The individual and the collective

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Carboneras Community | 2003-2008

Carboneras, Almeria, Spain

The ideas first explored in The House of Meanings in 1970-1972 were built over three decades later in a residential community of seven dwellings and a guest apartment on the Southern coast of Spain. I had to become a developer to see them realized. The result is a new housing typology, combining three freestanding houses with the apartment block that provides a backdrop. Each type borrows from its opposite: the houses are joined to the block by their roofs; and the penthouses use the houses’ roofs as expansive, unattached terraces. Each house and apartment is different, expressing individual divergence in the context of collective agreement.