PRESENTATION OF THE RESULT OF THE COMPETITION FOR AFFORDABLE AND GOOD LIVING  CONSTRUCTION 1:1 – TEN CONCEPTS FOR FRANKFURT

April 13 – June 23, 2019 – ground floor gallery (from May 17 – June 4, 2019 the exhibition will be closed)
 

Frankfurt is one of the German hotspots for property prices that are rising at an above-average speed. New housing financed on the open market is often offered at prices that even the middle class finds it hard to afford. The shortfall in subsidized housing that has accumulated down through the decades and the loss in existing subsidized properties is especially discernible here, too.
The City of Frankfurt, ABG FRANKFURT HOLDING as the developer, and Deutsches Architekturmuseum have jointly responded to these challenges with the cooperative HOUSING FOR ALL competition. HOUSING FOR ALL proposes exemplary housing models for a real-life building site, models that set out to combine economic cost efficiency with innovative housing and architectural qualities.
The idea was to find models that did justice to the changed demographic and socio-structural developments: Instead of focusing, as in the past, primarily on the nuclear family, today the emphasis in cost-effective housing is increasingly on making certain housing concepts consider the diversity of user groups and their differing needs. This requires solutions that will remain sufficiently elastic and flexible over several decades. Here, the issue involves not just your “own four walls,” but also addressing how housing projects can spawn vibrant, functional and socially mixed quarters.

The two-tier cooperative HOUSING FOR ALL competition process was carried out for the first time in 2018-9. Over 100 European architectural practices responded to the CALL FOR PROJECTS in Phase I and submitted over 130 realized projects that centered on affordable housing construction. The architects of the ten projects then selected qualified for the second phase of the competition, which was carried out as a cooperative competition. This PHASE II: BUILDING 1:1 resulted in ten concepts for plots in the Frankfurt’s Hilgenfeld housing estate – four of these were chosen by the jury experts and therefore commissioned to undertake detailed planning. One honorable mention was awarded.

The building site
From 2020 onwards, on the basis of the conceptual designs presented here, four housing projects will be realized in Frankfurt’s Hilgenfeld estate. The approx. 17 hectares designated for development are owned by the local authority and are earmarked in coming years for some 850 affordable rental apartments for a total of some 2,000 inhabitants. The estate is located in North Frankfurt with a view out over the Nidda valley, the Frankfurt Skylineand the Taunus hills. To the east, the estate abuts on Homburger Landstrasse and it backs to the south onto the Main-Weser-Bahn rail tracks. The Frankfurter Berg LRT stop is directly at hand, providing prime public transport links that will in future be strengthened even further with the extension of the U5 subway line to include this stop.

The urban planning
An urban planning ideas competition was held for the estate back in 2016. The entry by Thomas Schüler Architekten Stadtplaner (Düsseldorf) and Faktorgrün Landschaftsarchitekten (Freiburg) won first prize and was fleshed out in the form of revisions by the City Planning Dept.; the land use plan is currently being prepared. The HOUSING FOR ALL competition process was thus able to undertake ideal adjustments as regards both the building typologies and the scaling of the individual plots, which have thus been inputted into the land use plan.

The briefing as regards cost-effective housing
A total of 40 percent of the apartments in the Hilgenfeld housing estate will stem from subsidized housing construction. In addition, 15 percent of the total area is earmarked for communal and cooperative housing projects. These areas will be awarded to the best concept rather than to the highest bidder. Moreover, all apartments financed on the open market must, so the plan, be offered at affordable rents. In this way, the Hilgenfeld housing estate is destined to become a model quarter for affordable and good housing construction. The goal is to show that today it is still possible to create affordable housing for Frankfurt citizens in the long term, at several levels and using a variety of approaches.

PHASE I – CALL FOR PROJECTS
107 practices with 131 projects from 13 countries

PHASE II – TEN CONCEPTS FOR FRANKFURT
Seven practices from five countries submitted a total of ten concepts for Frankfurt
Four prize-winners:
schneider + schumacher Architekten ZT GmbH, Vienna
Duplex Architekten / Studio Duplex, Zurich / Düsseldorf, Hamburg
NL Architects, Amsterdam / STUDYO Architects, Cologne
Lacaton & Vassal Architectes, Paris

Honorable mention: Praeger Richter Architekten, Berlin

as well as
HEIDE & VON BECKERATH Architekten, Berlin
ifau Architekten, Berlin