Highrise of Homes, project (Exterior perspective)

SITE

James Wines

1981

A charcoal-and-ink architectural drawing that imagines a high-rise made up of stacked single-family houses and gardens, proposing a compact, communal alternative to suburban sprawl.

From a distance it reads as a monumental, grid-like cube, but close up each shelf-like floor reveals miniature homes, porches, and vegetation rendered in fine charcoal, producing a strange mix of domestic intimacy and bureaucratic order.

As a speculative project by SITE, it critiques late-20th-century suburbanization by compressing the detached house into a vertical collective, opening conversations about densification, hybridity, and the social life of housing.

Palette

Art Terms

Architectural drawing Charcoal Ink Architecture Built environment Perspective Urbanization

Exhibitions

Architecture in Government Housing

1936

Built in USA: Post-War Architecture

1953

Modern Architecture for the Modern School

1942

Integrated Building: Kitchen, Bathroom, and Storage

1945