Open Call für Diplomarbeitsthemen: Shared Spaces, Commons, Gemeinschaftsräume im Wiener Wohnbau

Open Call for Master’s Thesis Topics

for Architecture and Spatial Planning Students
starting Winter Semester 2023

Shared Spaces, Commons, and Community Rooms in Vienna’s Housing

Are you looking for a master’s thesis topic? Would you like to develop your thesis within a collaborative framework and contribute to a larger research context rather than working entirely on your own?

We are conducting research on shared spaces, community rooms, and commons in Vienna’s housing sector and are offering a range of thesis topics focusing on the emergence, design, use, and development of collectively used spaces (both indoor and outdoor) in Vienna’s housing projects.

Supervision will take place in a group setting (minimum of five participants). The format includes one workshop and two presentation blocks (research question, methodology, state of research) with feedback sessions beginning in Winter Semester 2023.

The call is addressed to students of Architecture and Spatial Planning at TU Wien. If interested, please submit a short exposé of your intended thesis project (motivation, thematic focus; max. 2 pages) to one of the supervisors listed below.

Supervision & Contact

Dr. Anita Aigner
Institute of Art and Design, 264-01, Architectural Sociology
anita.aigner@tuwien.ac.at

Dr. Judith M. Lehner
Research Center for New Social Housing (future.lab), E285-01
judith.lehner@tuwien.ac.at

Further information:
https://futurelab.tuwien.ac.at/research-center/new-social-housing/teaching

Possible Thesis Topics

Historical Development of Community Spaces in Social Housing in Vienna

This thesis aims to identify the specific characteristics of shared spaces across different phases of Vienna’s social housing production. Quantitative and qualitative characteristics are to be analyzed historically across various construction periods (e.g., Red Vienna, Fordist postwar housing, etc.).

Research questions include:

What types of spaces (with which functions) were provided for collective use in municipal and subsidized housing?

What percentage of total usable area did shared spaces represent within the prevailing housing typologies?

Which ideological and socio-political concepts were and are associated with these infrastructures from the perspective of politics and planning?

Between Luxury and Absence?

Community Spaces in Vienna’s Housing of the 1970s / Postwar Period

The Wohnpark Alt Erlaa, with its rooftop swimming pool, is considered an icon of 1970s social housing. But beyond such flagship projects, how were shared infrastructures realized in Vienna’s postwar housing?

This thesis aims at a differentiated examination of shared spaces in postwar multi-storey housing (optionally focusing on the 1970s). Privately financed housing projects may be compared with municipal and subsidized housing developments.

Cross-Plot Community Spaces

In current urban development areas in Vienna (e.g., In der Wiesen Süd, Erlaaer Flur, Neu Leopoldau), new models for the use of community spaces are being tested. These developments are linked to a paradigm shift in urban planning, where the focus moves from individual buildings to the neighborhood scale. Dialogue-oriented approaches during competition phases and participatory design processes before and during occupancy are key elements in the development of collectively used spaces and open areas.

At the same time, conflicts and contradictions arise—both legally and in everyday management and use.

Key questions:

How do cross-plot community facilities function in practice?

To what extent can pilot concepts be transferred or scaled to other projects and development areas?

What possibilities and limitations exist for introducing such models in existing neighborhoods?

Additional Thematic Areas

Micro-Commons – Community Spaces from a Commons-Theory Perspective

Community Spaces from a Legal Perspective

Material-Structural Analyses through Reflective Design / Research by Design

Use Analyses – Case Studies of Community Spaces in Practice

Building in Existing Contexts – Sustainable Upgrading of Postwar Housing Complexes through Shared Spaces / Micro-Commons

…

Own research questions within the broader thematic field of Shared Spaces – Community Rooms – Commons in Vienna’s Housing are equally welcome.

We look forward to receiving your submissions by October 31, 2023, and are happy to answer questions via the email addresses listed above.