Preparing for a modular retrofit future of walk-up apartments with the use of computational design

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Abstract

Due to the NECP, many homes are in need of renovation. In 2016, the Netherlands had 799,956 apartments built between 1906 and 1965. A large part consists of porch houses. The houses are poorly insulated due to hasty and savings in construction. This research focuses on walk-up apartments built after the Second World War. The aim is to define how to improve the renovation process of walkable apartment buildings through a modular facade system generated using computational design. This is done by connecting new facade elements to the existing building as a second skin. While preserving the existing typology of the buildings and emphasizing the current rhythm and small ornaments of the portico houses. The script tries to implement different sizes, because then it would be useful to renovate several porch houses at the same time. This creates more variation within the different facades and makes the total renovation time shorter and more cost-efficient. The script could potentially display the total number and dimensions of the various new facade panels, which would speed up the fabrication and assembly process.