Programme:
As part of the MSA PRAXIS research carried out with the team back at the practice, there were findings and voices within the community that needed to be heard. I would like to take these forward in this project to satisfy the needs of the users in a much more efficient way. Further explore our findings on the official WoArch website.
"using the city's evolutionary character and existing forms as a starting point"
- Rotterdam studio ZUS
"The idea of courtyards goes back thousands of years, to provide a protective area from outside forces, such as invasions by humans and wild animals."
- Brian Edwards, 2004 Courtyard Housing: Past, Present and Future
"The 'garden' as the last hope for survival"
- MVRDV Architects
What:
Where:
why:
who:
How:
Project Ribbon is not just a building, it is a community binding project bringing disconnected areas of Hulme together with their own flexibility. The Ribbon, theoretical or physical pathways, binds the learning environment of the new local library and the residential areas as part of bringing the "people" of hulme together with the "students" of hulme. Which offcourse leads on to greater discussions of the ribbon and its expansion within hulme and the types of people it can connect, like the children from the primary school opposite the site.
This programme will be based on a site split in half by Bonsal Street. You can explore more about the site through the projects tab. I chose this site because there were a lot of opportunities within the area that juxtaposed eachother. With the social housing in one corner and the students campus in the other, the empty and dead land that has been forgotten during the birley campus movement, disconnects these two types of spaces.
Through the research and findings via WoArchitects, we concluded that there were high number of unheard voices that were just waiting to be heard. One of the major findings was that the older residents of hulme, felt very isolated from the birley campus, or students in general.
Following on from the result of this, I thought about the very specific people I want to design for would be mature students as they must find it hard to fit in within the community as they can want a bit of both worlds. I also thought back to our research on vulnerable women, that young mums wanting to expand their career could find it hard to live within the student campus and taking care of their children at the same time.
From my precedent research and study trip to Rotterdam, my project very much imitates the crowdfunded Luchtsingel pedestrian bridge. The main drive of this project is the fact that each individual within the community, students or not, can have a small share of the bridge. Getting everyone involved.
