The Schwamendingen garden city of the post-war period is characterised by a loosely scattered development, surrounded by a spacious, isotopic, weakly defined green space. If the building structure here becomes denser, the open space inevitably comes under pressure. The previously weakly defined outdoor space is given a clear dedication: public territories, settlement territories, private spaces. In Vertikale Gartenstadt (vertical garden city), a decisive dedication is proposed: the public park strip on the enclosure is contrasted with a private, landscape-like forest backdrop between the buildings. Instead of generic spaced greenery, a lush counter-world!
The long garden façades of the two residential buildings are sculpted like the folds of a curtain. In the spaces in between, tall trees move so close to the buildings that the vegetation and buildings are inextricably intertwined. Here you live directly in the treetops, which are so close you can reach out and touch them.
The functional allocation is deliberately left open: would you prefer morning sun in bed and evening sun on the sofa? Would you prefer the bed right next to the veranda and the desk right by the entrance? Other aspects are defined instead: Thus, those rooms to which one can retreat form the private poles at the ends of the flat, between which the collective areas are stretched.
The appeal of the task lies in the search for ways to compensate for the shortage of living space. It may be difficult enough to ensure the functionality of the residential units despite major restrictions. However, the experimental arrangement only becomes frivolous (and therefore stimulating) when stinginess is combined with wastefulness. The length of the flats is wasteful here: 14 metres long for the 40m2 types and even 22 metres for the 75m2 units! But the height of the living spaces is also lavish: at just under 3 metres, they reach the dimensions of Wilhelminian-style flats.
