Dogma: Urban Villa

Press release

The exhibition Dogma: Urban Villa makes the case for more cooperative and collective housing

The Collective Urban Villa as An Answer to The Housing Crisis

How can we live communally and make housing in an urban environment more affordable and attractive? The renowned architectural firm Dogma sees a solution in a time-honoured building type: the urban villa. The Flanders Architecture Institute (VAi) has invited the architects to reveal their research in an exhibition. Discover it from 4 October in DE SINGEL.

Dogma: Urban Villa

Opening lecture by Dogma | on 03.10.2024 at 8pm

Exhibition | from 04.10.2024 to 09.02.2025

Flanders Architecture Institute at De Singel, Antwerp (BE)

Pier Vittorio Aureli left and Martino Tattara right ©Marc Baert

Dogma

Since its establishment by Pier Vittorio Aureli and Martino Tattara in 2002, Dogma has had a huge impact on the architectural world. Their work focuses on large-scale urban planning projects and the complex interplay between theory and practice. In addition to their design activities, Dogma’s architects engage in research, writing and teaching. Tattara is affiliated with the Faculty of Architecture at TU Darmstadt, while Aureli teaches at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). Their research by design focuses on the transformation of domestic spaces. Dogma’s international exhibitions include the Design Museum London (2018), Tallinn Architectural Biennale (2014), HKW Berlin (2015), Biennale di Venezia (2016), Chicago Architectural Biennale (2017) and the Flanders Architecture Institute (2019). In early 2024, the firm received the RIBA Charles Jencks Award, issued by the prestigious Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA).

more about Dogma

Faux Corbu, a prototype for cooperative housing © Dogma

Urban Villa

This is Dogma’s second exhibition with the Flanders Architecture Institute for DE SINGEL. On this occasion, they present their work alongside historical and international references in the main exhibition space. The common thread is the urban villa typology, which scarcely finds a place in Belgium’s architectural history. With the help of forty case studies, Dogma highlight the qualities of this building type and reveal how it can solve the housing issues in contemporary cities. Martino Tattara (co-founder, Dogma): “We firmly believe that a reinterpretation of the urban villa can lead to a more social and affordable housing policy.”

But what is an urban villa? Tattara: “An urban villa is a compact detached building. They have been built in many European cities since the early 20th century, especially in Germany and Switzerland. But also in Italy, where it is named a palazzina. It has several housing units, neither too large nor too small, inhabited by members of the same family. It’s not a single-family home, but nor is it a large-scale residential block. It falls somewhere in-between.”

"We firmly believe that a reinterpretation of the urban villa can lead to a more social and affordable housing policy."

‐ Martino Tattara, co-founder Dogma

Territorio de Gigantes. Two social housing blocks in Aguascalientes (Mexico), 2018

Faux Corbu. Prototype for cooperative housing in Tunis (Tunisia), 2024

Inglorious Bastard. Prototype for social housing as ‘urban villa’, Udine (Italy), 2023

Communal Villa. Prototype for a living and working space, Berlin (Germany), 2015

Flemish Villa versus The Urban Villa

This kind of building is rare in Flanders, especially in an urban context; and they are certainly not used collectively. Flemish villas tend to be in the suburbs or countryside. It is a building type that attracts middle-class families and one that is also considered a safe investment. Real estate speculation is never far away. Due to the latter, the villa does not always have a good reputation in Flanders. Dogma seeks to bring the villa to the city, looking at examples from abroad and from the past. Martino Tattara: “In Rome and in certain Swiss cities, urban villas are often built close together. But the intervening space is often very qualitative, thanks to the presence of trees and generous balconies that provide a buffer between the indoor and outdoor space. It is therefore a building type that allows for high density, but at the same time creates an interesting relationship between a green environment and the domestic sphere.” Dogma not only takes inspiration from (Southern) European cities, but also looks across the pond. The Jackson Heights cooperative housing complex was built in Queens, New York, in the 1930s. Annalisa Massari (Dogma team-member): “In Jackson Heights, urban villas were used to create garden apartments that together form a city block, erected around a central collective garden.” Alongside the historical and contemporary examples of urban villas, the exhibition also showcases the results of Dogma’s experiments in Antwerp, and in four other cities in which Dogma has worked in the past. The latter include a social housing block in the city of Aguascalientes in Mexico, a prototype for cooperative housing in Tunis based on a reinterpretation of the famous Villa Baizeau by Le Corbusier, a prototype for social housing for Udine in Italy and a scheme for a communal living and working space for artists in Berlin.

Urban villa ‘Le Chandoline’ Lausanne, 1933. Architect: Henri-Robet Von der Muhll. Drawing by Dogma

Urban villa, Dresden, 1902. Architect: Max Wendler. Drawing by Dogma

"In Rome and in certain Swiss cities, urban villas are often built close together. But the intervening space is often very qualitative, thanks to the presence of trees and generous balconies that provide a buffer between the indoor and outdoor space."

‐ Martino Tattara, co-founder Dogma

The urban villa in Antwerp

The three experiments developed for Antwerp presented in the exhibition are an attempt to densify the city with affordable housing units based on the urban villa model. The experimental projects arose through a collaboration with the Antwerp City Architect and the Flanders Architecture Institute. Martino Tattara: “We selected three residential blocks, one in the 19th-century city belt, one in the 20th-century belt and a third on the Left Bank. Three densely populated areas where we investigated the potential benefits of embedding the urban villa within an existing city context.” The results are visualized in the exhibition. Dogma and the VAi both hope that it will kick-start a dialogue around better urban densification and the creation of diverse, collective and affordable housing units. Annalisa Massari: “The goal of these experiments is to devise a kind of ‘urban villa 2.0’ prototype that can be used for more collective and communal forms of habitation and living. The prototype should be flexible enough to be used in different contexts and for diverse needs and users. It could be anything between a one-bedroom apartment and group housing.”

"The individual way of living in Flanders is no longer tenable, especially when you take rising energy costs into account and the environmental impact. The collective use of urban villas could make it easier to obtain quality housing for everyone."

‐ Martino Tattara, co-founder Dogma

Housing crisis

Fewer and fewer young people can afford to purchase a home nowadays and rents have skyrocketed. Could the urban villa offer a solution to this housing crisis? Tattara: “The individual way of living in Flanders is no longer tenable, especially when you take rising energy costs into account and the environmental impact. The collective use of urban villas could make it easier to obtain quality housing for everyone.” At the same time, he indicates the dangers of promoting this housing type: “It is a building type that can easily be misused by developers, and which is sometimes only open to a certain segment of the population. We believe it’s important to link the urban villa to alternative forms of ownership and not just the private, for example, via the cooperative real-estate model.” Dogma also points to another issue: the fact that the middle segment of the Flemish housing market is very poorly supplied. Tattara: “There is almost nothing between social housing and the private market in Flanders. Collective living may be the solution, and the ‘mid-scale’ urban villa could be an attractive type for this housing segment.” Dogma: Urban Villa is an exhibition that questions our contemporary housing norms: how can we become more connected to each other, and what is architecture’s role herein?