One goal, different ways of achieving it. A halfway-house between private and public building, Social Housing 2.0 knows no limits on the creative front.
When a public residential building needs to be re-purposed, invention is waiting in the wings, ready to come up with an exciting project that not only meets the specified energy-efficiency requirements, but also adds original styling and close attention to social considerations.
This was the case with the carbon-neutral floating eco-quarter, made up of low-consumption housing, built in May 2012 in the old port of Houthaven, a stone's throw from the centre of Amsterdam, which has since become a much replicated and reinterpreted format and even a cult location for various segments of the lifestyle sector.
The increasing use of shipping containers as dwelling units, after all, is not just a practical, sustainable, low-cost solution, but also provides a fertile canvas for creative exuberance. The trend is putting down increasingly firm roots, and winning considerable acclaim in creative quarters.
Projects of this type include Container City in London, which is the home of an array of eco-compatible lofts, the Mill Junction student city in Johannesburg and the recently announced plan to develop an attractive new Social Housing project out of the Dharavi slum in the Indian city of Mumbai. Designed by CRG Architects , the project took third place in theSuperSkyScrapers Competition, and involves transforming the district into two eco-sustainable skyscrapers in blue, red, green and yellow, made up of old re-purposed shipping containers, with a view to providing inhabitants with a healthier lifestyle. The resulting buildings - one with 139 storeys and a height of 400 metres and the second with 78 storeys and a height of 200 metres - will thus wrap around each other, and the structure, to be made chiefly of steel and concrete, will be completed with 4,500 shipping containers, to accommodate approximately 5000 people. The complex will also include blackwater and greywater recycling systems, reservoir areas, gardens and communal spaces.
