From the Unité d’habitation
to the Corviale, the design of
social housing on a human
scale has been a recurring
dream in the history of architecture.
Attempts to realise
that dream have almost never
lived up to expectations. Yan
Meng, Xiaodu Liu and Hui
Wang, the three partners of
the Chinese practice Urbanus,
are taking up the challenge in
Guangzhou. Vanke-Tulou is an
immense housing project with
an unusual cylindrical shape
that includes 245 apartments
distributed over 12,000 square
metres along with a hostel,
small hotel, shops, gym, library
and various communal outdoor
spaces. With just a few
months left before completion,
prototypes and drawings are
on show at the Cooper-Hewitt
Museum in New York from 3
October to 8 May, 2009. Elena Sommariva
