Apartment Building on Virrey Avilés Street. Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2022

Abstract

The Apartment Building in Virrey Avilés and the Small Family Cohousing are shaped by the constraints of their respective sites. The former occupies a typical lot in Buenos Aires, with a width of 8.66 meters, where circulations and collective spaces are organized towards the center of the urban block. A staircase in the middle of the courtyard blurs the boundaries between common spaces and the external areas designated for each unit’s use. The Small Family Cohousing projects are designed for plots stemming from the historic Site Operation in Santiago, measuring 9 meters wide by 18 meters long. Within them, a building of two to three stories is erected to alleviate overcrowding for multiple families currently living under one roof. The use of adaptable typologies and prefabrication technologies minimizes construction timelines, ensuring that the families remain away from their site for no longer than 6 months. Moreover, in both cases, architectural design is intertwined with the establishment of new paradigms of co-ownership and co-financing, serving as a testament that the pursuit of collectivity in housing transcends mere spatial considerations.

Keywords

• co-dwelling
• co-ownership
• family housing
• collective housing
• collective space