In a neighbourhood of 54 homes built in 1924 in Kortrijk, the original garden city concept had quietly unravelled. Private gardens had been enclosed or converted into garages, severing the connections between homes and neighbours. Rather than demolishing and starting again, this project takes a different approach: a precise, acupuncture-like intervention that revitalises the area from within.
Of the 54 homes, 18 plots remain under public ownership. Working within this footprint, the project densifies the neighbourhood from 16 to 31 units without displacing the existing community. At the heart of the proposal is the “kangaroo” housing concept: two distinct but interrelated dwelling units that can function independently or as a single combined home. The arrangement supports intergenerational living, live-in care and multigenerational households, allowing residents to expand or contract their living space without relocating. Shared elements — a common entrance hall, winter garden and collective garden — encourage encounter while preserving privacy.
Seven plots on the edge of the district are consolidated into three compact volumes. The inner-block space is reactivated as a shared garden, transforming what was once the back of the neighbourhood into a second front.
The participation process was central to the design. Door-to-door interviews uncovered a range of needs beyond those of the most vocal voices. The project did not arrive with a predetermined solution — it listened first.
Sustainability runs through every scale. Streets are transformed into pedestrian pathways through blue-green zones. Timber-frame rear extensions are designed to evolve from covered outdoor spaces into residential units over time. One-hundred-year-old façade bricks and clay tiles have been salvaged, tested and reused on site. Bricks that did not meet structural standards were repurposed as gabion boundary walls. New bricks were laid using a hybrid mortar selected to allow future reclamation.
The reclaimed bricks carry the memory of the neighbourhood into its next chapter — a material continuity between what the place was and what it is becoming.
