With reed sewage treatment, compost toilets and a successful community

The Gärtnerhof eco-estate is a pioneering project from the 1980s that offers answers to environmental and social issues for the future.

Planned by Helmut Deubner, who trained under Roland Rainer, the eco-housing estate is a “milestone of self-organised and self-managed housing”. The complex is car-free and consists of dense low-rise buildings with patio houses and duplex apartments, a kindergarten, a studio and generous communal spaces — even the need for privacy is well catered for. A sauna building, gardens and water, including a pond for swimming, ensure holiday quality. The environmentally sound concept includes solar energy, recycling and natural building materials and is still exemplary today. In 2004, another building group project planned by Atelier Deubner followed: the Lebensraum cohousing settlement.

With: Helmut Deubner, Atelier für naturnahes Bauen; Magnus Deubner, Atelier Deubner Lopez

Moderated by Maria Welzig, Az W