Apartment Block Design: Massing Matters

This architectural design book focuses on massing studies for multi-unit housing projects, namely apartment blocks; it provides a fresh look at architectural synthesis for architects, students and architecture-curious readers. The author re-examines the apartment block as a design model, for today and tomorrow, through a simple, flexible and explicit design approach. The innovation of this book lies in the idea that any type of apartment block can be designed and understood using three programmatic areas/elements of any apartment building: housing units, circulation and communal spaces.

The book’s author clearly and explicitly demonstrates multiple combinations of the three elements during the massing phase of schematic design for multi-unit housing projects by examining case studies of twelve globally renowned apartment buildings. This approach offers multiple design solutions rather than a single proposal. All case studies are examined using diagrams, drawings and photographs and a conclusion at the end of each chapter outlines the main knowledge acquired.

Beautifully designed and illustrated with over 150 full colour illustrations, this book is essential reading for any architect, student or reader interested in apartment block design.

Simos Vamvakidis is an Assistant Professor for Architecture at Patras University, Greece. He has been teaching design studios as a Lecturer / Year Leader and as an Assistant Professor in the UK, Greece and Lebanon, since 2008. He founded SVstudio in 2006, an architectural office that has won prizes in international architectural competitions. His latest built project is the eight holiday houses in Kea island, Greece. He is interested in any architectural gesture that negotiates / poses questions related to the way we experience public and private spaces. He is the author of two monographs: Innovative Architecture Strategies (2016) and Composing Architecture and Interior Design (2018).

He holds a PhD in architectural design from the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA), funded by the Onassis foundation, and the National Greek Scholarships Fund (IKI). He holds a Bachelor’s in Civil Engineering from UWA and a Diploma in Architectural Engineering from NTUA, graduating within the top five in 2003. He is an alumni of the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Architecture, MArchII, funded by the Fullbright foundation. He has made numerous conference presentations.