Quarantined Apartment Dwellers Need Balconies

In these days of social distancing, rural, suburban and small-town Americans are fortunate. Most of them live in homes with yards; they can go outside without violating safety guidelines. 

Condominium owners and apartment dwellers living in urban mid- or high-rise buildings, however, are far more constrained. That’s why the balcony has become the beloved architectural element of the city apartment. It is a way to get fresh air, to check in with neighbors, to see what’s happening on the street, or to communicate with the world, all without having to don a mask and take the elevator down to the street.

Think of the images of Italians singing from their balconies, or of New Yorkers banging on pots and pans nightly at 7 p.m. to show their support for medical workers. These acts of hope and community would not be possible if not for the small bit of property that’s a connector between inside and out. A balcony is private property that’s public space, a bridge between home and the world. A recent New York Times article sang its praises as the one element of urban living that should never be taken for granted again. 

Similarly, a staff writer at CityLab bemoaned her lack of a balcony, saying, “To have a balcony during coronavirus is to enjoy fresh air without anxiety.”

Balconies can be great pieces of design in themselves: think of Antoni Gaudí’s “skull and bones” balconies on Barcelona’s Casa Batlló. Other examples include balconies that branch out from Sou Fujimoto’s tree-like tower in Montpellier, France, and Moshe Safdie’s Singapore “Sky Habitat,” with its many private terraces and balconies.

But balconies are relatively scarce in many of America’s densest urban areas. Across the top 15 most populated metro areas, only 62% of renters have access to a “balcony, patio, deck, or a porch,” according to the 2017 American Housing Survey.

But what can condominium or apartment dwellers do if their homes have no private outdoor access at all? 

Most of the time, nothing. But in some cases, urban homeowners can retrofit a non-opening window into a space that can be opened to bring in fresh air and to allow some limited access to the outside.

“In many apartment units, there is a single source of light,” says Matt Thomas, marketing director at NanaWall. Since 1986, the company based in Germany and California has manufactured sliders and bi-fold doors, many of which can be retrofitted into existing buildings. 

Thomas points to an existing Chicago high-rise building where the company installed bi-fold doors opening onto a shallow balcony in each unit. In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, NanaWall retrofitted an apartment building so that units now have doors that open inward, not out onto a balcony.

“In this case, there is just a wrought-iron railing that’s four and a half feet high, no balcony,” Thomas says. “We will not do outward-opening panels without something underneath.” 

A NanaWall project in New York City was limited by zoning that did not allow for balconies overhanging sidewalks, so Juliet balconies, which are barely deep enough for one person, met the need for private outdoor space.

These are large projects taken on by property owners willing to invest in the upgrade to the many individual units. But for condominium owners, it can be possible to add a balcony to an existing land-locked unit, if the building’s homeowner association does not object and if local municipal zoning laws allow it.

It is not without cost and disruption, but in these socially isolated times, it may well be worth it.

This post first appeared on Forbes.com. To see the original, click here.