This thesis book is an attempt at presenting a design preject: and for me it was a project that was as difficult to define the problem as well as find the answer. It is my collection of thoughts, sketches, drawings and photos that came from nine months of heartbreaks, sweat, tears and some joy as I tried to define Castles in the Sky, a cooperative housing project for Chicago. The collection is not a complete set but an attempt, to provide the reader an idea (however vague or clear) of where I was and what I had on my mind.Housing has always been, of interest to me, spacially as well a socially. I have felt that urban housing communities have left much to be desired in our larger met.ropolitonareas. They lack flexibility, sense of community, ignor environmental influences, and have been designed much like a glass box. I have spent the last mine months designing what I hope is a better concept of the possibilities of urban high rise housing.Chicago's downtown high rise housing, market lacks any type of completely flexible communities. Typically, a potential owner can only purchase or rent enclosed volumes, of space, contained behind glass curtain walls. Separated from Chicagos real happenings except maybe for a small balcony.Visually the only flexibility is within the interior layout of the given volume. This lacks the most critical issue of flexibility, to have control of your own exterior and interior separation. That thin wall of material separating the continuation of the outside from the inside. Castles in the Sky with total openness to the city, hopefully provides something a little extra to Chicago's housing market.