"My Micro NYC," a micro-unit scheme designed by nARCHITECTS that won the city’s AdAPT NYC competition. (Click Image To Enlarge)
NEW YORK’S FIRST PREFAB APARTMENT TOWER WILL RISE IN 2015. ITS 55 UNITS WILL BE VERY, VERY SMALL.
Mayor Bloomberg inspects the model unit at the Museum of the City of New York (Click Image To Enlarge)
On Tuesday, Mayor Bloomberg--trailed by his perpetual entourage of news cameras--stepped through the door of a tiny but neatly kept apartment. He explored the model unit, which currently sits inside of the Museum of the City of New York, pulling down a trundle bed and peering inside of unexpected storage spaces. There wasn’t much ground to cover (only 300 square feet, in truth), and soon Bloomberg migrated to a podium to introduce the unit as the winning design in his AdAPT NYC competition, which seeks to imagine the future of housing in New York.
the building, which will contain 55 micro-unit apartments, will be the first prefab tower in New York city (Click Image To Enlarge)
Of course, it’s unlikely that Bloomberg will ever live in a “micro-unit,” but his administration is betting that millions of other New Yorkers will like the idea. Specifically, the city’s 1.8 million households of one or two people, a demographic that has ballooned over the past two decades, growing far beyond the roughly 1 million studio and one-bedroom apartments available in Manhattan. Mayor Bloomberg explained.
“The city’s housing stock is misaligned with the changing demographics of its population, largely because of outdated housing codes that prevent the construction of smaller units,"
Inside, the 300-square-foot units are designed to appeal to young professionals (Click Image To Enlarge)
AdAPT is part of a grand experiment to change that. On a plot of land in Kip’s Bay, the city has agreed to suspend its current housing codes and allow the construction of a tower consisting solely of micro-units under 300 square feet. The winning AdAPT proposal, by a team including nARCHITECTS, developers Monadnock, and the Actors Fund HD, will begin construction on the site next year. Their scheme, "My Micro NY," calls for nine stories of long, thin units stepped back from the street. Each apartment will be prefabricated in the Brooklyn Navy Yard and arranged on site using a crane, saving precious construction days and millions of dollars.
The units are divided into a 'toolbox,' which packs a bathroom, kitchen, and fold-down table into a compact box, and a 'canvas,' the window-facing tabula rasa that can function as a bedroom, or living room, or study (Click Image To Enlarge)
nARCHITECTS, who’ve been building living spaces in New York for more than a decade, designed the units to be a bit like a cabin on a ship--full of hidden details. Each unit is divided into a "toolbox," which packs a bathroom, kitchen, and fold-down table into a compact box, and a "canvas," the window-facing tabula rasa that can function as a bedroom, living room, or study. A juliette balcony lets in air, and over head, a step ladder leads to a storage space equivalent to that of a VW Jetta. The firm’s design will pack 55 of the modular units on site, with nearly half priced below market.
A juliette balcony lets in air, and over head, a step ladder leads to a storage space equivalent to that of a VW Jetta (Click Image To Enlarge)
Some may disagree with Bloomberg’s approach to the housing shortage. Richard Florida has argued,
"Increasing density in urban cores isn’t always the right path toward building communities, providing a counterpoint to urban economists arguing that we need more flexible land use, more flexible building regulations, that we need to build more housing in some of these very precious urban areas which don’t want any.”
Florida suggests that cities which expand “out, not up” will breed healthier and more creative neighborhoods. In other words--the city should be looking at how to lure tech startups to Queens and the Bronx, not figuring out how to fit more people in Manhattan.
The units will be constructed by Capsys, a prefab company based in the Brooklyn Navy yards (Click Image To Enlarge)
But as long as Manhattan exists, there will be people chomping at the bit to live there--so why not design a better model for how we use space in these hot-commodity neighborhoods? AdAPT isn’t so much about planning how a city should grow--rather, it’s acknowledging how the city is already growing, and planning accordingly.
Wherever you fall on the continuum of Jane Jacobs to Michael Bloomberg, there are plenty of alternative proposals on view in Making Room: New Models for Housing New Yorkers at the Museum of the City of New York. Check it out until September 15.
COMMENTARY: Micro apartments maybe new in the U.S., but they have become mainstream in other countries like China and Japan where buildable land is at a premium, construction costs are high, and population densities are high. The only alternative is to go vertical with buildings consisting of hundreds of micro apartment units. Checkout these 330 square foot "make your own" micro apartment units in Hong Kong:
And look at how this Japanese family lives in a very small urban house built between two buildings:
In a blog post dated November 10, 2012, I profiled the Keret House, a 4-foot wide house sandwiched within the space of two buildings. The Keret House, was conceived and finally built by Polish architect Jakub Szczęsny and finally finished at the end of 2012.
The Keret House (Click Image To Enlarge)
Courtesy of an article dated January 25, 2013 appearing in Fast Company Design
Wow! This is really neat! I have been looking into construction companies calgary and how they can help me! can you tell me where I can find more information like this? Thanks so much for sharing all these great ideas and designs! Thanks!
Posted by: Suzy Frame | 02/22/2013 at 02:47 PM
There are a lot of substitute suggestions on perspective in Creating Room: New Designs for Real estate New Yorkers at the Art gallery of the Town of New You are able to.
Posted by: Alton Williard | 01/27/2013 at 10:18 PM