Architecture cannot make you like a person, but it most definitely can contribute to you not disliking people.
How? ‘Streepstraat’ figured it out. By giving residents of a collective housing project the one thing they so desperately crave: privacy.
Streepstraat – which isn’t a reference to a well-known Academy Award hording actress – sets the stage for something you wouldn’t expect when thinking about living in an apartment. That people would actively look each other up. That new neighbours are old school neighbours: people that actually know each other. And while architecture cannot make you like a person, it can contribute to you not disliking people. How? By designing visual and acoustic privacy. By providing an experience that makes you realize that you do indeed live in a residential complex, yet were seeing and hearing each other unsolicitedly isn’t an issue.
And so, by granting individuals more ‘space’, they are far more willing to be part of a collective. Which they actively are, adding to their own quality of life. That is not even mentioning how ‘Streepstraat’ honours the age-old trees on the premises, how it has saved a landmark decommissioned water tower and how the project successfully optimized construction costs. In a way Streepstraat deserves its very own Oscar nomination.
