A city can only be understood by direct
participation…
Despite
its artificiality, Dubai’s hybrid and complex urbanism has an invisible
and unique infrastructure with a hierarchical system that operates
within an economic matrix of activities, goods, and participants.
Developed through a continual transformation of cultural, economic and
social parameters, Dubai is a fragmented, or “cut and paste”, city. Its
allure lies in its ability to adjust rapidly, in its complexity, in its
contradictions. It is within this perpetual “flux” and uncertainty that
architectural works, studio research and student projects may be
triggered and generated. The work is sited somewhere between the
real/possible and the imaginary / projected.
While Dubai’s
suburbs expand rapidly, like an urban carpet that effortlessly rolls
out onto the desert, its center is also undergoing a dramatic
transformation, characterized by increasing density and layering.
Existing buildings seem inadequate. They are unable to sustain this
“urban condition” that is dynamic, complex and unpredictable. The
studio work presented herein employs evolutionary design and
morphogenetic processes, which subsequently test the creation of
architectural prototypes and formal solutions.
Direct
participation gives rise to individual strategies for the construction
of space, while mirroring the contemporary experience of urban life.
Starting from recordings and observations of the “instantaneous,” the
work re-imagines, redefines or reinvents the public spaces of the city.
This “design of moments” becomes a technique of “mending” the
fragmented and disconnected city. Rather than falling into the trap of
seeing the city from an idealistic/romantic perspective, the work aims
at exposing the entrails of architecture, at discovering unique and
invisible opportunities.
Each project
becomes a vehicle in the exploration of the new “urban condition.”
Starting from observation and direct action, and moving to speculation,
these proposals respond to the new condition, and underline that cities
are not static, but dynamic and complex organisms, fluid fields of
rapid change. Architectural notions like “simultaneity,” “multiple
affiliation,” and “smoothness” correspond to organizational systems
like “matrix,” “network” and “blur.” The map of the city that emerges
is both seamless and complex. Patterns of behaviour are transformed
into urban organizational structures that negotiate, and adapt to, the
forever-changing demands and multiple realities of the city.
Dubai projects /
Project titles:
(Un)Folded City,
Instantaneous Urbanism, Urban Incubators, Urban Condensers,
Metropolitan Institute, Urban Hybrid, and Interface /Interchange.
