Intergenerational social garden town
Basic information
Project Title
Intergenerational social garden town
Full project title
Enabling inter-generational care and new ways of living in a 1950s garden town social housing
Category
Regaining a sense of belonging
Project Description
The project concerns the renovation and conversion of 12 duplex social homes located in the “new garden district” in Menen, built in 1954.
The project looks for new forms of living that enable different types of care relationships, focus on intergenerational living, accessibility and strengthen cohesion between residents and the neighborhood. The structure of the existing building is given a front extension to create space and acquire new relations between private interiors and public street.
The project looks for new forms of living that enable different types of care relationships, focus on intergenerational living, accessibility and strengthen cohesion between residents and the neighborhood. The structure of the existing building is given a front extension to create space and acquire new relations between private interiors and public street.
Geographical Scope
Local
Project Region
Menen, Belgium
Urban or rural issues
It addresses urban-rural linkages
Physical or other transformations
It refers to a physical transformation of the built environment (hard investment)
EU Programme or fund
No
Description of the project
Summary
The project concerns the renovation and conversion of 12 duplex social homes located in the “new garden district” in Menen, built in 1954.
The project looks for new forms of living that enable different types of care relationships, focus on intergenerational living, accessibility and strengthen cohesion between residents and the neighborhood. The structure of the existing building is retained to reduce the ecological impact and the building is given a front extension to create more space and achieve a better interface between the house and the street. A community center is also being constructed. In this way, contacts between residents and the neighborhood are facilitated and solidarity is strengthened. As designers we are aware of a super diverse social context. Based on conversations with residents of the garden district, we analyzed existing ways of living together and living together in the neighborhood. To strengthen the current sense of community, we use this analysis as the main thrust of the new architectural and landscape design. We see listening to the residents of the neighborhood as a method to make people belong and feel connected to a place and to each other.
The project looks for new forms of living that enable different types of care relationships, focus on intergenerational living, accessibility and strengthen cohesion between residents and the neighborhood. The structure of the existing building is retained to reduce the ecological impact and the building is given a front extension to create more space and achieve a better interface between the house and the street. A community center is also being constructed. In this way, contacts between residents and the neighborhood are facilitated and solidarity is strengthened. As designers we are aware of a super diverse social context. Based on conversations with residents of the garden district, we analyzed existing ways of living together and living together in the neighborhood. To strengthen the current sense of community, we use this analysis as the main thrust of the new architectural and landscape design. We see listening to the residents of the neighborhood as a method to make people belong and feel connected to a place and to each other.
Key objectives for sustainability
The design is not only sustainable in material and energetic terms, but also focuses strongly on the sustainability of social relationships within the garden city. On a material level, maximum retention of the existing volume reduces waste production. A renovation within a social residential area is usually not an obvious one, but it is a challenge that we as designers want to take on. The part that is being added at the front will be provided with a circular prefabricated modular wooden construction, which can be dismantled in the long term and adapted by residents. Collectivizing technical installations ensures financial and energetic sustainability. Within the building, shared spaces and facilities ensure lasting relationships between residents. In each individual home, there is a strong focus on staging private-public transitions, which encourages appropriation and therefore identity creation. We believe this is the basis for sustainable neighborly relations. Providing a community center on the ground floor provides for a sustainable relationship between this building block and other social housing in the neighborhood.
Key objectives for aesthetics and quality
Through conversations with residents of the existing garden district, who will also be the target audience for the future home, we have gained a clear picture of what quality of life residents want. By basing the design on these conversations, our design is as close as possible to the wishes and lifestyle of the future residents. Living experience here goes beyond the necessary comfort requirements and daylight. Living in the garden district is strongly related to the surrounding landscape. There is a public cart track in front of the building, and a private collective backyard behind the building. In the design we focus on gradients between private and public. In this way, residents can focus more socially on the public front zone in their home or withdraw more into the home. Aesthetically, the preservation of the old building provides some interesting moments. Because the former facade is enclosed by a new front building, the old brick facade becomes an interior facade, giving the front zones of each unit a warm and semi-private character. We have chosen volumetrically to make the characteristic gable roof of the old building tangible. For the new part, the front building, we choose to have the roof slope slightly upwards. In this way, the entire volumetrics of the building are connected to the rest of the district, which has gable roofs, but at the same time it has a more open character.
Key objectives for inclusion
We strive for an integral form of inclusion. The building consists of social housing so affordability is inherently a feature of the design. The aim of this design is to strive for even more inclusion within the task of social housing by increasing the supply and flexibility of housing. Family compositions within social housing can be very diverse and change over time. In our design we strive for a diversity of residential units that takes into account both special and changing family compositions. Accessibility for wheelchair users is fully guaranteed for each of the units after the renovation, while this was not the case before for any unit. In addition, we also focus on care relationships: We facilitate intergenerational care between units and within the same unit.
How Citizens benefit
Through conversations with residents of the existing garden district, who will also be the target audience for the future home, we have gained a clear picture of what quality of life residents want. By basing the design on these conversations, our design is as close as possible to the wishes and lifestyle of the future residents. For example, we heard about existing habits of children playing in the front yard, neighbors having a BBQ together in the front yard and the like. By orienting the new front building as much as possible towards this front garden zone and designing the landscape accordingly, we try to facilitate these existing uses even better.
Physical or other transformations
It refers to a physical transformation of the built environment (hard investment)
Innovative character
Sustainability, renovation, inclusion and participation are concepts that we strongly want to apply in the context of social housing, where this is not always the case.
Existing social housing that no longer meets contemporary standards is in many cases either replaced by new construction or partially renovated. If we look at the full term of a building and its impact on the climate, a hybrid approach in which we partly opt for a renovation and partly for a sustainable circular new construction is a favorable solution that we want to apply here.
In this project, inclusion also goes beyond accessibility, we think about different ways of intergenerational cohabitation and offer various housing typologies such as co-housing that are an experiment within the context of social living in Belgium. The regulations have not yet been adjusted to this, but we believe that these types of housing can strengthen social cohesion and reduce loneliness. A participatory process is not always obvious in the context of social housing because the actual residents of the building are not yet known in advance. We are therefore committed to broader participation from the neighborhood to estimate how people live in the neighborhood. In this way we ensure greater cohesion of the building block in the garden district. The knowledge gained from this project can therefore also be used through knowledge sharing in the rest of the district that is in need of renewal. The building block is, as it were, an experiment in housing types, construction methods and participation that can subsequently influence future renovations in the rest of the neighborhood.
Existing social housing that no longer meets contemporary standards is in many cases either replaced by new construction or partially renovated. If we look at the full term of a building and its impact on the climate, a hybrid approach in which we partly opt for a renovation and partly for a sustainable circular new construction is a favorable solution that we want to apply here.
In this project, inclusion also goes beyond accessibility, we think about different ways of intergenerational cohabitation and offer various housing typologies such as co-housing that are an experiment within the context of social living in Belgium. The regulations have not yet been adjusted to this, but we believe that these types of housing can strengthen social cohesion and reduce loneliness. A participatory process is not always obvious in the context of social housing because the actual residents of the building are not yet known in advance. We are therefore committed to broader participation from the neighborhood to estimate how people live in the neighborhood. In this way we ensure greater cohesion of the building block in the garden district. The knowledge gained from this project can therefore also be used through knowledge sharing in the rest of the district that is in need of renewal. The building block is, as it were, an experiment in housing types, construction methods and participation that can subsequently influence future renovations in the rest of the neighborhood.
Disciplines/knowledge reflected
The design arose from close conversations between us as an architectural team with employees of the social housing society, other architects and engineers, local social services, experts in social housing and artists. The discussions with the housing company were mainly useful to gain an idea of the needs within the current situation of the social residential area and quality objectives for the future residential area. Asking advice from architects and engineers with experience helped us to support our ambitious vision with conservation and to incorporate experience from the field within social residential areas into our design. This way we can get an estimate in advance of what works and what doesn't. By consulting local social services, we got a clearer picture of what is going on in the neighborhood and how we could strengthen neighborhood work. The design of the community center will be explored with them in the further process. Experts in social housing from the VMSW closely monitor the living quality of the proposed homes and provide us with comments where necessary. The architectural design also involves collaboration with 2 teams of artists. One team is creating an outdoor oven around which residents can gather to cook in relation to the neighborhood. The other team uses the recovered bricks of the old building to create a seating area with a bunch of fruit as a learning place and meeting place that brings residents closer to nature. All this to strengthen social cohesion and connection with the place. In addition to all these parties, we see the residents of the neighborhood, we also listened to and learned from residents, whom we recognize as 'residents
architects'. Residents are central to the design, but also to the entire participatory process.
architects'. Residents are central to the design, but also to the entire participatory process.
Methodology used
The design is innovative due to a design method that views the residents as co-designers and a construction method that is hybrid renovation and new construction timber frame within the context of social living. We strive to maximize the involvement of the client and users through a co-creative design process and participatory workshops, for the design, implementation, management and 'the afterlife' (the process of appropriation that begins once residents move into homes). The support built up in this way ensures a strong sense of ownership during the usage phase.
How stakeholders are engaged
Locally, we have had conversations with residents of the block and the neighborhood, by talking to them on the street and drinking coffee and eating cake together. We lived together as neighbors, so to speak. These conversations formed the guideline for further design. During the design process we also enter into a strong dialogue with !Mpuls, the social housing company that owns the garden district. She shared her experiences. At national level we received support from the Flemish master architect team who, together with a team of critics, supervised our innovative design process.
Global challenges
The world is simultaneously faced with a major materials issue and energy issue. This design with hybrid conservation and new construction that is completely renovated in an energy-compliant manner can be an example of what is possible. In terms of collectivization, this design not only offers solutions in residential forms, but also in landscape.
Learning transferred to other parties
The entire design is highly replicable in the context of social housing. In the garden district of Menen alone there are about a hundred homes of the same type from the 1950s, where the design can be exactly replicated. We are facing a similar major renovation issue throughout Belgium and Europe, a demand for inclusion, new forms of living, etc. This project can not only serve as a construction example, but it is also a living experiment. The new forms of living that we propose in this project and ensure social cohesion can be applied everywhere. The landscape design also proposes replicable ambitions with strong softening.
Keywords
care
social housing
intergenerational living
garden town
renovation
