Evolution of Technologies for Construction of Apartment Buildings — A Temporal Perspective

Abstract

Designing apartment buildings is one of the most responsible tasks since it has the largest effect on the users and is their closest interaction with the built environment. People spend the most time in their homes and therefore it is imperative to explore all aspects of housing with the goal of understanding and subsequently improving the living conditions. Architectural research in housing is mostly focused on urban planning and on spatial characteristics of the apartments but there are other areas which need to be considered, such as the structural aspect. The structural elements of the buildings are primarily important for the building stability, but also for the living comfort. Additionally, the choice of the structural elements influences both the building cost and the time needed for construction. Development of new materials and technologies has enabled faster and cheaper construction of apartment buildings of higher quality and has opened up new architectural design possibilities. The goal of this paper is to identify the time periods of predominant use of certain materials and structural systems in apartment buildings and to show the evolution of construction technologies through the prism of residential architecture. The sample used in this research consists of apartment buildings in Osijek, Croatia constructed from 1930 to 2015.