Omar's visit 1

25.07.2011 Monday

Omars visit to the studio was one of the most exciting and positive experiences of this studio so far. Both teams have gone some ways in developing certain urban forms and more or less consciously have taken either a top down rigid urban grid to be filled in approach or the opposite bottom up, all details matter, every bush every personal opinion and design is knitting that with urbanised areas between those selected spaces. But today studio participants were challenged to look beyond their own approaches.

This studio is aiming to come up with a big project , a new urban space for a society without that tradition. But essentially the project should be guiding organic growth by the people. How is it done may be a matter of nationality, state or scale. Is mode of repetition and mass production like in a grid the answer? (Andy Warhol) Can it be a platform of organic growth? Question to be tested in the grid scenario I suppose.

The studio should challenge the amount of housing in the brief, argue further for more. Do we design the site to occupy all land available from the beginning and intensity later, or do we propose to build intensely on smaller area and later occupy rest of site. The risk of not occupying everything from the beginning is a political risk of loosing the land to Israelis, the issue of trust of Palestinian people.

In the study of the sensitivities of the site the should be a process of giving meaning or a feel to selected spaces. This study and the conceptual ideas of grid should be blended, Correlated or collaged. Let's test the friction between maps. Arguments will remain but will adapt to each other. The meeting of thesis and antithesis. Lets connect, disconnect, evaluate, discard also, glorifying what is there. Lets really DEAL with a COLLAGE! Let's re-read the site as an architect. Not as a Bedouin with its sheep. Let's harvest ideas, of what can be done here. What type of effect am i going to face with a decision A or decision B?

The project for Palestinians is set in a situation of conflict and mistrust. There isn't community but individuals who want to protect their land. Some elements of the site like olive trees plantation are there so that no one comes and occupies the land of the owner of this plot. But the economy of development may mean this space of sensitive value and beauty for us as designers has little meaning for the owner. He will build without hesitation. These are anthropological stories of these spaces. How do we combine both quality and economy of spaces and behavior of land owners? And how do we create community?

The only constant is change. Things are decaying. Houses are growing. How do we respect environmental solutions and the growth of the building in the process of urbanisation. Where Urbanization is unification and formalization. Will grid , like in old Roman cities adopt to topology like it happened in Nablus. What is therefore the point of it in the first place, what are the advantages of it as a starting point of urbanisation, at the same time what are the advantages of 'donkey road' network following topology of the hill?

Thinks to think about. In two days we meet again to discuss some propositions.