Project
Team ········· Yotam Ben Hur
Assaf Kimmel
Type ········· Residential
Year ······ 2022
Status ······· Competition
Assaf Kimmel
Type ········· Residential
Year ······ 2022
Status ······· Competition
Between Two Grids: Architecture of Multiplicity ®
We need a new approach to housing, one that rethinks our physical and emotional relationships to our homes and challenges the conventions between individuals, between architecture and urban planning, and between urban life and nature. In an era, recovering from an incarcerating pandemic while combating humanity’s escalating climate crisis, housing remains the greatest agent in maintaining our own well-being as well as that of our planet. Covid-19 has proven the critical role of our homes in protecting our health and mind through promoting flexibility, privacy, dual use of living and working spaces and the gravity of outdoor spaces. Climate change continues to urge architects and dwellers to rethink design, materiality and use, and offer alternative models for sustainable, climate resilient and responsive ways of living. At the same time, our fast growing metropolises, and rising housing demands require us to think about human and spatial diversity that promote social interaction, equality, justice and affordability.
Architecture of multiplicity is a new housing model for a social impactful, environment responsible and human centered Tel-Aviv. An approach for future building extensions and preservation of listed buildings in the city that offers both an alternative unit ownership paradigm and a spatially diverse environment for its inhabitants. This model is meant to discard and replace the prevalent real estate driven extensions model benefitting solely the unaffordable “penthouse” unit, and often resulting in homogeneous, cookie cutter, generic living spaces.
The project proposes an addition of 2.5 floors on top of a 1930s listed building on 87 Rothschild Boulevard, by extending its existing structural grid and superimposing a new spatial grid. The new floors are built with a steel frame that rests on top of the structural grid and follows the current boundaries of the building. Designed to accommodate a diverse range of households, the project offers multiple unit types that vary in area, number of levels, aspects and private exterior spaces. The design of the new floors also enables the integration of small units that are given by the developer to the tenants of the existing apartments below. These smaller units act as open-air spaces with minimal amenities such as restrooms, showers or kitchenettes. The use of these spaces is not prescribed but can be imagined as indooroutdoor spaces for social gatherings, fitness and work spaces. Coupled with a new collective rooftop space and ground floor communal lobby, these spaces are intended to improve the living conditions of the new and existing tenants by offering them additional spaces beyond their immediate units.
Rotated at approximately 45°, the spatial grid is built with triple layered insulated low-E glass panels on most of the exterior walls and with retractable wooden walls in the inner rhombic spaces. These create flexibility of use within the units, where the primary rooms can be connected to one another by retracting the wooden panels. As for the terraces, they create views towards multiple aspects while also partly shading the glass walls that are ecessed inwards and are covered by movable curtains.
The existing building, designed by Carl Rubin and completed in 1936, is restored to its original design and is fully preserved with all documented fixtures both in the apartments’ facade and in the staircase. The integration of a discreetly positioned elevator in the north west corner suggests a new layout to the existing apartments, which maintains the columns while allowing entrances both from the existing staircase and from the elevator directly into the apartments.
When designing for a climate responsive future, the project questions the vision for a ‘White City’ previously driven by the use of the environmentally degrading concrete material. In a post-concrete era, white Tel-Aviv is overtly reimagined with white steel structure, recycled terrazzo flooring, glass and textile enclosures, aluminum cladding and wood interiors. An architecture that pays homage to the past character of its host city, while thinking ahead for its resilient future.
Architecture of multiplicity is a new housing model for a social impactful, environment responsible and human centered Tel-Aviv. An approach for future building extensions and preservation of listed buildings in the city that offers both an alternative unit ownership paradigm and a spatially diverse environment for its inhabitants. This model is meant to discard and replace the prevalent real estate driven extensions model benefitting solely the unaffordable “penthouse” unit, and often resulting in homogeneous, cookie cutter, generic living spaces.
The project proposes an addition of 2.5 floors on top of a 1930s listed building on 87 Rothschild Boulevard, by extending its existing structural grid and superimposing a new spatial grid. The new floors are built with a steel frame that rests on top of the structural grid and follows the current boundaries of the building. Designed to accommodate a diverse range of households, the project offers multiple unit types that vary in area, number of levels, aspects and private exterior spaces. The design of the new floors also enables the integration of small units that are given by the developer to the tenants of the existing apartments below. These smaller units act as open-air spaces with minimal amenities such as restrooms, showers or kitchenettes. The use of these spaces is not prescribed but can be imagined as indooroutdoor spaces for social gatherings, fitness and work spaces. Coupled with a new collective rooftop space and ground floor communal lobby, these spaces are intended to improve the living conditions of the new and existing tenants by offering them additional spaces beyond their immediate units.
Rotated at approximately 45°, the spatial grid is built with triple layered insulated low-E glass panels on most of the exterior walls and with retractable wooden walls in the inner rhombic spaces. These create flexibility of use within the units, where the primary rooms can be connected to one another by retracting the wooden panels. As for the terraces, they create views towards multiple aspects while also partly shading the glass walls that are ecessed inwards and are covered by movable curtains.
The existing building, designed by Carl Rubin and completed in 1936, is restored to its original design and is fully preserved with all documented fixtures both in the apartments’ facade and in the staircase. The integration of a discreetly positioned elevator in the north west corner suggests a new layout to the existing apartments, which maintains the columns while allowing entrances both from the existing staircase and from the elevator directly into the apartments.
When designing for a climate responsive future, the project questions the vision for a ‘White City’ previously driven by the use of the environmentally degrading concrete material. In a post-concrete era, white Tel-Aviv is overtly reimagined with white steel structure, recycled terrazzo flooring, glass and textile enclosures, aluminum cladding and wood interiors. An architecture that pays homage to the past character of its host city, while thinking ahead for its resilient future.