OUTLINE

Given the global financial conditions, governments fail to sustain social stability within the cities. Sensitive social groups become marginalized and human rights fall down many levels within the political agenda. This studio seeks to find new models of coexistence and support between people within the city, a kind of symbiosis, through common spaces or buildings, from guerilla architecture to parasitical interventions and occupation of leftover spaces within the city fabric.

Students will have to research two currently marginalized social groups in Beirut that might not have any established relationship / connection between them until today and propose a symbiotic relationship through architecture, for example senior citizens / kindergarten students. Their proposal will have to answer to each social group's specific needs and demands, whilst promoting interaction among them in a way that establishes mutual benefits. Their analysis will extend from generic demographic data, like gender, marital status, age range, nationality, occupation, etc to more complex issues like cultural interests, ways of interaction and social trends. These input will then have to be formed into architectural space that will be inhabited by both social groups, and not only.

The main scope is to bring to surface these target groups and design a project that will be able to create a sustainable social microsystem that will act as a lighthouse / beacon within the city, provoking public interest on their issues.

The initial project site is within the Gemmayze area of downtown Beirut, yet a series of small sites where basic elements of their design approach could be implemented were proposed by each student group. Through this design strategy, students were asked to speculate on creating an  interconnecting network of small or medium sized architectural interventions within the city, a network that could finally sustain viable growth in multiple neighborhoods.

At the same time, students were called to develop their digital media skills as a design tool in the generation of a project, and not just as a representational tool at the end of the design process.

Already from 2008, academia acknowledged that the infiltration of technology in every aspect our everyday lives is changing the way we see architecture: In the first International Conference on Critical Digital: “What matters(s)?” held in Harvard’s GSD, one can realize the immense discourse that is still being built on this matter: 

“Cultural changes based on the fast evolution of digital technologies are continuously developing and affecting all of our activities as professionals, academics and citizens. Digital culture has affected our notions as inhabitants and creators of a built environment, changing and affecting the way we conceive, transform and produce space.”