changing, animated by use, weather and glass reflexions. The global architectural design proposes some evidence: it favours a straight expression of its construction.
The project is part of the urban redevelopment of the Frequel-
Fontarabie block in North-East Paris. It was to become a pilot operation for the newly voted Plan Climat de la Ville de Paris, which asked for a maximum energy expenditure of 50 kWh/m2/year. To meet this target, the architectural team decided to rely solely on architecture on a site that, although very dense, offered to take advantage of sun.
The new volumes are adjusted to the end walls of the next buildings to reduce shadows. They draw a ribbon garden shared by residents and opening onto the new public garden, constructions getting lower as you penetrate the block.
The three entrance-halls open directly onto this courtyard. Each one is open to all residents: respectively giving access to the underground garage, the letterboxes or the bike storage room.
The bearing structure is minimized to a post-slab system using less concrete, offering more flexibility in flat layouts and enabling future conversion of the building. The resulting colonnade, allows the sunlight deep into the flats.
Limited use of concrete on facades favours a larger use of renewable materials. Custom-made wood framed sliding windows give a very precise quality to both exterior and interiors.
Apartments are designed so as to maximise natural light and ventilation, most bathrooms opening onto a window. Inhabitants are given greater control over temperatures in any season.
The double envelop sets an acoustic and bioclimatic device reinforced by Trombe walls. Sunlight penetrates the first extra-clear glass envelope and hits the wavy wall, whose dark matt surface turns light into heat. To stop this natural heating, inhabitants simply roll down the blind facing the wall and open the exterior windows.
Size of the site :944 m2
Size of the building :1960 m2 (GFA)

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Co-Housing Vienna

0

Co-Housing Vienna

Policies and regulations
Financing
Urban Design
Promotion and production

Main objectives of the project

In the center of Vienna, in the so called Nordbahnhofgelände, an incubator of sustainable urban living is created: the Co-housing Vienna - Wohnprojekt Wien. The Co-housing project was finalised on December 2013, it consists of 39 apartment units, and it is located in an attractive newly developed, urban area.

Date

  • 2013: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Markus Pendlmayr
  • Architect: Markus Zilker
  • Architect: Katharina Bayer

Location

Continent: Europe
City: Vienna
Country/Region: Austria

Description

The heart of the project is a self-organised community and the shared dream to live together in the city in a sustainable, collaborative and open-minded way. This way started from the very beginning with the participatory planning process of the communal spaces and the individual apartment units, continued with the creation of an alternative mobility system, a communal garden for the neighborhood, and ended up with the communal ownership of the building, in other words with active participation during all the levels of the projectŽs development.
One of the greatest challenges of the project was to achieve high individualisation inside the frames of community and to express it in terms of architectural design. Several communal spaces offer the possibility for exchange and communication while the individual apartment units can be spaces for retreat. The communicative architecture of the building promotes free and spontaneous encounters. The apartments and the common spaces were developed and designed from the very begining under the cooperation of the architects and the residents, allowing in this way alternative modes of living and flexible uses. The common spaces consist of the guest apartments, a sauna on the roof and on the lower floors, a communal kitchen, workshops and event rooms including a playroom for children. The project is hosting different models of living and working, multiple generations and diverse cultures under the same roof. The building is planned with almost passive-house standards and consists of a massive construction body with a wooden facade.

Size of the site: 4.783m²

Size of the building: 5.300m²
The energy efficiency is supported by a mechanical ventilation system with temperature controlled through groundwater and a photovoltaic installation on the rooftop.

At the end the Co-housing Vienna is a model for a new way of living in the city of Vienna.

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

110 ROOMS. Collective Housing

0

110 ROOMS. Collective Housing

Policies and regulations
Promotion and production
Ownership and tenure

Main objectives of the project

The collective housing contains a system of 110 rooms, which can be used as desired. Answering to the client’s demand, each apartment can be expanded or reduced adding or subtracting rooms in order to answer to inhabitants needs. With that flexibility in mind, rooms are similar eliminating any type of spatial hierarchy and program predetermination.

Date

  • 2016: Rehabilitación

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Guillermo López Ibáñez
  • Architect: Alfredo Lérida Horta
  • Architect: Anna Puigjaner Barberá
  • Architect: María Charneco Llanos

Location

Continent: Europe
City: Barcelona
Country/Region: Spain

Description

The building is designed as a system of similar rooms. So each apartment can be sized and programed depending on the need.

For the next years, each floor is divided as a set of 4 apartments of 5 rooms. Rooms are connected, no corridor is needed. A kitchenette is placed in the middle acting as the center, the other rooms will be used as bedrooms and livingrooms. This flexibility is able due to the position of bathrooms, where all installations are placed as points for supply. The interior patio is roofless allowing natural ventilation, an important factor for comfort and consume control.

The ground floor refers to Eixample’s traditional halls where marbles and large spaces define the place of reception and representation. The facade as well searches to consolidate the traditional style of the area, where prevail opaque stucco walls with vertical openings and balconies.
This project is born from the radicalization of everything that seems to us valuable from Eixample’s typological tradition. Thus, floor plants are formalized following the distribution of equal (or almost equal) rooms that traditionally characterized late XIX C. housing in the area, and have modified their use throughout the decades without substantial changes. A rigid system that allows changing its use over time.

Something similar happens with the façade, where the traditional archetypal composition has simply been replicated to consolidate the preexistent: vertical openings, balconies and wood shutters. Zero invention, pure reproduction. The façade finishing is done with traditional lime stucco, which, as often happened, represents through its pattern the memory of its old inhabitants.

The ground floor recovers the popular language of old Eixample’s halls, where, through furniture and large habitable objects, the space was arranged to house different uses. Here, these furnitures are transformed into marble volumes in the middle of a large open space (where it literally rains allowing to understand the hall as an extension of the street)
The building structure is defined by a mixed system. In the ground floor a metallic structure forms each volume, and supports the building loads. The rest of the floors are supported by a reticular grid of concrete pillars and slabs, which define an order that allows future changes.

The construction system rationalizes costs and optimizes long-term use. Thus, the constructive solutions follow the tradition of the Eixample’s neighborhood, where the building is placed. Solutions which have been already used during decades there, proofing to be successful and efficient.

At the exterior façade, a ceramic layer with thermal insulation is suspended covering completely the structure and the inner enclosure. This sheet defines a continuous base for the finishing coating, which is a two-color lime stucco following the traditional neighborhood façade type. The exterior carpentry is done with laminated pine wood, complemented with traditional wood shutters for sun and ventilation regulation, increasing the building’s energetic efficiency.

In the interior, all the partitions are done with dry wall systems, allowing easy future changes in room connections.

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Nowy Nikiszowiec Affordable Housing Settlement

0

Nowy Nikiszowiec Affordable Housing Settlement

Mismatches
Promotion and production
Ownership and tenure

Main objectives of the project

Nowy Nikiszowiec Housing Settlement is an unprecedented example on the Polish housing market. This is mainly due to nature of the investment. It is the first Polish state-funded housing complex with flats intended for rent only. It is a step towards large part of customers who can't afford a mortgage and are looking for a place to live in decent conditions

Date

  • 2021: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Stanisław Tomaszewski
  • Architect: Paweł Gumuła
  • Architect: Karolina Bielonko
  • Architect: Katarzyna Kłaczek
  • Architect: Weronika Misiak
  • Architect: Aleksandra Zubelewicz-Lada
  • Architect: Michał Tatjewski
  • Architect: Maciej Kowalczyk
  • Architect: Wojciech Conder
  • Architect: Aleksander Drzewiecki

Location

Continent: Europe
Country/Region: Poland

Description

Nowy Nikiszowiec is a complex of multi-family buildings located in the iconic Nikiszowiec district of Katowice. The place is famous for its unique on a global scale, well-preserved housing estate from the beginning of the 20th century, intended for employees of the nearby Giesche mine. The newly created housing estate refers directly to the original idea of spatial arrangement, which is its historical counterpart.

The difference is the purpose of the new investment. The project is being developed not with mine employees in mind, but with a large social group of middle-class people looking for a flat but unable to get a mortgage to buy it. To meet this need, the Polish government launched a program called "Apartment for Development", in which it finances the construction of housing estates with flats for rent. The Nowy Nikiszowiec estate is the first case of this type on a larger scale
The Nikiszowiec district in the background of the city of Katowice resembles an island divided by forest areas and numerous expressways connecting the cities of Silesia. The designed housing estate has similar characteristics. It is surrounded on three sides by a forest, while to the east it borders the mine area and the historic estate from the beginning of the 20th century.

It consists of three buildings in a block shaped development. At the same time, it has many distinctive features, among which the brick-colored façades, terraced courtyards and the central square which is the core of the estate and future meeting center for residents. The buildings will contain 513 turnkey apartments for rent as part of the government program piloted by Polish Fund for Real Estate Development.

The main concern was to provide a scale-friendly space for residents with numerous references to the most interesting elements of the historic neighboring estate. The priority was to create an open space conducive to the integration of the local community, as opposed to the often fenced housing estates implemented by private developers.
The buildings are designed in a reinforced concrete skeleton structure. The predominant height is four storeys. The exceptions are eight-storey dominants at the corners of the buildings. In addition, the inclined area causes the buildings to gradually lower, creating a terraced shape of solids.

One of the most characteristic features of Nowy Nikiszowiec is the homogeneous facade, which has the same expression both outside and in the courtyards. Its colors, like many other features, were taken from the surrounding context where brick dominates. Due to the economic aspect the brick was replaced by a noble plaster with an admixture of shiny mica flakes. The façade is characterized by inter-window spaces shimmering in several brick shades, creating a characteristic rusty checkerboard. It is a reference to the composition of different shades of the brick facade, only applied on a larger scale. As a result, a unique effect was created that confusingly resembles facades made of prefabricated concrete facings.

An equally important element of this investment is the partial use of prefabricated concrete elements, such as stair flights, staircase landings and balcony slabs

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Sprzeczna 4 Residential Building

0

Sprzeczna 4 Residential Building

Policies and regulations
Financing
Urban Design
Promotion and production

Main objectives of the project

Sprzeczna 4 is a manifest of prefabrication. This prototypical, demonstration building ordered in our office was designed to disenchant prefabrication – a technology compromised in Poland in the communism era by the large-panel housing estates.

Date

  • 2017: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Jan Belina-Brzozowski
  • Architect: Konrad Grabowiecki
  • Architect: Wojciech Kotecki

Location

Continent: Europe
Country/Region: Poland

Description

The building was deliberately erected on a plot of land that apparently does not fit the stereotype of prefabrication: tiny, rambling and located in a compact 19th century frontage development. Consciously, at times unreasonably, all the available prefabrication technologies were applied: exposed coloured concrete, impression and reliefs, electrical installations integrated into the walls, heating ceilings and many more. The result is a building assembled from numerous large-size elements produced in a factory, not built with the hands of labourers on a construction site. The facility folded from large-size elements is not finished and it does not incorporate any accessories or decorations. It is a sincere story about what a building is, what it is made of and how it works.
Sprzeczna 4 has become an occasion to discuss current issues in housing construction. Not only does it stand as a polemic against the semi-feudal system of housing construction, which dates back to the 19th century and relies on the labor of poorly paid immigrants. It has also been exemplary in its implementation of fair business practices and appeals to society’s social responsibility with its low-cost technology.
precast sandwich concrete walls with insulation and architectural concrete elevation; aluminum glazing; timber windows; steel balustrades; timber terraces

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Housing Complex Jordanovac

0

Housing Complex Jordanovac

Mismatches
Financing
Promotion and production

Main objectives of the project

Housing ensemble with 4 buildings sits in the contact zone of single family houses and residential towers from mid-seventies. Our proposal tries - both in terms of size and type – to mediate between the two, gathering them around a semi-private yard. Buildings themselves contain three maisonette-like apartments each with richly designed outer spaces.

Date

  • 2017: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Luka Korlaet
  • Architect: Svebor Andrijević

Location

Continent: Europe
Country/Region: Croatia

Description

The ensemble is made up of four buildings of approximately 600 m2 grouped around a semi-private yard. The choice of materials and landscaping show the effort to humanize and domesticate the environment. The buildings contain three apartments each. Like in a housing row, each apartment is provided with a direct pedestrian and vehicular access. In terms of design, the buildings are simple white prisms with smooth plastered main body on the pedestal of large sized glass and/or HPL panels. This design references the best examples of Zagreb mid-war architecture, but in a contemporary interpretation. Roofs are intensely green and used as outdoor areas with extraordinary views over the city. The apartments have several levels and spatial quality of small family houses and are oriented on multiple sides, which, in combination with large openings, makes them well-lit and ventilated.
The task was to design an ensemble that moves away from ubiquitous solutions, both in terms of land use and layout of the apartments. We've proposed a solution that encloses a semi-private space with strong character: these are not just four precisely designed buildings put together; they create an ambience that unifies them into a whole. Boundaries between public and private are blurred, with carefully designed paving patterns and no fences inside the ensemble.

Another important aspect of the project is a range of carefully designed outer spaces: apart from communal realm, there is a variety of gardens, loggias, terraces and green roofs. These intensely green roofs are not just luxurious outer spaces; they compensate for the lost greenery thus reviving the old Le Corbusieran ideal.

Although simple in appearance, buildings have complex longitudinal sections, with apartments overlapping each other to catch the best views as well as southwestern sun. Structural solution allows for a wide range of spatial arrangements: inside the perimeter of a certain apartment there are only partition walls. There are altogether 12 apartments of various sizes: 125 to 250 m2.
Spatial concept and applied structural solutions are in direct correlation: structural system consists of longitudinal reinforced concrete walls on a 9,00-meter span, thus allowing apartment layout variations. Main parts (white prisms) are covered in ETICS facade system with smooth plaster finishing while lower parts of the building are large format glass and/or HPL ventilated facades.

Large openings are glazed in high-end aluminium frames. Windows belonging to the same apartment are visually connected with a white band thus giving a hint of what's going on in section: facades become a display of internal structure. Flickering, moiré-ish pergolas may look ethereal but at the same time they are engineering tour de force: conceived on a 9-meter span, the main truss had to be carefully pre-stressed in order to gain its final geometry.

Special attention was paid to the technical aspect: due to careful building physics calculations and applied materials, buildings were labeled as Energy Class A+. They are equipped with heat pumps and ceiling&wall heating/cooling system. Recuperation system allows constant air exchange in the area without energy loss.

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

317 Social Housing Units

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317 Social Housing Units

Mismatches
Financing
Urban Design

Main objectives of the project

This social housing project proposes a reflection on adapting different buildings to the previous landscape, trying to understand the existing topography, and also proposes a new approach to the traditional Mediterranean courtyard houses using a modular growing system that builds drilled buildings in floor plans and sections.

Date

  • 2015: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Antonio González Liñán

Location

Continent: Europe
Country/Region:

Description

We wish to create an independent fragment of the city that reconstructs perceptive essences associated with an understanding of the Place itself. Empty spaces, squares, streets and courtyards are configured as basic elements in order to define our new "neighbourhood." Due to the sharp slope of the plot the proposal is to amend the topography by means of terraces integrated into the geometric framework, with slopes of approximately 5 metres. The buildings adapt to the different slopes, adopting a pattern to seek better orientations. The typology is based on a rational grid. The diversity in positioning the gaps, terraces, patios and empty spaces in general seeks to establish internal spatial continuity, by establishing internal relationships between the dwellings and improving the performance and energy efficiency of the buildings.
Given the uniqueness of the initiative, designed to provide subsidised housing, a comprehensive strategy has been adopted based on an interpretation of the Place and typological research, based on improving living conditions in order to give rise to quality housing that is sustainable and adapted to the various considerations that influence the contemporary way of living. Our project is proposed to be tailored to the circumstances pertaining to the Place (landscape, wind, light, malleable spaces, the future memory of the inhabitants, etc) and attempts to integrate itself as an abstract element superimposed by means of a geometric pattern that governs the entire operation. The topography, based on the initial regulatory framework, forms spatial situations that are carved geometrically and that hollow out or empty the pre-existing reality. The buildings are proposed in a way that gives greater importance to the empty space and to their relationship with the terrain than to their own or independent form. In this way the buildings adapt to the topography, either supported or "floating", focusing on the continuity of spaces, of visual relationships, orientation.
Our building model aims to improve the quality of life by using systems that optimise the conditions of use and energy saving, encouraging wherever possible the use of the area's own natural resources. The degree to which the sun falls on the façades depends on the orientation and is controlled by means of a "deep façade" system (internal filter-storage area). A cross-ventilation system is proposed, since all the dwellings have double orientation. This system is based on an inner courtyard connected to the outside by terraces that change their orientation to improve air circulation and keep the homes continually ventilated. The dwellings can be very versatile, changing the use of the rooms according to the needs of the inhabitants or to the times of the year in order to optimise the orientations.

The structure is based on a concrete frame system which stands over a continuous foundation that unifies retaining walls and foundation slabs creating an unified system which works as a whole structure and avoids risk of landslides.

The main material used for the buildings skin is klinker brick in three colors (White, Grey and Black).

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Brdo Housing Project F5, phase 2

0

Brdo Housing Project F5, phase 2

Policies and regulations
Financing
Urban Design
Promotion and production

Main objectives of the project

In the framework of the National housing programme Slovenia with it’s business policy finances and promotes the residential construction. An efficient public housing strategy is is one of the fundamental components of quality and sustainability oriented city, with the last example of housing Brdo on the outskirts of the capital city of Ljubljana.

Date

  • 2016: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Katja ŽŽlajpah
  • Architect: Aleš Žnidaršič

Location

Continent: Europe
Country/Region: Slovenia

Description

The residential neighbourhood Balcony apartment in two phases comprises 272 apartments in 3 types of residential buildings with total size of 27.500m2 and 16.500 m2 underground garage. The designed housing blocks are formally disciplined; yet display certain playfulness thanks to the rhythmic arrangement of covered loggias and projected balconies. The floor plans, marked by a quality of bilateral orientation, focus on the spatial openness of integrated living rooms and kitchens. The all-over design with their rational approach employs simple and affordable architectural elements in order to re-invest resources into spatial generosity within the limits of the social housing framework.
The area is situated in the outskirts of the capital city of Ljubljana, which is considered to offer qualitative living standard within regulated systems of neighbourhoods and settlements, planned as distinctive ambient entity within the regulatedurban typology. Moderate articulated design of the buildings aims in a specific way to provide and accentuate those parameters that offer primary a friendly and qualitative accommodation within these concentrated settlement systems. The solution incorporates criteria that become the creators of urban design: the evaluation of appropriate criteria on the size of building area, evaluation of "optimal" range, providing quality between the individual and the collective.
The premises comprise three buildings that differ in size and types, which define the comprehensive and modifications of the typology of a functional unit of five parallel laid out buildings. The dwelling typology is oriented towards a model that is aiming to ensure social friendly relations to the greatest possible extent: less concentration of units linked to common entrances, parameters of privacy / intimacy of the habitat (two-sided oriented flats), natural cross over ventilation, the correct insulation, as well as the orientation of housing units (providing views - both landscape and privacy), a large structural diversity of apartments, from the smallest units to the diverse terraced housing in the form of "family houses" at the top of the building (penthouse) and to include one of the forms of outer surfaces – the balconies, loggias or terraces. The facade is composed of two elements - the plaster and fibre-cement panels. The headlining in the loggias and balconies is made of aluminium panels, reflecting the surroundings.

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Transformation of 530 dwellings

0

Transformation of 530 dwellings

Policies and regulations
Financing
Promotion and production
Ownership and tenure

Main objectives of the project

The project consists in the transformation of 3 social housing’s buildings of 530 dwellings.

Date

  • 2017: Rehabilitación

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Christophe Hutin
  • Architect: Frederic Druot
  • Architect: Jean Philippe Vassal
  • Architect: Anne Lacaton

Location

Continent: Europe
City: Bordeaux
Country/Region: France

Description

The transformation gives to all dwellings new qualities of space and living, by inventorying very precisely the existing qualities that should be preserved, and what is missing that must be supplemented.

The addition of large winter gardens and balconies in extension of the existing give the opportunity, for each apartment, to enjoy more space, more natural light, more mobility of use and more views.

The existing small windows are replaced by large glazed sliding doors opening onto the winter garden.

The technical facilities are upgraded: bathrooms electrical installation, the two former elevators in every staircase are replaced by a bigger one and supplemented by a new elevator.

New access halls are done and the gardens in front of the building are improved. All the families stayed in their dwelling during the construction works. No increase of rent after the transformation.
While the high-rise buildings for luxury housing are now designated as examples of ecological housing, the G, H and I buildings offer the opportunity to reach these qualities immediately, in a generous, economic and sustainable way.

Due to the proposal of transformation with all inhabitants inside, the project excludes interventions on the existing structure, stairs or floors, and proceeds by additions and extensions, large enough to be fully used. Inside the flats, only refurbishment of facilities or finishes has been done.

The extensions of 3,80m deep widen the space of use and the mobility through large glazed sliding doors connecting every room to the winter garden, offering, as in a house, a pleasant private semi outdoor space.

The energetic performance of the building envelope is highly improved by the addition of winter gardens which act as passive solar collectors.

The work on economy allows to concentrate the budget on the extensions, the key point to improve in a significant and sustainable way the dwellings quality. The overall cost of transformation respects the budget, based on the usual cost for a basic renovation of facades, insulations, and facilities.
In order to reduce the duration of the works, the construction uses prefabricated modules, fast built like scaffolding in front of the building. Precasted slabs and columns are transported to the site and lifted into position by a crane to form a freestanding structure. Concrete poured in place was used only for foundations.

Along the added structure, the original windows are removed in a specific intervention to take care of asbestos-contaminated seals. Concrete window sills are removed to open from floor-to-ceiling, and create double-glazed sliding doors. Thermal curtains behind the glass provide extra insulation to the heated interiors.

On the other side, a lightweight façade of transparent, corrugated polycarbonate panels and glass in aluminium frames is assembled and equipped with reflective solar curtains. Glazed hand railings run along the balconies.

A proper planning and scheduling of the construction site allowed to achieve the transformation in just 12-16 days per apartment: half day for laying the concrete slab, 2 days for adapting the old façade, 2 days for placing the new façade, and 8-12 days for renovating the interiors.

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona

Mixed dwelling building in 22@

1

Mixed dwelling building in 22@

Financing
Urban Design
Promotion and production
Ownership and tenure

Main objectives of the project

Social dwellings with shelters for the most vulnerable groups, combined together with Urban Responsibility by generating public space with an interior street, Social Responsibility by matching the conditions of the different programs and Environmental Responsibility by implementing passive design strategies such as the winter garden.

Date

  • 2018: Construction

Stakeholders

  • Architect: Judith Leclerc
  • Architect: Jaime Coll

Location

Continent: Europe
City: Barcelona
Country/Region: Spain

Description

For the first time in Barcelona, two usually separate programs are combined into the same building: social housing with temporary shelters for the inclusion of the most vulnerable groups. The design of the overall project responds to 3 basic criteria: Urban Responsibility by generating public space with an interior street that both separates and visually links both programs. Social Responsibility by matching the conditions of the different programs. Environmental Responsibility by implementing passive design strategies such as the winter garden and obtaining an A energy rating label.
The challenge of this project is to include social reinsertion as one more vector of the design process along with sustainability. Inclusion and accessibility of marginalized people starts with its inclusion in the program. For the first time in Barcelona, two usually separate programs are combined in the same building: official rental housing with temporary shelter accommodation for most vulnerable groups. We seek to integrate them not to stigmatize them.

Its location on a former industrial plot in the new central area of Glories, aims at reinforcing its urban presence by accumulating all the public programs on the ground floor. The constructive concept seeks the same level of comfort for all users taking advantage of the natural characteristics of the site: maximizing solar exposure and cross ventilation on a corner plot. Solar gains are reinforced by the incorporation of a winter garden facing south and large loggias facing the western corner. The solar gain of these intermediate spaces has been simulated with Designbuilder and complemented with highly efficient systems such as aerotermia and double flow ventilation thus achieving an A energy rating.
The selection of material is entirely from the Iberian Peninsula, aiming for the most natural, breathable and healthy as possible, including the invisible ones like the insulation. The ventilated enclosure of Faveton extruded ceramic pieces allows for a great comfort with little insulation (8 cm only). The corrugated design minimizes the weight of the piece and considerably reduces the substructure. This vertical undulated surface brings warmth and light to the façade and these same ripples have been reproduced on the mold of the latticework giving a homogeneous quality to all parts of the envelope and dissimulating domestic activities such as drying clothes. The rest of flooring and ceiling materials have a high thermal resistance for a better inertia like exposed concrete and terrazzo whereas mobile materials such as entrance doors and Barcelona blinds in the balconies use a warm and renewable material: Wood.

Authors:

Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona