Guest Researcher Lecture: Sharif S. Kahatt 

Collective Housing as social Infrastructure

The architecture of neighborhood units in Lima

Since the 1960s, the city of Lima has been well-known around the world for its barriadas (squatter settlements) and informal urbanizations. Despite this, it is important to recognize that many architects and different State offices have worked intensively on “formal” social housing contributing in several fields. Peruvian architecture has developed important ideas and forms of urbanization, which have produced urban articulations between collective housing and public spaces in contexts of scarcity, enabling us to imagine new housing possibilities for the cities today.

Sharif S. Kahatt is an architect, urbanist and full professor at the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism of the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú in Lima, where he heads the Department of Architectural Design. He was awarded the Bruno Zevi Prize in Rome for his research on PREVI-Lima and the X BIAU Prize for his book Utopías Construidas (2015). He was curator of the Peruvian pavilion at the 14th Venice Biennale (Fundamentals, 2014) and coordinated the 7th Bienal de Arquitectura Latinoamericana (2021). He has been a partner at K + M Arquitectura y Urbanismo in Lima since 2010. Prof. Kahatt is currently a visiting researcher at the KIT Chair of Architectural and Building History, where he works on topics related to his latest book: Atlas de la vivienda colectiva de Lima. Arquitectura y Proyecto Urbano (2024).

Thursday, January 23, 17:30 at “Grüne Grotte”

KIT, Fakultät für Architektur, Englerstr. 7, Karlsruhe

Professur Bau- und Architekturgeschichte / Professur Internationaler Städtebau