The Mounds

Year:

2022 Nov

In the face of the imminent climate and housing crises, “The Mounds” aim at being a theoretical exercise in provocation and radicality. Located in the South Bronx by the Harlem River, the site is going to be completely flooded by the year 2100. The project tries developing a new typology for housing that simultaneously maximizes density and open spaces, while addressing the water levels rise. To maximize the number of units the project takes over the entire site, flying over the Major Deegan Highway. “The Mounds” are composed of six cores that allow the concentration of more than 2500 single standard units. The standard units can combine to create larger apartments of up to 5 units allowing occupancies to grow and shrink, maximizing flexibility, and attempting a fluid definition of the notion of “living”. The six cores are connected by a mesh spanning the entire site and crossing the river. The mesh allows for both the maximization of outdoor open spaces and the connection of the waterfront to the rest of the community. The Mounds’ logic is to embrace future flooding by abandoning lower floors as water levels rise. The bottom units can then be replaced on the Mounds’ top. Evolving into a tower that is at once a reaction against and a marquer of the forces that generated it