Building Exoskeletons for the Integrated Retrofit of Social Housing

Abstract

In Europe, most of the social housing heritage, built before the 1980s, suffers of architectural and functional obsolescence and seismic vulnerability, raising questions about the future of the cities and their inhabitants. In an era of environmental emergency and lack of resources demolition and reconstruction is not a sustainable alternative. A multi-purpose campaign of architectural, functional and structural retrofit is fundamental but the complex information and requirements to handle require integrated and innovative solutions. The bio-mimicry design approach led to the definition of the “building exoskeleton”: an external steel frame, two or three-dimensional, encapsulating the existing building and provided of shape memory alloys-based devices for passive seismic dissipation. The simplicity of the structure gives high flexibility in the definition of the new architectural features and functional performances, adapting to the changing necessities on both space and time scales. The energy performances result also radically improved. The efficiency of this scheme to improve the seismic response of the constructions is verified for a real case study – a concrete frame with brick infill – through static and dynamic nonlinear analyses with the software SAP2000. Finally, the economic and technical feasibility of the proposal is discussed together with the implications of the project and the possible developments.

Assessing the Transformability of Public Housing through BIM

“…Due to the widespread current state of obsolescence and inadequacy, most of the post-WWII ERP buildings require retrofit interventions [9]. Several efforts have been done in the last few years concerning the seismic-energy retrofitting strategy for residential buildings [10][11][12][13][14][15][16]. Nevertheless, regeneration processes have a substantial impact on all the three pillars of sustainability (social, economic, and environmental) [17] and, concerning ERP stock housing, it should respect a holistic approach addressing not only energy interventions and structural strengthening but also new living spaces and new apartment architectural reconfigurations which better respond to user needs [18,19].…”

“…A well-appreciated strategy concerning architectural and typological reconfiguration is the splitting of big apartments. In the case of small living areas, the addition of an external exoskeleton [10,[13][14][15], following the typological solution of Lacaton and Vassal on public housing [21], can help brace the load-bearing structure, adding insulation and new greenhouses on the existing envelope and incorporating the related surface into living areas of apartments. Furthermore, intervening on the internal layout may help the realization of apartments with fewer partitions to determine wider flexibility of use.…”

Retrofit of Residential Buildings in Europe

“…With the shift in the age profile of the European population [17], accessibility and the elimination of architectural barriers are also important issues to address. Consequently, transformation strategies may also incorporate elevators, usually absent in buildings constructed A comprehensive overview of the results can be further consulted in Scuderi [16].…”

“…A comprehensive overview of the results can be further consulted in Scuderi [16]. These synoptic tables constitute a catalog of best practices which can be used and expanded by designers and architects.…”

Designing Flexibility and Adaptability: The Answer to Integrated Residential Building Retrofit

“…Following, the list of the buildings studies, classified for historical period. A more detailed description of the solutions can be found in Scuderi [33].…”