This housing scheme is an entry to a competition sponsored by the American Institute of Architects for new housing concepts in New York City. The building creates a large variety of apartment types, while improving the public space along 4th Avenue. It is articulated as a “bookend” to the Brooklyn city block: Existing typologies of residential and civic programs are transformed according to the demands of contemporary city life. The typology of low-rise family townhouses of the side streets is extended onto the corner site, where it folds up to become a multi-story apartment slab with a retail base, facing the higher density 4th avenue.

The semi-public courtyard is the nucleus of the complex in which all the different programs converge. A large breezeway in the lower half of the building’s street wall opens the courtyard and all rear yards to the avenue. The courtyard becomes a stage, displaying the different aspects of contemporary urban life to the passerby. At the same time, the vibrant activity on the avenue can be experienced from within the sheltered space of the block. A modern re-interpretation of a Renaissance space.

Type: Unbuilt
Place: New York
Year: 2004
Collaboration: Daniel Schütz, Georg Windeck