Byker Wall Housing Project

Description

Erskine was highly critical of the ‘tabula rasa’ approach of many of the post-war housing projects, which did not take into account the social fabric for which they were intended. However, this project stems from the demolition of a Victorian working class neighbourhood with a strong tradition of communal living. Its approach, though, brought about a substantial change by incorporating citizen participation strategies. The new building designed to replace the rows of terraced houses was intended to maintain the existing community links and to convey the spatial and cultural characteristics so valued by the residents to a linear, high-rise building. The curved lines of the building serve two purposes: acting as an acoustic barrier against traffic noise from the nearby highway and blocking the icy winds from the north. Far from being homogeneous along its entire length, as would be the case with most buildings of this typology, the building changes its features according to the diversity of dwellings that emerged during the consultation phase. The dwellings are oriented towards the interior of the complex, with the bathrooms and distribution spaces facing the north façade, which features a limited number of openings. This linear and changing building is in line with the revision of the modern movement carried out by the Team X and was a step forward in the right direction for urban regeneration projects.