30ethics

1 the unit

Rooms: - private rooms - common rooms - exterior space

existing, retained

existing, demolished

new

Thresholds: - terrace and balcony

private

- entrance - windows

2 the courtyard

communal

Rooms: - terraces

public

private communal public

Thresholds: - circulation

street pedestrian bicycle

- topography - rainwater swale - vegetation

3 the group

opposite page: ambiguous space behind the apartment blocks. The same brick block is repeated across the site. below: while the apartments are spacious, narrow rooms and high window sills compress the living spaces. chart, right: this is how the potential thresholds are identified. They form a fabric that links otherwise isolated units, from the scale of an individual unit, to the overall site itself.

Rooms: - side yards - lake edge - back lane

Thresholds: - circulation

street back lane - rainwater swales

- topography - vegetation - views

4 the site

Rooms: - entrances to the site - lake edge alcoves

37 Scale is an organising idea that defines user publics and clarifies their relationship to the site. At the smallest scale, the inhabitants of a single unit form a public. At the median scales, the public subdivides demographically into children, single parents, married parents, married couples, single adults and single seniors — 770 people all with different needs and desires. At the largest scale, the site, all people in the single family houses in the area, Dartmouth visitors to Maynard Lake, as well as all the people in the apartments, form a public. The thresholds between each scale of the site are the moments where different publics interact. Resilient spaces have thresholds that can mediate between public and private territories, depending on the changing needs of the inhabitants. Public and private spaces are held in an ever-shifting balance — not a static state, but rather a state of constant adjustment. Shifting thresholds afford leeway for immediate small-scale change, and long term future change, such as new ideas for zoning and public access. Flexible thresholds allow for a mindset different from that created by individual property rights and a strict delineation between neighbours. Thresholds hold many stories.

Made with FlippingBook interactive PDF creator