A rectangular area 500 m x 170 m oriented in a north-southerly direction, has to be developed to contain 980 apartments distributed on six levels. The area is part of an urban planning scheme in an undeveloped area and therefore surrounded by a non-consolidated and un-built up urban fabric.
The aim of the project is to meet several requisites considered to be of primary importance:
Four distinct paraboloid rings irregularly and casually defined form continuous urban fronts on one side, while on the other enclosing four ample pedestrian spaces separated from the surrounding context; four green oases with hillocks and depressions rising and falling "naturally" and with no access points for roads. The roads in the neighbourhood run inside the area between one ring and another without however ever penetrating them, breaking away from the general orthogonal layout of the road network while keeping it functional.
All the apartments placed radially on the perimeter of the rings are "loops" facing internally and externally onto the courtyards, with the bedrooms facing north, north-west, and north-east, and the living-rooms always facing south or south-west and south-east. All the apartments are protected on the north side by a brise-soleil composed of horizontal strips of wood which covers the entire façade, the stair wells and lift shafts, while to the south they open onto shaded jutting terraces with horizontal "pergolas" composed of photovoltaic panels for the production of solar energy. The section of the block closed to the north by the wood wall and open to the south with the jutting solar panels encircles the entire perimeter of the four rings and is inverted depending on the slant of the shadows so that the jutting "pergolas" are alternately inside and outside the green courtyard. The planimetric irregularity of the rings obtained with the inversion of this section results in external and internal facades which appear different depending on the angle from which they are seen.
The apartments are positioned to the right and left of each stairwell. The two apartments contained between one stairwell and another can be modified at any time. From two 2-bedroom apartments they can be converted into one 1-bedroom apartment and one 3-bedroom apartment by simply demolishing and reconstructing a door opening making it possible to annex the second bedroom of one apartment to the contiguous one. The number and layout of the 1-2 and 3-bedroom apartments is absolutely flexible and can be even modified over the years.