project declaration revisited

The studio brief called for a new city fiction for Christchurch. A speculative proposal is called for through design research. This project proposes a series of instruments in a linked system throughout Christchurch, from which will rise moments of transcendence, or opportunities to move to another ‘place’. Linked by more than the aesthetic, through sensory clues like materiality, texture, and use these interventions will signal an awareness of memory, of the loss and destruction caused by the series of Christchurch earthquakes. My proposal is a city that functions as a living memorial.

Architectural interventions will operate as a permanent, coded system, a route through central Christchurch de-codable through collectivity to signal meaning and moments of sacred or spiritual. Collectively they will create a frame that records loss, tensioning the past and the present, and looking to the future with hope. These interventions will be placed strategically and in series to reflect the many earthquakes, with some points or interventions more disruptive of the surviving urban fabric than others. When encountered in sequence they will signal or trigger disjunction and loss. Five of the fifty-two spaces will be developed in detail, using a spatial language reminiscent of earthquake movements, such as cutting, thrusting and sliding. I will also explore pressure, pressing, texture, negative and positive play through model-making. The design of these spaces will allow speculation as to the other identified locations for interventions.

My coded system will need to work within Christchurch’s remaining and new urban fabric. This is an investigation into how to represent the series of earthquakes that have struck Christchurch since September 4 to renew ownership for those still living to the heart of their city. It will mean negotiating form and materiality, memory and place, individual and collective memory, and the temporary and permanent.

... now time for some long overdue model iterations and explorations!