Cities People Love

How can we better assess and guide the quality of high-density apartments? This month we are sharing highlights from our evidence base on how to deliver well designed apartments & housing. In our article, "The Impact of Design Evaluation on Apartment Quality," Alexa Gower explores the role of design assessments. She compares Melbourne’s Better Apartment Design Standards with London’s Housing Supplementary Guide, highlighting the differences in approaches and outcomes. Discover why the way we write design tools matters. Follow the link below to read more!

Single-person households now make up 25% of Australian homes, but the housing market hasn’t kept up. Innovative models like build-to-rent, co-living are emerging and expected to grow over the next 15 years. In our article, "Responding to the Rise of Solo Living", Anwyn H. explores these models and offers solutions for diverse, affordable solo housing. Read the article in the link below!

This month we are sharing highlights from our evidence base on how to deliver well designed apartments & housing. Shared and communal spaces in apartment buildings are essential to supporting social connection and building community in apartment buildings. Guidelines for designing quality shared spaces, however, are not yet implemented in state policies. Sian Thompson’s research outlines key considerations for designing and providing shared and communal spaces in apartments, from strategies to better facilitate connection in circulation spaces to the design of communal areas. Read the article below!

This month we are sharing highlights from our evidence base on how to deliver well designed apartments & housing. Homelessness continues to be an issue in Australia. Since 2016, the total number of people experiencing homelessness has increased by 5%. The Common Ground model uses Housing First Principles to address homelessness through delivering best practice housing facilities and providing guidance for the delivery, design and funding of congregate supportive housing. Follow the link below to read about the best practice design outcomes for Common Ground housing facilities.

In housing our growing population at higher densities, it is essential that apartments are designed with consideration for families with children. This article, shared by Philip Oldfield, highlights the shortage of family-friendly apartments in Melbourne and Sydney and the need for more 3-bedroom apartments in new developments. The need for more family-friendly apartments to open up the housing market and keep growing families in their local communities was further explored in The Age this week - https://lnkd.in/gMQ_CYAv Designing family-friendly apartments requires sufficient bedrooms and space, plus a range of other design features. Read more about what makes an apartment family-friendly here: ‘Designing apartment homes for families with children’ - https://lnkd.in/d97gsZdc

Women over the age of forty-five are one of the fastest-growing groups in the homeless population in Australia. The voices of older women and their lived experiences are missing in conversations about housing design, affordability, and allocation. This month we are sharing highlights from our evidence base on how to deliver well designed apartments. Samantha Donnelly and Sophie Dyring developed an evidence-based design guide for older women’s housing. Read about the research that informed this work in our article ‘The importance of lived experience in designing housing for older women’ in the link below.

Over the next few weeks we will be sharing highlights from our evidence base on how to deliver well designed apartments. Our article 'Designing apartment homes for families with children' provides guidance on how we can better design and deliver this type of housing. Designing apartments for families with children can be as simple as thinking about things like flexibility, safety, durability, storage & privacy. Follow the link below to read the article!

Australian cities have experienced a surge in apartment development in recent years, with more Australians living in higher-density housing than ever before. The High Life study is calling for more comprehensive aspirational design policy to deliver well-designed apartment housing that promotes residents’ health and meets their needs. It is essential that policy works to deliver well-design apartments and promotes the health and wellbeing of all residents. To learn more about the findings of the High Life study, including impacts of apartment design on residents and how our policies could be improved read the article below by Sarah Foster, Paula Hooper & Alexandra Kleeman.

More Australians are living in apartments than ever before. Many of the National Cabinet’s targeted extra 1.2 million homes over the next 5 years will be apartments in multi-storey developments. While the housing debate is focused on housing supply, we are not just delivering housing stock, but homes that need to meet the needs of diverse households over decades to come. There is a wealth of research that can instruct us in how to deliver well-designed apartments in Australia. Over the next few weeks we invite you all to reflect and learn together on what it takes to deliver high quality apartment living as we share new research, current initiatives and existing evidence on what it takes to deliver the apartments that we want and need.

Wishing everyone a relaxed, joyful festive season and new year! Cities People Love is taking a break. We will be back in February 2024!