The garden city, which has been regarded by different Latin American governments and architects as the expression of progress and model for social housing policies, is an urban idea imported from the modernist European garden-suburb concept conceived during the post-war era -a period marked by modernization and explosive population growth. The adopted concept was the theory of the neighborhood-unit and the satellite city model. Though there are studies on this imported concept, there is little research on the informal changes related to the adaptation of this idea to the context of extended families and to the needs of inhabitants. The goal of this research is to explore this "transformation of modernity" in Lima during 1950-2013 through the analysis of two case studies: UV3 and UVMatute. The proposed hypothesis suggests that it is possible to guess the tactics used by dwellers to adapt the neighborhood to their changing needs. The results show a conflict between two city-making methods: a static and planned method, which has some garden-suburb elements; and a dynamic, informal method, which refers to an everyday and appropriated city. The relationship between these two methods has given rise to the "other modernity" concept, which offers new possibilities for the development of an inclusive, participatory and flexible urban planning.