Designing for Complexity: A Systemic Approach to Spatial Relationships in High Density Housing

The functionalism and reductivism behind post war modernist high-rise housing typologies like the slab block, failed to understand the impact of this highly condensed circulation on the social interactions of residents. Contemporary high-rise architecture typologies like the point tower still don’t account for the complex social needs of inhabitants - providing isolated group activity spaces in lieu of addressing and elaborating the shape and form of the transitional spaces between the street and the unit door. This thesis asserts that understanding the complexity of social needs and normative social behavioral patterns will inform an approach to design that will allow for a more humane and socially interactive environment. This thesis design explores Systems Theory, Pattern Language, recent precedents and tactics like clustering, layered gradients of privacy, visual buffering, transparency, texture and materiality in a high-density residential design for Toronto’s rapidly intensifying core.