Nearly 40 million Americans live in high-rise condos and apartments. And because of the COVID-19 pandemic, developers and residents have been forced to rethink high-rise condo and apartment living in terms of health, space, and utility.
To capture these thoughts, and to understand the future of high-rise living, a team at Grimm + Parker Architects, which specializes in high-rise architecture projects, last summer conducted a fact-based exploration of the challenges and pressures that developers and residents experienced during the health crisis, and how those factors are likely to affect apartment design.
The vast majority of the survey’s respondents—92%—saw the social and physical implications of COVID-19 as being at least moderate, and in some cases significant. “Quarantine is difficult enough, but the added noise from other residents makes it so much more difficult. I can hear doors slamming, cabinets slamming, constant thuds from neighbors above, dogs barking. It wears on mental sanity,” said one exasperated resident whom the report quoted. Download a PDF recap of the Grimm + Parker multifamily research report, The New Normal & The Future of Multifamily Housing.
The survey pointed out that there was a lot of concern expressed about health and safety, and the increasing density of high-rise apartment and condo projects, which complicated social distancing and the ability of residents to “separate” rooms within apartments for different uses. And 80% of residents indicated a shift in desired residential unit types, which was a disconnect in developer thinking.
Common challenges cited by respondents included the lack of adequate space while sheltering-in-place, to live, work, and exercise. Only 11% of the resident-respondents lived in a high-rise condo or apartment with a balcony, so quarantine made access to the outdoors problematic. Conversely, those respondents with balconies were able to adapt that space for, say, fitness or meditation.
The…