This article explores the rise and consolidation of shared use collective space in modern Chilean collective housing. Urban level morphological analysis of some collective housing projects built between 1906 and 1959 is intersected with a perspective that refers to the field of housing regulations in order to illustrate the closeness of their relationship. The article concludes by showing how the radical experiences during the fifties and sixties in Chile were the result of a profound and complex process of State and institutional modernization, progress in terms of discipline, and a new metropolitan culture.