Housing and the City: How Do We Transform Housing to Live Better?
Award-winning architects in Europe share their vision for flexible and adaptable, residential architecture
Rafael F. Bermejo
25 September 2021
“The quality of housing is a key factor, not only for human well-being, but for the development and well-being of the city – and we only realised that after experiencing the lockdown,” said architect José María Ezquiaga, director of the 6th International Congress Architecture and Society (held in Pamplona, Spain from 8 to 10 September), in his introduction to a talk by French architect Anne Lacaton. For Ezquiaga, many houses turned into traps during the lockdown, demonstrating that even in well-off countries, “we haven’t solved the problem of habitability”.
Renovation of 530 homes by Lacaton & Vassal, Frédéric Druot and Christophe Hutin, Bordeaux (2017). Photography by Philippe Ruault.
Lacaton, the winner of the 2021 Pritzker Prize along with partner Jean-Philippe Vassal, spoke about housing as the key to urban regeneration. In an engaging speech, she shared her vision for residential architecture, which has been turned to reality in some of her studio’s projects. Today, she says, housing is “the most beautiful challenge for contemporary architecture”.
Lacaton, the winner of the 2021 Pritzker Prize along with partner Jean-Philippe Vassal, spoke about housing as the key to urban regeneration. In an engaging speech, she shared her vision for residential architecture, which has been turned to reality in some of her studio’s projects. Today, she says, housing is “the most beautiful challenge for contemporary architecture”.
Without a doubt, housing is essential, and the house is also the basic unit that shapes the city. This is why strategies for the city of the future must, in Lacaton’s opinion, start with housing. “The sudden necessity to stay home has brought to the forefront in a very clear … way the importance of the dwelling as the most important space of daily life for everyone,” she says. “During this period, most people [expanded their] use of housing and had to [incorporate] versatility in housing. Housing has become a place of multiple uses: daily life, work, education, leisure, a place to work … and a new kind of family life, more extended, more intense, and more permanent.”
She further argued that housing today is not good enough and not used appropriately, and offers neither freedom nor versatility. “Housing is a place for relationships, where relationships are built … on the quality of housing depends the quality of relations in the public space.”
She further argued that housing today is not good enough and not used appropriately, and offers neither freedom nor versatility. “Housing is a place for relationships, where relationships are built … on the quality of housing depends the quality of relations in the public space.”
Austrian architect Dietmar Eberle, co-founder of Baumschlager Eberle Architekten, argued in his speech ‘Reinventing Housing’ that rethinking housing is imperative as between 65% and 70% of buildings in cities are residential spaces. So, to reevaluate our way of life in urban areas, it is essential to start by reexamining our housing.
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Generous space for inhabitants to mould
Eberle argues that architects should begin by forgetting about the way a building is used, and instead prioritise other aspects, such as the building’s relationship with the environment, the structure and the facade, which can last up to 50 years rather than the 10- to 20-year serviceable life of most surfaces, lighting and airconditioners, for example.“Architects should care about public space first, and about the relationship of the building to the public, and second about the structure of the building” he says. In a recent project in Amsterdam, he designed a residential building without any planning for use or function, but rather thinking about quality and which elements will last longest. “My general belief is that the layout of an apartment is not an architectural question, but a question of the individual. So I like to make buildings where you give these opportunities to the people so they can organise themselves however they want.”
Eberle argues that architects should begin by forgetting about the way a building is used, and instead prioritise other aspects, such as the building’s relationship with the environment, the structure and the facade, which can last up to 50 years rather than the 10- to 20-year serviceable life of most surfaces, lighting and airconditioners, for example.“Architects should care about public space first, and about the relationship of the building to the public, and second about the structure of the building” he says. In a recent project in Amsterdam, he designed a residential building without any planning for use or function, but rather thinking about quality and which elements will last longest. “My general belief is that the layout of an apartment is not an architectural question, but a question of the individual. So I like to make buildings where you give these opportunities to the people so they can organise themselves however they want.”
Lacaton has a similar vision for housing. She believes that a fundamental aspect of housing is a generous layout that leaves it to the owner or tenant to tailor the space.
“Inhabiting … implies the freedom to occupy a space … Dwellings must offer freedom of usage to generate possibilities. Housing must offer as much extra space as programmed space to promote relationships within spaces, to bring about pleasurable situations. … Every dwelling must have a private outside space, like a balcony, a terrace, a winter garden … to offer the opportunity to move around and not to be contained in the space limited by walls.”
“Inhabiting … implies the freedom to occupy a space … Dwellings must offer freedom of usage to generate possibilities. Housing must offer as much extra space as programmed space to promote relationships within spaces, to bring about pleasurable situations. … Every dwelling must have a private outside space, like a balcony, a terrace, a winter garden … to offer the opportunity to move around and not to be contained in the space limited by walls.”
Renovation of 530 homes by Lacaton & Vassal, Frédéric Druot and Christophe Hutin, Bordeaux (2017). Photography by Philippe Ruault.
So, a home needs to reach beyond its basic function and provide extra space. That’s a challenge, as Lacaton pointed out, as in France, the standard home is 60 to 65 square metres and has two bedrooms. She specifically mentioned projects such as the 60 homes in Mulhouse, France, where curtains and large sliding doors can be opened and closed to create different atmospheres.
She also advocates larger doors, to improve fluidity of movement around the house. This is one of the ideas that radically changed the 530 homes in a three-block building in Bordeaux. The architects did not touch the interiors, instead transforming the houses from the outside by attaching structures that provide each house with an extra-large, closed terrace. They converted window openings into doors leading to the new bright, spacious area. Each owner then transformed their terrace in their own unique way.
So, a home needs to reach beyond its basic function and provide extra space. That’s a challenge, as Lacaton pointed out, as in France, the standard home is 60 to 65 square metres and has two bedrooms. She specifically mentioned projects such as the 60 homes in Mulhouse, France, where curtains and large sliding doors can be opened and closed to create different atmospheres.
She also advocates larger doors, to improve fluidity of movement around the house. This is one of the ideas that radically changed the 530 homes in a three-block building in Bordeaux. The architects did not touch the interiors, instead transforming the houses from the outside by attaching structures that provide each house with an extra-large, closed terrace. They converted window openings into doors leading to the new bright, spacious area. Each owner then transformed their terrace in their own unique way.
Buildings that are more efficient and inclusive
Both Lacaton and Eberle suggested that housing transformation must include improvements in the efficiency of buildings. This is also in part due to the fact that ventilators and airconditioners restrict inhabitants’ ability to design open spaces in their own ways. Eberle has built passive homes with no heating or cooling technology in projects in Luxembourg, Lustenau (Austria) and Graf (Austria), and an optimised residential project in Lohbach (Austria).
Both Lacaton and Eberle suggested that housing transformation must include improvements in the efficiency of buildings. This is also in part due to the fact that ventilators and airconditioners restrict inhabitants’ ability to design open spaces in their own ways. Eberle has built passive homes with no heating or cooling technology in projects in Luxembourg, Lustenau (Austria) and Graf (Austria), and an optimised residential project in Lohbach (Austria).
However, Lacaton also stresses the importance of working on what already exists. “We have a chance … to evaluate and find new places … where we can densify the city. … It can be done only if there is special care to improve the quality of the housing. So, quality and generosity of housing, affordability, diversity of people and ways of life, are the essential conditions to make the city. … Now the urgency is to redefine this public ambition and the collective vision of housing that should be imposed on all involved in the process of building.”
“Without habitability, there is no well-being in the city,” Ezquiaga pointed out. “Cities should not just be places to survive but should reflect our way of being in the world. New perspectives incorporating the idea of sustainable development and resilience must be adopted. We need cities capable of facing the challenges of reducing carbon emissions and valuing public space.”
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Fascinating points of view … it’ll be interesting to see what the side effects of this generation of new urban architecture will be. The Modernist architects of the 1920s-40s combined innovative uses of standardised materials, standardised layouts, natural light and communal living/circulation spaces to come up with a utopian vision of urban residential living, but which was also cheap and fast enough to fill the enormous demand for housing after two World Wars.
Unfortunately, those same design innovations led directly to the global proliferation of poorly designed, cheaply built and soulless apartment/tenement blocks and cookie-cutter suburban developments (which must have horrified Le Corbusier et al). Much like the way plastic was largely developed to solve problems like food transportation and unhygienic surfaces — which it did, but at (it transpires) enormous environmental cost. Same goes for nitrogen fertiliser, developed to feed the world post-WWI and now responsible for devastating the large tracts of the planet’s topsoil.
I wonder what this next lot will come up with? Surely they can’t do any worse … right?
These are all wonderful. I'm glad there is a push to bring much more green and access to fresh air to cities and make it more pleasant for people. Well done.
Excellent, thoughtful article, particularly the part about allowing the occupiers the chance to organise the interior space to suit them. You only need to read the comments on this forum to realise how different everyone’s wants/ needs needs/ priorities for their homes are