Supervisor: Lawrence Barth
Student: Anna Shpuntova
These days we seem to use the word ‘sharing’ and ‘collective’ a lot when it comes to discussion about new ways of living, new urban domesticity. There is a growing range of crossovers between individual households and new models of collective formations. Architectural practice suggests more and more examples of co-living, cluster apartments, different variations of live-work environments. There are multiple reasons for people choosing to live collectively, share their households, work spaces and even responsibilities like child-care. The simplest ones are a wish to reduce economic costs for keeping the house, need to avoid loneliness or keep in touch with a community that shares your interests or occupation.
In the background, there are several important trends deriving from rapid changes in the world around: new demographic patterns, extreme digitalisation of every-day life, new approaches to the work space born in the post-pandemic world, new knowledge economy, etc. The line between our work environment and home is not defined nearly as strictly as it was before. Now work can be done at the office, in bed, at the cafe in the corner, at a rented ‘hot-desk’ or wherever one feels comfortable enough. Besides that, ‘in most European cities, the concept of a nuclear family — defined as two adults with at least one child — has long ceased to constitute the majority of households’1 . The traditional understanding of a family has been extended and changed. We tend to live outside our family settings, building wider systems of relationships based on affect. Therefore, the whole notion of domesticity is being rethought and becomes more varied.
What we also observe is that the majority of projects elaborating on the notion of sharing are community-driven. They are initiated by rather small groups of people who share intimate knowledge about one another and plan these project over a sufficient period of time. Otherwise, we tend to struggle with creating high-quality collective environments and therefore they don’t serve to deliver density so much desired in our cities today. On top of that, unlike, for example, Vienna2, a lot of cities lack a sufficient regulatory legal framework and institutional traditions that would allow for things like to be organised more often. Nevertheless, I would argue that there is no particular reason why the market could not learn from community initiated projects. This is why we should explore the examples which offer an innovative approach to the questions of shared living and ‘extract’ from them a set of principles that can be further applied in the market-driven projects of collective reaching beyond user initiative.
Among such examples are the Spreefeld (Berlin), Mehr also Wohnen (Zurich), Wohnprojekt (Vienna) collaborative projects. What all of them are putting forward is a shift from a traditional compact, functional and rather isolated nuclear family lifestyle towards expansion, rising complexity of the family life itself and the households’ incorporation into a wider system of relationships and affective ties. If we ask, in what kind of urban condition could be this new type of domesticity put forward, we can see that there is a tremendous potential for defining a new urbanity in the inner periphery of our cities today. In the post-pandemic world with the new live-work patterns mentioned above, the potential of enriching the peripheral areas with services became evident. There is a possibility to requalify these areas, to make them meet our expectations of density, becoming at the same time grounds for a new collaborative spirit, distanced but not isolated from the central city. It can be done via building inside these projects mutual support systems and systems of care which could be translated and extended over a wider urban area.
1 Niklas Maak, "Post-Familial Communes in Germany”, Harvard Design Magazine, no. 41 (2015), http://www.harvarddesignmagazine.org/ issues/41/post-familial-communes-in-germany.
2 Wohngemeinshaften: refers to a living arrangement in which several tenants share an apartment. The ‘Das Wiener Modell’ publication by Wolfgang Forster and William Menking elaborates on different housing models in Vienna and legal apparatus for subsidised and collective housing.
In this essay I will explore how exactly can such systems be built using the Spreefeld project in Berlin as a reference. I will look into its’ architectural qualities, organisational principles and the way it addresses the morphological organisation of the neighbourhood. I believe this project exemplifies the way we might be living differently today and shows at a scale of an assemblage how the new version of domesticity can start to reshape the urban life. The project asks important questions about the way we shape our cities to accommodate differences. It explores what would be the things, activities and places we would be willing to share if we decided to live collectively and what we would rather keep private; how do we want to run our households today, raise children and spend our leisure time. What if we looked at areas like Vauxhall3 in London and implemented there what we learn about serviced and collective living from projects like Spreefeld? To conduct this analysis, I will first elaborate on literature to explore the roots of the modern understanding of domesticity. Moreover, I will look into and the trajectory of conflict between autonomy of a liberal subject and its position within a wider system of relationships. The search for balance between the two is something that goes hand in hand with the architecture of collective.
Domesticity. Private and collective
‘A safe nest –– is something that each individual needs as much as each group. Without this there can be no collaboration with others. If you don’t have a place that you can call your own you don’t know where you stand’ (Herman Hertzberger. Lessons for students in architecture. Rotterdam : NAi Publishers, 2016).
If we follow Jacques Donzelot’s and Michel Foucault’s4 writings, they claim that the modern family appeared as an answer to new liberal governments’ policies as we moved into the 18-19 centuries. The state at that point became concerned with the prosperity and well-being of its population, it was called to take charge and become the agency responsible for the satisfaction of the citizens’ needs5 . Therefore, major focus was put on ‘preservation’ and well-being of children. Subsequently, women and children themselves started claiming rights and authorities they hadn’t aspired for before. Before that, under the ‘ancien regime’6 the family constituted a system of dependencies, being at the same time a subject and an object of governance. All members of the household had to oblige the head of the house who had an almost absolute power over them. In his turn, the head himself was responsible before the monarch in keeping the order inside his family and being an agent of the higher power.
As a result of this trajectory, the claim of rights started to transform the family and domestic life. Space of the home was a place of inner tension between transmission of order and the individual autonomy of a liberal subject. On the one hand, there was a wish on the part of the state to regulate and ‘normalise' the family life, on the other — aspiration of individuals within the family to be independent, cultivate their autonomy. This tension found its translation in spatial terms as well. It leads us to the question of identification of one self in a dwelling. The spatial negotiation between private and collective in relation to the patterns of domestic life within the period from 16 to 20 century7 was traced by Robin Evans. He claims that the search for privacy in the household
3 The reason why I mention Vauxhall is because it is an example of such inner periphery area in London which could become a test bed for new patterns of domesticity this essay is looking into. It is located in South London, rather centrally, but at the same time on the periphery of this centre. Nevertheless, it has been forgotten for many years due to the lack of proper links to the employment areas which led to its evolution as a residential neighbourhood. Today this is rapidly changing, with major developments at the doorstep of Vauxhall, and its character transforming enriched by new services.
4 Jacques Donzelot, The policing of families (London : Hutchinson, 1980), and Michel Foucault, The history of sexuality (New York : Pantheon, 1978-86).
5 Donzelot, The policing of families, 51.
6 The Ancien Régime, also known as the Old Regime, was the political and social system of the Kingdom of France from the Late Middle Ages until the French Revolution starting in 1789, which abolished the feudal system of the French nobility and hereditary monarchy.
7 Robin Evans, Translations from drawing to building and other essays (London : Architectural Association, 1997).
8 From Lawrence Barth, ‘Domesticty’ course lectures, within the Housing and Urbanism MArch programme.
as we understand it today started not so long ago. The fact that we turned from those who were sociable to those who are ‘socialised’8 is linked to the changes in homes layouts and appearance of the corridor or a passage as a distinctive spatial element. A shift occurred: from 16 c. homes where the inhabitation and circulation spaces didn’t distinct from each other greatly to the 19 c. when the room became ones’ fortress separated from the rest of the house (fig.1-2). Within a system of interconnected rooms, all of them having multiple doors, the members of the household had many opportunities for contact and interaction, even if it was not always a desirable one. On the contrary, the ‘corridor-plan’ arrangement ‘made it difficult to justify entering any room where you had no specific business’, bringing valued intimacy and privacy. One of the reasons for this shift is described both by Evans and Foucault: it is in changing attitude to our carnality. The subjects of the body, sexuality, family’s private matters were ‘confined and moved into the home’9 in the 19th c. following the frankness and freedom of the 17th c.
As we moved into the 20th century, search for the balance between private and shared was translated by modernists to multiple versions of the ‘minimum dwelling’ diagram. One of them was put forward by Karl Teige (fig.3). In this diagram the individual space is reduced literally to a cell, while all other facilities are collectivised. Pier Vittorio Aureli and Martino Tattara argue that the origins of the individual cell in this scheme can be traced to the monastic traditions of monk cells. The community looked for conditions where monks could ‘live together but apart in their own idiorrhythmy’10. It meant that the living was structured around important collective spaces, like church, refectory, garden and a very little space was left for one self. Therefore, I would agree with these authors when they call the rise of a minimum dwelling diagram ‘a disruptive force in the history of domesticity’11. When we talk about collective living today, the focus is not only on the shared facilities themselves but on the quality of the individual space. It brings us back to the question of ones’ autonomy within a wider system of relationships, ability to be free and experience contact with others voluntarily. The quality of life in a collective setting depends largely on ability to enjoy the private space comfortably and host guests, share the feeling of your habitat with the closest circle inside it, not only in the collective spaces
9 Foucault, The history of sexuality, 3.
10 Roland Barthes, cited in Pier Vittorio Aureli, Martino Tattara, “Soft cell: the minimum dwelling”, The architectural review (2018), https:// www.architectural-review.com/essays/soft-cell-the-minimum-dwelling.
11 Pier Vittorio Aureli, Martino Tattara, “Soft cell: the minimum dwelling”, The architectural review (2018), https://www.architectural-review.com/essays/soft-cell-the-minimum-dwelling.
Spreefeld
The Spreefeld project was delivered in 2014 in Berlin as a part of the Spree riverbank redevelopment. The site was abandoned and underused for a long time not being attractive for large investors. The housing project was initiated by the citizens protesting against an office block development planned there at first. It was designed by 3 architectural practices: BARarchitekten, FATKOEHL Architekten and Silvia Carpaneto. Each of the offices was responsible for one building in order to allow each tenant group to coordinate with their own ‘Planungsteam’12. One of the important aspects of the project was the financing scheme that included low interest loans from the German financial institutions and personal investments from the future tenants. However, the financial and managing aspects are beyond the scope of this essay which will rather explore the architectural qualities of the project.
The site is a part of an area with an industrial past which had been built up without any real coherence by a rather wide spectrum of uses. Therefore, it is different from the traditional Berlin block morphology and the vibrant streets of the city center (fig.6). The site plan offers a translation of a segmented perimeter block system with 3 building volumes pushed towards the edge. Two of them are parallel to each other and the third is almost parallel to the river, perpendicular to the others, but still a little bit rotated (fig.7). This slight angle of rotation allows the site to find a balance between being too open or too closed making all facades work equally hard and be equally important in terms of the orientation. Such plan brings in the characteristics of a courtyard pattern while working through its permeability with a wider geography of the urban area. Most of the site ground is left open and can be accessed and used by the citizens from ‘outside’. This concerns also the beach in the riverfront area and a terrace on top of the boathouse. In general, the amount of common space available for the residents in this project is extremely generous: ‘A person who owns a 540 sq.ft. apartment has access to 1.600 sq.ft. of shared facilities’13. It includes roof terraces, children day-care, gym, catering kitchen, washing facilities, living rooms, terraces, etc.
Among these shared spaces the most distinctive are the so-called ‘option spaces’14 which are located in the same place in every building. The use of these spaces is flexible and can be agreed upon among residents as a collective, they are as well available for rent for non-residents. These spaces are rather generic in their configuration but very generous in area, well-lit and open for external observation via double-height windows, and quite attractive in their materiality (fig.8-9). They are points where the assemblage collective experience starts in many forms: workshops and hobby-spaces for both adults and kids, meetings of residents and decision-making processes, celebrations and simply work. Such places also help to always maintain the projects’ connection to the wider city and attract different actors with a range of occupations.
Overall, the common language of design elements is obvious across all 3 projects: same materials, types of fenestration and systems of balconies set into voids in the facades (fig.5). All 3 practices follow a common set of ‘rules’ not only to ensure a visual coherence but also to reduce the costs and use money for things that matter more for the community. Every building follows the ‘tripartite’ scheme in section: communal and work spaces occupying double-height spaces on the ground floor, cluster apartments on the next two floor and single ones on the rest of the floors (fig.10). All of these unified on the facades through the balconies and shared terraces crossing views with each other.
12 BARarchitekten website, http://www.bararchitekten.de
13 Maak, http://www.harvarddesignmagazine.org/issues/41/post-familial-communes-in-germany.
14 The BARarchitekten mention that the organisation of the option spaces on the ground floor were the parts of the project where each practice could play so called ‘Wildcards’, make each building distinct from others, taking into account rather strict basis of standardised elements and common visual language.
The buildings themselves are quite generic in shape. However, the plans are the part of the project that perhaps shows best the incredible combination of rationality, economic solutions and the highest flexibility in households’ arrangement. A number of elements like circulation cores and service elements is fixed in each project. At the same time the dwellings layouts don't follow strict rules and are open for alterations according to the residents wishes (fig.11-12). Among project materials there is an apartment plans catalogue which shows the rich variations of layouts. All of the 64 apartments can be completely different and therefore offer multitude of domestic environment types, promoting social diversity in the project. This attitude does not impose a way of life or the way a family should look like, instead it provides a place for everyone. Among options there is a cluster apartment extended on 2 floors and shared by a greater number of residents.
Reflecting on the conflict between personal autonomy and association raised above, it can be said that the Spreefeld project is a perfect example where the balance between the two seems to be found. It became possible because of maximised opportunities for encounter and collective activities, shared experiences; and, on the other hand, typological richness in the attitude towards individual dwellings which can be all adjusted to personal tastes of the residents, extended and occupied in so many ways. This broadened notion of a threshold between private and collective works not only inside cluster flats and between individual dwellings and common spaces. It is visible at the scale of an assemblage as well. In the future the area will become more desirable for new developments, not in the last turn thanks to the Spreefeld itself. It means that the importance of public access to the projects grounds will be even higher for the growing and densifying neighbourhood. And the amount of the project collective space open to the citizens, both interior and exterior, public paths through the site created in the very beginning, prove that in the case of such future the project will still offer a place for participation, involvement of a wider urban area.
Conclusion
We can look at the Spreefeld to learn from its typological richness and ability to incorporate the life of the individual dwelling into the collective experience through a number of elements and spaces. It is ‘to a certain extent a test model for a new architecture of hospitality, investigating how much personal space a human being needs, and in what form community—beyond the nuclear family—can take place in domestic architecture’15. The project also starts the transformation of the neighbourhood by offering it to come in and share services and ground with the residents. The previously forgotten and undesirable site is now full of potential on multiple scales thanks to this development. Spreefeld contributes a lot to the conversation about thresholds between individual and collective and how the transformation of the wider urban area can be rooted in the domestic realm.
Bibliography:
Abalos, Iñaki. The good life : a guided visit to the houses of modernity. Barcelona : Editorial Gustavo Gili, 2001.
Aureli, Pier Vittorio, Martino Tattara. “Production/reproduction: Housing beyond the Family”. Harvard Design Magazine, no. 41 (2015). Accessed April 23, 2022, http://www.harvarddesignmagazine.org/issues/41/production-reproduction-housing-beyond-the-family.
Aureli, Pier Vittorio, Martino Tattara. “Soft cell: the minimum dwelling”. The Architectural Review (2018), https://www.architectural-review.com/essays/soft-cell-the-minimum-dwelling.
BARarchitekten website, http://www.bararchitekten.de.
Borsi, Katharina, Anna Shapiro. “Type, new urban domesticities and urban areas”. Internationale Zeitschrift zur Theorie der Architektur, 24 (38), 151-166. Accessed April 23, 2022, https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1229979/ type-new-urban-domesticities-and-urban-areas.
Donzelot, Jacques. The policing of families. London : Hutchinson, 1980.
Evans, Robin. Translations from Drawing to Building and Other Essays. London: Architectural Association, 1997.
Fatkoehl architekten website, https://fatkoehl.com/wohnenmixed-use/spreefeld-berlin/.
Fernandez Per, Aurora, Javier Mozas. 10 stories of collective housing : graphical analysis of inspiring masterpieces. Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain : a+t architecture Publishers, 2013
Foucault, Michel. The history of sexuality. New York : Pantheon, 1978-86.
Kries, Mateo, Mathias Muller, Daniel Niggli, Andreas Ruby, Ilka Ruby. Together! : the new architecture of the collective. Weil am Rhein : Vitra Design Museum, 2017.
Maak, Niklas. "Post-Familial Communes in Germany”. Harvard Design Magazine, no. 41 (2015). Accessed April 23, 2022, http://www.harvarddesignmagazine.org/issues/41/post-familial-communes-in-germany.
Murawski, Michal. “Revolution and the social condenser: how Soviet architects sought a radical new society”. Strelka Mag (2017), https://strelkamag.com/en/article/architecture-revolution-social-condenser. Rose, Nikolas. Governing the soul: the shaping of the private self. London : Free Association Books, c1999.
Schmid, Susanne, Dietmar Eberle, Margrit Hugentobler. A history of collective living : forms of shared housing. Basel : Birkhauser Verlag, 2019.
Table of figures:
Fig.1: Drawing by the author.
Fig.2: Drawing by the author.
Fig.3: http://www.dogma.name/project/loveless/.
Fig.4: https://fatkoehl.com/wohnenmixed-use/spreefeld-berlin/.
Fig.5: http://www.bararchitekten.de/projects/sfb.html#.
Fig.6: Ibid.
Fig.7: Drawing by the author.
Fig.8: https://www.buildingsocialecology.org/projects/spreefeld-berlin/.
Fig.9: https://www.archdaily.com/587590/coop-housing-project-at-the-river-spreefeld-carpaneto-architekten-fatkoehl-architekten-bararchitekten?ad_medium=gallery
Fig.10: Drawing by the author.
Fig.11: https://fatkoehl.com/wohnenmixed-use/spreefeld-berlin/.
Fig.12: Ibid.
Fig.13: Ibid.
Fig.14: Ibid.