The presentation investigates social housing strategy implemented by local and national authorities in Bucharest, Romania, between 1906 and 1954. As Bucharest faced at the turn of the century one of the highest mortality determined by tuberculosis and poor living conditions from Europe, the authorities decided to house the workers in semidetached standardized dwellings, planned in lotissements based on Garden City principles. In almost fifty years, Bucharest designed more than 5,000 dwellings in 40 lotissements, accommodating approximately 20,000 residents. The socialist opposition signaled the wrong direction of the reform, in both its architectural and social features, claiming that the reformers ignored the vulnerable classes. Although these lotissements improved the conditions at the periphery and changed lodgers’ lives, it became clear even for the reformers that the construction of lotissements could no longer be sustainable, as Bucharest tripled the population between 1912 and 1945. The communist authorities abandoned this technique in 1945 and inaugurated a different strategy, focused on the construction of apartment buildings to house the workers. Today, the lotissement are part of the protected heritage of Bucharest.

Andrei will also be presenting his research in a colloquium with the Department of History of Art and Architecture on Wednesday, March 22, 2017 from 12 – 1:00pm in Room 202 Frick Fine Arts Building.