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40 418 QRLR II: An Alternative to Mass Housing  

Credits: 
6
Full course name in Norwegian Bokmål: 
QRLR II: An Alternative to Mass Housing  
Course code: 
40 418
Level of study: 
Master
Teaching semester: 
2022 Spring
Assessment semester: 
2022 Spring
Language of instruction: 
English
Year: 
2022
Maximum number of students: 
15
Person in charge
Nina Berre
Tom Davies
Required prerequisite knowledge

Admission to AHO and successful completion of three years bachelor level studies (180 ECTS)

Part of course series: Quite Rise of Low Rise

Course content

This course-brief picks up the theme of earlier Quiet Rise of the Low Rise (QRLR) work broadening the theme to look at the legacy of Low Rise/High-Density (LR/HD) housing in Norway from the ‘60s to the present day. The course opens with new archival material from the mid ‘60s courses taught by Professor Herman Krag at NTNU, Trondheim, and early LR/HD projects such as Øvre Ullern Terrace, west Oslo and low rise atrium houses at Hamar (Arkitim). The course will explore the works of earlier students and Norwegian and international architects´practises in the 1960-1980s to understand the development of terraced, atrium-plan and other housing in Norway within the international context to which this belongs. Bringing the dutch architect John Habraken´s publication Supports. An Alternative to Mass Housing (1972) to light, the course will also try to answer why these typologies on one hand were discontinued, but still have relevance in a contemporary context.  Current projects such as LPO’s Lachmannsvei and the renaissance in diverse housing types in London in recent years as documented by New London Architecture, will be studied. Aspects of the course will include the planning and institutional challenges inherent in building such typologies, the current resurgence of interest in alternatives to the block and leave the students with some of the tools needed to contribute to new and interesting housing types in the future.

Learning outcome

Knowledge:

  • Legacy of diverse housing typologies in Norway and the wider international context detailed knowledge of individual projects
  • Community engagement and interview  techniques

Skills:

  • Archival research
  • site-studies/field work
  • community engagement /interview
  • overview of planning and development regulation and challenges and, means of addressing those challenges

General competence:

  • Archival and engagement skills, planning and building knowledge, historical context.
Working and learning activities

The course will be structured through a series of lectures, site-visits and group-work – through which the students will focus on particular projects and work towards and exhibition as the course outcome.

The students will  work through archival material following architects through studies totheir built-projects to understand how ideas and skills developed professionally. As well as archival and site-studies the students will talk to residents to learn about the project as lived experience.

The present day context will then look for current comparable examples and learn about their development, the approach taken and the challenges to completion etc. from their architects and developers.

Guest lectures will include those working with Low Rise High Density housing in London, potentially Professor Mark Swenarton the author of Cook’s Camden: the making of Modern Housing and Luis Diaz whose work on housing typologies unlocks much of the community and use related thinking behind these projects. As well as practising architects working with contemporary schemes in Oslo and London.

Form of assessmentGroupingGrading scaleComment
Project assignment-Pass / failAssessment will be in the form of an exhibition intended to be presented at AHO and an online archive. Comprising written, illustrative and textual analysis.
Vurderinger:
Form of assessment:Project assignment
Grouping:-
Grading scale:Pass / fail
Comment:Assessment will be in the form of an exhibition intended to be presented at AHO and an online archive. Comprising written, illustrative and textual analysis.