 TRIPOS STUDIO TWO |
urban communication - urban voicesThis year, studio 2 addressed the processes of urban transformation and renewal through design projects set in strongly contextual urban environments. Within each of the two key projects a range of issues is raised, from the social to the technical, and from strategic urban planning down to 1:1 materials studies. The aim is to describe the character of a site as it exists, and to think critically about how and why urban evolution takes place. The studio set out to take up a site and a set of conditions that bring together environmental, social and economic issues. Sustainability is thus a key issue. Our central concern is to question how architectural ideas can reinforce a sense of community by allowing its aspirations and concerns to be voiced, on unusual sites made newly available through significant transformation of the local transport infrastructure. The projects are located alongside a proposed route between Deptford and Greenwich, on opposite banks of the creek. Programmatically, they provide the opportunity to develop proposals celebrating the poetry of the ordinary in a manner and at a scale that is counterpoint to the millennial ambitions promised by the famous Dome. Explorations and documentation of the urban qualities and character that Deptford and Greenwich display, from the brutal to the polite, have allowed us to examine generally held assumptions about what urban renewal ought to mean. project oneThe first project, Urban Communication, is set under the nineteenth century brick arches carrying the railway line between Deptford and Greenwich stations, and offers a provocative site for an urban infill project. The project initially required a strategic urban proposal for the evolution of the whole site in response to the new pedestrian link over the creek, in an attempt to establish how the arches might enable the local community to be reconfigured (breaking down the zoning of housing and light industry). A more limited area, comprising a three arches, was explored in detail with one of the following briefs: judo or fencing club, bakery / café, student hostel or sauna. As part of the scheme design phase, students were asked to consider key environmental aspects of their proposals, which typically included sound, light and thermal qualities. The first project culminated with a detailed design element, which required the students to develop construction drawings and the making of a piece of their design at full scale. project twoThe second project, Urban Voices, builds further on the strategic urban work, but takes on a more complex brief and a larger and more challenging site beneath the new concrete structure of the Docklands Light Railway. The brief was for a field studies centre, devoted typically to examining the plant and animal life of the creek and immediate urban ecology, and to educating visitors (particularly school children). In addition the brief called for accommodating the headquarters of a local or national campaign group; a café / bar; and lettable workshops. This project extends the earlier studies of the new route and the new urban landscape that might emerge as a result of how architectural programmes respond to but also have a significant impact on their ‘sitedness’. New issues are raised in relation to the microclimatic conditions of the site, the relationship of the site and its programme to the community, and its potential ecology and landscape. |
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