Experimental multi habitation

Students: Angelidou Maria, Farantatou Eirini
Supervisors: Klampatsea Eirini, Papalexopoulos Dimitris
Architect-agriculturist consultant : Papaioannou Maria
National Technical University of Athens, Greece, School of Architecture
Date of presentation: 31/10/2012

As architects, but more important, as citizens of Athens we realize more and more every day that a so vivid city could be possible to conceal misty, gloomy corners. Strolling around, one can discover a 'thesaurus' of abandoned buildings neglected in the midst of times. Since we recognize the need to activate the latent building stock of the city, we study through the experiment PUSH&GROW2in1 under which conditions a new housing model could be prosperous in them, utilizing and reproducing qualities and conditions of the countryside.

An experiment that adds, disparate for the cityscape, identification of multi-habitation and cultivation inside a shell.

We studied the methods by which a typical compact building can be converted into a backbone of outdoor levels, which in turn would result in a living area that borrows characteristics from life in rural areas. How can the light enter every corner of the building? How can soil coexist with materials such as concrete and metal and look like they have always been one? How the strict irreversible geometry of the plants will complement the fluid geometry the oncoplastic making of an architect and vice versa? What is the "best house" in which one returns after his involvement with the crop gardens?

Habitation and cultivation are uses that become complementary, in places where the resident can exploit, adjust, take care, produce and collect. Our vision was to create a new kind of multi-housing in which cooperation, partnership, joint development of every aspect of the building will be favored.

We are searching, planning and proposing such a model that could be visualized as possible!

Through the aim of the model's implementation, alternative combinations of its characteristics lead to many options for integrating multi-habitation systems and urban agriculture both in one neighborhood and the city.
Apart from the individual placement of the model in ideal points two versions for further study are proposed.

In the first case, we develop the properties of ornamental and aromatic plants that clean the surrounding atmosphere. If green roofs are placed around a ring, then we'd have as a result the creation of a dome cleaner air environment.  In this way, the model buildings inside the ring would give organic products.

In the second case, we imagine a product exchange network of a wider area, which will function as following:  only one group of products will be cultivated in every model unit. For the rest, the residents will be directed to nearby buildings with different groups of products. In this way this part of the city will be supplied with greater amounts and the multi-habitation system with urban agriculture's sectors will occupy larger areas, having now the ability to shape to a satisfactory rate the image of the city and the perception of the urban lifestyle.

In each case, it is obvious that the implementation of the model would improve one the appearance of the city of Athens second would contribute to the remaking of the urban fabric by itself. Besides, every city looks for tools with which it will listen to people's needs in order to remain vibrant. It can therefore only support all this we are accustomed to call "nature" and to stimulate the human tendency towards it.  One  way  or  another.