Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project

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Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project

Information

  • Project Name: Productive Garden + Living
  • Student Name: Vinzent Hadschieff, Jakub Ivancik
  • Softwares/Plugins: Rhinoceros 3D , Blender , Adobe Creative Suite
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Excerpt: ‘Productive Garden + Living’ is a Masters Design Project by Vinzent Hadschieff and Jakub Ivancik from the ‘Aarhus School of Architecture.’ The project aims to rethink urban living by merging residential spaces with productive gardening through a climate-responsive timber structure. It challenges the separation between living and working, encouraging daily interaction with nature, food production, and community life, while creating a sustainable, breathable environment suited to its coastal context.

Introduction: This proposal, created by Vinzent Hadschieff and Jakub Ivancik for Studio 2A: Spatial Systems at Arkitektskolen Aarhus, rethinks urban density by focusing on domestic production. Located in the transforming area of Aarhus’ southern harbor, the project questions the conventional divide between living and working spaces.

The students were tasked with developing guiding principles and catalysts to shape their design. Addressing the paired themes of Timber and Truss, the project transforms structural requirements into a rhythmic spatial system composed of 13 wooden trusses, bridging the private realm of the home with the shared energy of a productive garden.

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Site Context

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Site Plan

The southern harbor of Aarhus is a site in transition, shifting from industrial roots to a vibrant urban fabric. The program calls for a hybrid typology: productive gardening integrated with residential units. Rather than treating the garden as an appendage or a rooftop afterthought, the project treats the cultivation of greenery as a primary architectural driver. The site’s industrial location demands a sensitive approach to wind and exposure, necessitating a building envelope that can breathe while providing shelter. The program focuses on creating a circular ecosystem where tenants interact daily with their food sources, ensuring that “productive living” is a tactile, sensory experience.

Design Process

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Drawings from the design development phase
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Drawings from the design development phase
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Drawings from the design development phase

The design process began with an investigation into the Vertical Truss as more than a load-bearing element. The team explored how the geometry of the truss could be extruded and manipulated to create a “spatial system,” a structural skeleton that defines boundaries without closing them off. By utilizing timber for its carbon-sequestering properties and tectonic warmth, the truss was developed as a threshold zone.

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Thomas Herzog, villa
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Doris thut, neubiberger straße
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Pei ark, Canada

The process involved plentiful sectional studies to determine how the diagonal members of the truss could facilitate movement, allow airflow and maximal light perforation, and create pockets of microclimates. This allows the building to act as a lung, filtering fresh air and light into the floor plates of the apartments.

Final Outcome

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Detailed Axonometry Of Threshold Space
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Energy Concept Drawing Depicting Air And Heat Flows
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
West Elevation

The resulting architecture is a layered composition where the boundary between indoors and outdoors is intentionally blurred. The vertical timber truss serves as the backbone of the project, functioning as:

A Climatic Buffer: A transition zone that moderates the maritime climate, creating habitable semi-outdoor spaces.

A Social Connector: A shared circulatory spine that links individual units to the communal garden areas.

A Productive Scaffold: A framework that supports farming and a shared greenhouse.

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Section
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Structural Axonometry Showing Structural Material

The final outcome is a habitable infrastructure that grants every tenant constant access to fresh air and greenery. By elevating the truss from a hidden component to the primary architectural identity, Hadschieff and Ivancik have created a residence that is not just a place to stay, but an active participant in the city’s green ecology.

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Renderings Communal Greenhouse Space
Computed with Blender, Greenery Done with AI
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Renderings Communal Greenhouse Space
Computed with Blender, Greenery Done with AI

Conclusion: Ultimately, the project presents a holistic model of urban living where architecture, ecology, and community are seamlessly integrated through a climate-responsive timber framework that supports both habitation and food production.

[This Academic Project has been published with text and images submitted by the student]

Site Context

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project

Design Process

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project

Final Outcome

Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project
Productive Garden + Living: Reimagining Housing as a Space for Living and Growing | Masters Design Project

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