Description
This participatory project was created to enable a group of 14 low-income families to access homeownership. It is located on a 35-m-wide plot of land near the canal and the centre of Molenbeek. From the outset, the residents wanted an environmentally friendly project, leading to a passive building in which they could master all the necessary built-in technologies. The site is divided into seven bays perpendicular to the street, of 5 m each, in which two superimposed duplexes are placed, sharing a common entrance on the ground floor. The ground floor duplexes have a terrace and a garden at the rear, while the upper floor ones have terraces at the front and rear. All the dwellings are therefore through apartments, and thus offer a southern orientation at the front and a northern orientation at the back. The number of rooms varies from two to five and the dwelling floor areas vary from 100 to 150 m2. The four-storey building is built out of wood, a material that is clearly visible on the street side where a timber structure serves both as a sunshade and as a balcony. On the first two floors, each unit is singled out by a bright colour, while the next two floors are clad in wood.
Exterior view
Interior view
Originally published in: Gérald Ledent, Alessandro Porotto, Brussels Housing. Atlas of Residential Building Types, Birkhäuser, 2023.