Apartment building

22 Chrysanthemon Ave, Polydroso, Halandri, 1977-80

Architects
Tassos Biris (1942-)
Dimitris Biris (1944-2002)
Associate architect
Maria Kafritsa (1952-)



Constructed in the new suburb of Polydroso Halandri, this apartment building designed by Tassos and Dimitris Biris, architects and professors, and their associate Maria Kafritsa, is a characteristic example of their multi-levelled concerns about the relationship of architecture with its users and with the town. The design was drawn up on the basis of the award winning proposal submitted by the three architects in an open competition. The building has five floors over a ground-floor pilotis. It contains six apartments occupying one floor and nine occupying two. The two staircases, each of which leads to an equal number of apartments per floor, divide the floor plan into three parts. The overall effect is a synthesis of independent and spatially complex dwellings-ekistic units which communicate among themselves by means of roofed and outdoor public areas. Thus a building unit-community is created that fosters interpersonal relations between the inhabitants.
The main rectangular volume of the building is a complex cubist synthesis of solids and voids. The materials used on the façades are bare concrete, plastered fill-in surfaces painted in the primary colours, and metal door and window frames, and railings on the balconies painted a bright yellow colour. The same yellow is used on the structure that crowns the building.

TRANSPORTATION