Co-fill

Can suburban land and housing use and occupant wellbeing be improved through collective infill housing models?

The primary motivation for this thesis stems from my personal belief that architecture has both potential and responsibility, to improve our wellbeing and shape the way we reside.

The underlying passion emerged from growing up in Khandallah and seeing the potential for residential infill in large backyards. The privilege of sharing my own backyard facilities with friends and family grew my curiosity into why more backyards can’t be shared. Why do fences have to divide our lives?

After living with my grandparents for a time in my early childhood, I then watched them downsize out of the family home as we moved in. My fascination with the benefits of co-housing and multi-generation living grew. I wanted to explore what living with, and learning from, a wider demographic has to offer.

In a world where we are more virtually connected but less connected physically than ever before, I became interested in the potential co-housing has to reconnect people.

My curiosity in co-housing also stemmed from the pressure I face as a young adult in the New Zealand housing market at present, and the potential co-housing has as a more sustainable, economic, and social way of living. I wanted to use this research to explore a housing typology that responds to the way I want to reside in the future.

I’ve become fascinated with the changing housing dynamics one experiences in a lifetime and which residences are the most positive for mental wellbeing. Why do we associate shared living environments with youth (as hostels or flats) or in old age (in age care, and moving back in with family) but not as a normal housing typology for typical adulthood New Zealand. I am interested in the transition between flatting life and first home living. This research investigates how these environments could be merged?