Open + Ascend

Located in New Orleans, Open and Ascend consists of the stacking and rotating of house types to form a collective housing complex within a single block. The ground floor ceiling has apertures for both infiltration of light and water. Collection of water in this context is imperative at this level which includes rain gardens, bioswales, and pools. The ground floor is designed with a residual sentiment in that it incorporates the square within square geometries from upper levels. Square geometries consist of changes in topography while enclosed spaces accommodate public and residential amenities.

In a morphological sense, the homes are aggregated to form various rectangular clusters that accommodate communication cores and outdoor passages. The outdoor passages, combined with an occupant’s unit, facilitate exposure to all desirable directions: the inner courtyard, street, and main access points.

Outdoor corridors, combined with circulation cores, accommodate collective spaces for all residents in the cluster. These collective spaces can range in uses from hanging gardens to celebrations.

The design of the housing clusters involves a stacking and rotating of the original Horizontal home from the housing investigation earlier in the semester. The units are shifted volumetrically to decrease the mass to void ratio on upper levels by either increasing the size of courtyards or converting them into light wells.