Roel Kosters
Architecture & Dwelling - Dutch Housing Studio
Image: Floor plan on housing level
Sheltered Urbanity
While the city of Amsterdam is growing in popularity among families, most families in Amsterdam express concerns about their living environment. Urban families are looking for sheltered urbanity; a neighbourhood with other families, accessible amenities, qualitative outdoor space and no fast traffic. This notion forms the starting point of the design of a housing block for urban families on the Apple Market, a location dominated by a modernistic parking garage. The two upper, unused layers of the parking garage are removed, the remaining structure serves as a basis for a new housing block. Doing so, the plot is densified while being able to redevelop the existing square into a sheltered playground. The housing block contains 70 varying family apartments which are grouped around a collective courtyard. By gradual transitions between private, collective and public domains, the housing block facilitates children to safely expand their action range when they grow up.