This paper is part of a master’s degree in Architecture at Delft University of Technology. It is addressing single-person households as they are found to be the most affected group from the current state of the Dutch housing market. This forms the relevance of this study and formulates the research objective.
The theoretical part describes the background of the problem from a market and a historical perspective. It further examines the needs, preferences and lifestyle patterns of this household composition and investigates ‘compact’ and ‘live-work’ as architectural notions. The design case analyses precedential building’s circulation schemes, shared facilities and public/private threshold. The suitable living environment is defined as a live-work building with compact dwellings and shared facilities. The aim of the paper is to provide a design hypothesis for Building 7 for this target group located in the M4H area in Rotterdam. A conceptual design is proposed, but this section is still to be elaborated into a detailed design.