Multigenerational House Łódź

About

The Multigenerational House in Łódź is located in the centre of the town on Wólczańska 168. It consists of three buildings: a town house, a monumental villa, and an outbuilding. The villa, dating back to the late 1800’s, is a municipal monument that once belonged to manufacturer Adolf Schoepke. To realise the Multigenerational House, the three buildings, and their mutual courtyard, were completely renovated. A total of 16 residential units have been created, as well as 1 common room and 1 commercial unit. 11 of the 16 residential units are designed with the needs of disabled people in mind. [2;6]

The Multigenerational House aims to bring together disadvantaged social groups and to promote the social mix of local communities. After the refurbishment of the buildings, the initiative designed a set of co-living rules and selected residents based on requirements set out by research into the socio-demographic profile of the town. Tenants of the Multigenerational House are a mix of, amongst others, elderly people, families, physically disabled people, single people and children from orphanages entering the phase of independence. [1;2]

The NGO ‘Socially Involved’ is running diverse participation and education programs on site, making the Multigenerational House a meeting place for tenants and the neighbourhood. [1;2]

Governance

The initiative is the second stage of the city-wide program titled ‘Developing a model for conducting revitalisation of urban areas in a selected ares in the City of Łódź’. The parent program was initiated by the Municipality of Łódź. The project of the Multigenerational House was initiated by a group of citizens through the Forum for the Fartherland Association. In 2013, they submitted the idea to the Citizens’ Budget Competition. The City Council took up on the idea, and the next year started the development of the Multigenerational House at Wólczańska 168. [2;7]

The Municipality of Łódź installed an interdisciplinary team to realise the Multigenerational House. This team was supported by Laboratorium Architektury 60+ (LAB60 +). LAB60+ is a Polish foundation dealing with innovative approaches to planning and design for the needs of an aging society. They played an important part in the design of the renovation and in research for implementation of the initiative. [3;4;5]. They, among others, conducted research into best practices from other countries, and conducted focus groups and interviews with potential residents to understand their needs. [2;3]

The project was also included as a pilot in the EU H2020-project Homes4life, a project focused on creating a certification scheme for housing initiatives that create a long-term vision of people’s needs and requirements in a holistic life-course approach. [6;7]

Business Model

The initiative consisted of three stages:

• The first stage was the refurbishment of the existing buildings.
• The second stage was the development of the functioning model of the multi-generational house.
• The last stage was the organisation of various activities in common space for social inclusion, participation and educational programs.

During the first stage, the refurbishment was completely financed by the Municipality of the City of Łódź, with a budget of €1.924 million. The development of the functioning model of the multigenerational house contains a total financing of €37.000,- by two parties: 85% financed by European Regional Development Funds (ERDF) and 15% financed by national co-financing. For NGO activities organisation in common space, the initiative received €18.000,- of financing, 85% of which was financed by European Regional Development Funds (ERDF), and the rest was financed by national co-financing. [2]