From Private to Public: The Public Balcony as a Catalyst in Ankara Apartments

Abstract

This study explores the role of the public balcony in collective dwelling culture focusing on how it varies and is experienced through architectural and everyday practices. It investigates the balcony’s potential to enhance the social and spatial quality of life by negotiating the relationship between privacy and publicness. These two concepts are addressed together to emphasize their interdependence and the architectural richness arising from their tension. The study draws on theories of public space to elaborate how this duality manifests in apartment design. Selected apartments built between the 1950s and 1990s in Ankara Turkey are analyzed through their contextual functional formal and relational characteristics. Through this analysis the public balcony is conceptualized as a distinct architectural element that contributes to originality within the apartment typology. By offering diverse design strategies public balconies serve as intermediaries that draw urban life into residential environments enriching the living experience of collective housing. © 2025 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.