‘13 Houses, 1 Garden’ is a Masters diploma studio investigating alternative approaches to densification in the context of Geneva. Taking place on a site in the vicinity of the HEAD – Genève Campus where mid-century houses are slated for demolition in favor of a large housing complex, interior architecture is used as an impulse for intentions and solutions against tabula rasa.

Starting from the urban planning layout, the studio proposed to consider as a starting point an alternate future, where half of the houses are demolished to propose denser housing solutions, while keeping 13 houses in the middle of the plot. Surrounded by 3 new housing buildings, these houses and their gardens form a new common space for the inhabitants. Students experimented with transforming these buildings through new uses, housing, cultural, leisure, and outdoor programs, while rethinking the relationships between private and collective space.

Building on individual themes explored in previous research, each student started working from the interior of one house. Each individual project is embedded in the same context and various ways of relating to it are possible and encouraged. One could propose to transform a house, or a part of it, or to insert an autonomous piece of design within it, or to add elements to a garden, etc. The outdoor environment is considered as an integral extension of interiors, elaborating on the disciplinary boundaries of interior architecture, and considering landscape as an inhabitable interior.

The semester culminated in a cohesive group project, articulating individual intentions within a shared framework, adding a collective dimension to the project. The final collective exhibition highlights the complexities and contradiction of articulating a constellation of personal interventions into a feasible, coherent whole.

STUDENTS