Kuku 23 Housing Gastgebgasse, Vienna (AT)
New building, Affordable housing

Client: Genossenschaft Heimbau, Altmannsdorf und Hetzendorf
Location: A-1230 Vienna, Gastgebgasse
Architecture: Dietrich Untertrifaller with Schenker Salvi Weber
Competition: 2019 / 1. prize
Construction: 2021 – 2023
Area: ca. 34,000 m²
Programme: 430 subsidized apartments, studios, workshops, music school, dance school

Photos: Aldo Amoretti, Kurt Hoerbst

Team
Harald Eder (Project management), Elisabeth Graf, Martin Höck, Clemens Holzhuber (Project management), Sarah Ioannidis, Lukas Kral, Andreas Laimer, Maria Megina, Benjamin Michels, Anna Mölk, Denis Omanovic, Dominik Tschabrun, Ilie Stanese, Melania Zeni

Text: Gerlinde Jüttner

Partners
Landscape: Rajek & Barosch, Vienna
Social sustainability: Reality Lab, Vienna
Cultural concept: art:phalanx, Vienna

Kuku 23 – Living in the art & culture quarter

A new residential district was created along Gastgebgasse in Liesing, in the immediate vicinity of the Sargfabrik cultural centre and the Atzgersdorf educational campus. Four blocks of flats and the studio building offer space for 430 subsidised flats, workshops, studios and a dance and music school.

We developed the concept for the Kuku 23 residential quarter with the aim of providing low-threshold cultural activities, especially for children and young people. After all, Vienna's southernmost district needs more art and culture.

The buildings are divided into individual "houses", visually separated by naturally lit joints. This allows for varied roofscapes, better lighting conditions and a more human scale. The studio house mediates between the coffin factory and the school campus and, with its two-storey passageway, leads over to the open-plan residential development. The special feature of the studio building is the open supporting structure, which is broken down into individual column slabs and enables a variety of room programmes.

The studio building

In order to facilitate new living structures and synergies, the building dissolves the typical boundaries between working and living. A continuous room height of 2.80 metres and open floor plans allow flexible, open-use planning of the units. In this way, the studio building can react to the processes in the neighbourhood in the long term and grow with them.

The studio house ensures a good and fruitful coexistence with the Sargfabrik through special functions (commercial space on the first three floors, residential studios above) as well as structural measures (controlled ventilation and sound insulation).

The two-storey studio space is perfect for performances or large-scale artistic works.

The two residential buildings

We have developed a variety of residential typologies: corner-lit, orientated to one side, or through the pergola. Studios for creative people and small businesses ensure a good social mix and a lively, communicative neighbourhood. The networked creative and communal spaces on the ground floors are accessible to all and mutually stimulate each other.

High-quality, customised living and working space particularly meets the different requirements of artists and creative professionals.

Synergies with the Sargfabrik

Art, culture and creativity programmes form the common thread and interweave with the Sargfabrik and the education campus. Neighbourhood institutions such as music and dance schools, studios, workshops and event spaces sustainably interact with the Sargfabrik's programme, creating a unique art and culture quarter in Vienna which is alive every day.

Neighbourly interaction

Numerous communal facilities are open to everyone and strengthen neighbourly interaction. Micro-rooms can be used for yoga, children's play and home offices. The cooking studio in the centre offers space for parties and culinary events. There are raised beds for gardening on the roof and a separate terrace with sports equipment for fitness.

Floor plan L0
Floor plan L1

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