CoHousing in Two Approaches? European and Latin American Cases

MOTTA, JORGE MARTÍN; ROCCA, MARÍA ELISA

Tours

Conferencia; Le Studium Conference ?Self-managed Co-HOUSING: bourn out of need or new ways of life??; 2012

Le Studium

Cohousing is a type of collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the design and operation of their own neighborhoods. The physical design encourages both social contact and individual space. Private homes contain all the features of conventional homes, but residents also have access to extensive common facilities such as open space, courtyards, a playground and a common house (Cohousing Association of the United States) Cohousing is called to a housing type that is based in the collaboration. Although Cohousing different experiences differ by their size, location, property type, projective aspects and priorities, there are four features that define them: - Participation: all people are part of the process, so that it responds directly to their needs. - Site design: Cohousing is designed so as to foster a strong sense of community. - Private homes with common areas and services: common areas are included in the project and are designed for daily use integration of private spaces. - Direct management by the residents: both maintenance and administrative tasks and decisions are made by themselves residents. (Procopio 2009) Cohousing is a habitat model that combines the autonomy of private housing with the advantages of to have shared spaces, services and resources. A Cohousing has two facets: the first one is the building project where the design itself gives the contacts and the social relationship; and the second one is the communitarian project where the residents assist each other, according to each skills and availability, and share the manage, social and recreational activities. Here, it is important that common spaces gives an answer to the particular resident?s needs and wishes. All this explains also economic savings produced by a reduction in production costs, although different studies indicates that there are many obstacles that cohousers must overcome. Since the debates of self-help building in 1960s and 1970s (with several important authors like John Turner, Charles Abrams, William Mangin, Peter Ward and Jacob Crane, among another) to the present many studies has shown the benefits of dweller control of the housing process. Therefore, Cohousing is one of the possible solutions to the contemporary housing problems, from the point of resources as from the social point. But this solution, so promising, is still minority and have yet a lot of challenges to achieve. To see several aspects of Cohousing?s products we have studied the relationship among those three concepts: - Cohabit - Living together - Cooperate