Casual Encounters: New Housing New York International Competition
Brooklyn NY
First Place, Brooklyn Site

"Casual Encounters" is Blostein/Overly's First Place winning entry to the "New Housing New York Competition". This competition was presented in response to the growing demand for affordable housing. This trend demonstrates the extent to which current models of development and preservation are unable to meet the evolving needs of New York City residents.

Our proposal, a critical response to the prevalence of the row house within the City, becomes a series of mid-rise towers, sheared one-half level that meet the street activity and thread between them a mixed series of unit types and create moments of ambiguity in conventional public and private relationships. The party wall as a device to separate is folded into the notion of the brownstone stoop as a place of casual encounters. Making up the towers, a set of “sheared brownstones” interlace a lower public zone with an upper private zone; these zones are also offset one half level from each other. The unit’s stair connecting these zones wraps through the public stair and becomes an “optic window-box.” These units are interchangeable with flats, expanded units, and ground level small commercial space to form a highly efficient organization, freeing up space for floating exterior “skygardens” for the residents as well as parking at the base. The proposal totals 70,000 square feet of habitable space, but the unit strategy can accommodate lower and higher density situations and varied site configurations. In the case of “Casual Encounters,” architecture is systematized to respond to a variety of conditions while new technologies allow the system to be highly transformative within a prescribed set of parameters.

perspective view
from boulevard