RAISE YOUR STANDARDS an investigation of how design attributes improve the quality in apartments

Abstract

The housing construction industry in Sweden faces several challenges, such as a housing shortage, slow building pace, high prices, and low-quality residences. To maximize profits, construction companies prioritize quick and cheap building projects, resulting in smaller apartments with a concerning lack of qualitative features such as axiality and circular movement. The purpose of this thesis is to draw attention to design attributes as an important part of housing architecture, and its contribution to the advancement of architectural quality. The thesis explores several design attributes in contemporary housing architecture and investigates how they can be incorporated through floor plans in an existing, newly developed, housing proposal. The aim is to redesign the apartments in an existing proposal incorporating design attributes without compromising the building’s program. The final proposal illustrates how design attributes are incorporated in different types of apartments and investigates the impact of the changes on the existing building volume. Eventually demonstrating area efficient apartments that through design attributes have achieved high architectural quality. The research questions focus on how design attributes improve the quality in different types of apartments and explore their impact on the building itself compared to the existing proposal. • Q1. How can design attributes improve the quality in different types of apartments? • Q2. What impact do design attributes in apartments have on the overall building? The thesis investigation has been conducted as a collaboration between five main methods: research for/on/by design, literature studies and case studies. Literature and case studies have gathered information on the topic, built a foundation for further investigation and defined the design strategies that are being used. Lastly the thesis practices research by design carried out by using several design attributes as strategies in the design proposal.