Project Overview
- Location
- Malmö, Sweden
- Year
- 2020
- Category
- Multi-Family Housing
- Size
- 2,100 m²
- Status
- Completed
About the project
A courtyard housing block organised around a shared linden-planted garden, giving each of its eighteen units a private threshold to green space.
How This Project Came Together
01
The Brief
02
The Problem
03
The Approach
04
The Outcome
Eighteen affordable units that didn't feel like a block.
Malmö Bostad AB needed eighteen units of affordable housing on a tight urban infill site, but wanted to avoid the double-loaded corridor typology that had defined the municipality's affordable stock for thirty years.
The site was too small for a garden and a full unit count.
At the required density, standard massing left no room for meaningful shared outdoor space — just a strip of grass no wider than a corridor. Residents surveyed on comparable schemes ranked outdoor access as their single biggest complaint.
One shared courtyard, reached by every unit's front door.
We arranged all eighteen units around a single central courtyard planted with linden trees, replacing internal corridors with open-air walkways that face the garden. Every unit, regardless of floor, opens directly onto shared green space rather than a hallway.
The waiting list is now longer than any other block in the district.
Post-occupancy surveys rank the courtyard as residents' top reason for staying long-term, and the scheme now has the lowest turnover rate in Malmö Bostad's affordable portfolio. The linden canopy, still young, is expected to fully shade the courtyard within a decade.
In Detail
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