10 minute read
To Begin Again
This journey of The Right to Roam of One’s Own started with five different paths. They did not intersect but brought individual journeys of many to step along. Architects were sharing the joy of travelling together while looking at the fascinating world around for centuries. Architecture was never an outcome of constant indoor learning. Dimensions and needed proportions can be discovered through the works written throughout human history. However, it will only help to follow them. It will not allow to create any new perception that can be based on the understanding of physical space, Urban environment does not encourage people to look outside of it. The city was never by itself. It exists only in the precisely measured relation to the rural areas. Cities rapidly step into the rural. Year by year. We cannot learn from the pure nature as it is very hard to find. The landscape is artificial, it is fully under the control of still biased human eye. It looks for its own understanding of beauty and necessity of one plant on top of another one. If the world will slowly all become urban, than there is still so much to learn from rural environment that might soon disappear.
Walking though the land of the Island a collective of Hiking Architecture was discovering everyday a routine of the outside. How to walk longer distances and do not forget to breath on the way up, how to appreciate very long and rapid time, being fully present and tune into your own rhythms. Architecture of the gates of the private land that are constantly checking if you are a human or a sheep, but more importantly all the trips are aligned with an idea of architecture experience. What can we learn by giving all attention, energy and focus to one single thing - being on the way in this very moment.
Walking architect is not less of an architect. Specially when it brings different minds together to curiously create and attentively listen to what is out there.
The right to Roam of One’s Own has started the way towards discoveries of the country. It has found the beginning but the path does not end here. There are many more maps to be read and winds to blow under another careful eye of walking architects from the nearest future.
Hassocks to Lewes, 35 mm
Ramsgate to Margate, 35 mm
Harslemere Hills, 35 mm
Epping Forest, 35 mm
“Hiking Architecture relies on two bases. Hiking and Architecture. There are two check-lists that will help us to get there safely, to enjoy the place, time, golden autumn fresh shadow wind, to become attentive listeners of the forest, while cosily unrolling our city masks.
Hiking: 1. Carry - Backpack (if you have the one with a belt it is amazing, if not – take the most comfortable of all. It might help to pack your things in waterproof manner as rain might be our good friend for the journey, but mostly humid air) - There is a fragile balance to be found. You have to be prepared for almost everything, but not put too much as it gets heavier on the way.
2. Drink - Bottle of water (you know yourself better than anyone, make sure you have enough volume for 4.5 hours of constant walking, you might need two bottles)
3. Eat - Lunch + 2 snacks (we are going to eat lunch on the hill, so any kind of food that can survive the trip is welcomed. 2 snacks might be helpful on the smaller stops to bring your mood to the best power, share with the person you like or discover it on the way back) - we are not going to be far from civilization, but it’s nice do not rely on it too much.
4. Travel - Tickets, some money and things to do on the train, you know better than me
5. Wear - Shoes (hiking shoes would be amazing, but you can make it in your trainers as well. Your shoes are your best friends, make sure you are comfortable, dry, warm and cosy, it might get muddy on the way) - Pants (comfortable, quick to dry, preferably wind proof, but who has those is a lucky one) - Layers will always help. A shirt, a sweater and a jacket will help you do not get too warm on the way and too cold while standing. Rainproof jacket will be very useful (umbrellas won’t help) - For now the forecast shows + 7 c. Forest doesn’t bring much sun in - jackets/gloves/ scarves might be helpful. - Extra socks/shirt in case of heavy rain (if you want to be on top of things)
Architecture:
1. Documenting the walk. I suggest documenting the trip in any way and media you find suitable. It can help your own project, it can create something new or be forgotten for years. You can be the one drawing on the way, reading future in your friends’ footprints, making a movie, moving, singing, reading poems, measuring distances, taking record of the wind directions or sounds. Solving puzzles.
Intuitively bring whatever enters your backpack – there is a space to be whoever you want for a day on the cliffs!
2. Asking yourself a question. If you ask yourself just one question before going and then try to find an answer (or more questions) on the way. It can be something very open as – “Why am I going there?”. Or a bit more focused – “How many ships am I going to see on the way?”
At least they might be useful to start a conversation with a stranger on the way.
3. Not doing anything and just be - is always an option! Enjoying the journey
3. Not doing anything and just be - is always an option! Enjoying the journey
you don’t want to live as the city does, you want to see Sunday as the day to begin
In this hiking moment
you don’t fall into rhythms projected by the announcements of stations
in the morning tube”
The right to roam still stays endangered and possibly can be scrapped in the visible future. If modern society is not being able to create new system of ownership. As one of many being born at the end of the 20th century I was experiencing the world through the values of the capital, goods, property and privacy. These means were put above many and created the goals for the whole generation. It stayed for the following one as well. I believe that the question of an open access to the land has its urgency in our time as well as 100 years ago. I am looking forward to see a wide range of possibilities that can replace the existing system of ownership over the land. Not everyone needs to have a paper supporting their property rights, but everyone needs to have an opportunity to walk all the way through the forest and feel fresh breeze of the seaside when the forest opens up towards the shore.
The right to roam is also a question of accessibility of public interiors, social norms and open spectrum of possible behaviours. A space of a museum can become an example. It can be quiet and controlling. It can be either an open borderless space of learning for younger visitors or it can be an empty storage packed with unnecessary rules but not curiosity. How open and free we are within public rules, where we need them in the form they have now and where the norms can become more adaptable and inclusive to the changing times. Connecting the city to the country from it’s very private origin. Going all the way to the interior and then slowly stitching the pieces back to the rural environment.
The right to roam is an essential part of making cities liveable again. The cities with spaces to think, to create, to listen and learn about the resources that support the urban life. A train-ride to the privacy of very much needed emptiness in the daily flow of information, a grasp of very tensional reality of natural landscape.
Today’s world is not respecting the boundaries, it has aims and powers that many people struggle to share. Maybe it is failing on the way to create a better space with more balanced authorities. Maybe it is taking an old path that cannot be walked anymore. It is following a strategy of drawing very sharp lines. The right to roam has a clear line too. But as a system of an open access to the land we all live on, it suggests to find a new way of drawing boundaries and borders. To have gaps, open gates, intersections and typologies of necessary divisions. It is not blurry, it is systematic overlap of the every need that has to be met by the accessible landscape of the future. There are people exploring the nature, sharing what they own and respecting the waving line of a common walk.
Andrews, Kerri. “Wanderers: A history of Women walking”. Forward by Kathleen Jamie. London: Reaktion Books, 2020.
Andrews, John. “A hike over and through the Bedford Square building”. Ex AA Diploma graduate and tutor. London, AA Archive.
DRIG. The Drawing Research Interest Group. “Mobility of the line. Utility of the Line”. Andrews, John. Bullen, Duncan. Chard, Nat. Hardie, George. Malinowski, Antoni. Turko, Jeffrey P.. Wingham, Ivana.
http://arts.brighton.ac.uk/projects/mobility-of-the-line-utility-of-the-line
Fulton, Hamish. “Walking journey”. London: Tate Britain Exhibition, 2002
Hayes, Nick. “The Book of Trespass: Crossing the Lines that Divide Us”. London: Bloomsbury Circus, 2020.
Harmon, Katherine. “The Map as Art”. US: Princeton Architectural Press, 2010.
Knight, Sam. “Letter from the UK: The search of England’s forgotten paths”. London: The New Yorker, 2019.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-the-uk/the-search-for-englands-forgotten-footpaths
Long, Richard. “A Line Made by Walking”. Tate, 1967.
Mafi, Nick. Photography by Christian Flatscher. “Snøhetta Completes Path Cantilevered Over Austrian Alps”. Architectural Digest, 2019.
Murray, John. AA Diploma 10 student under tutors Bernard Tschumi and Nigel Coates . London, Architectural Association Archive, 1977-78.
Natural England. “A guide to definitive maps and changes to public rights of way”. 2008 Revision
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/414670/definitive-map-guide.pdf
Perec, Georges. “Species of Spaces and other Pieces”. Penguin 20th Century Classics. Paris: 1973-74.
Pyle, Robert Michael. “Where Bigfoot walks”. US: Counterpoint, 2017.
Pyle, Robert Michael. “Nature Matrix: New Selected essays”. US: Counterpoint, 2020.
Shrubsole, Guy. Powell-Smith, Anna. Blog. “Who Owns Britain?”
https://whoownsengland.org/about/
Shrubsole, Guy. “Who owns England? How we lost our land and hoto take it back.” United Kingdom: HarperCollins Publishers, 2020.
Stinson, Liz. “10 Gorgeous Lookout Points (That Also Play Nice With Nature)”. WIRED, 2016.
https://www.wired.com/2016/10/10-gorgeous-lookout-points-also-play-nice-nature/
Shokr, Hanna. Essay “The line that cannot be tamed”.
Wecke, M. ‘Going Nowhere’. AA Diploma 14. London: Architectural Association Photo Library, 2020.
Snohetta, Wild Reindeer Centre Pavilion
Snohetta, Path Cantilevered Over Austrian Alps
Zaha Hadid, Messner Mountain Museum
Haim Dotan, Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon Bridge
HHF, Ruta del Perregrino
Rintala Eggertsson Architects, Seljord Watch Tower
Saunders Architecture, Aurland Overlook
Close to Bone, Vlooyberg Tower
Processcraft, Mirrored Cabin
J.Mayer.H, Sarpi Border Checkpoint
Quilotoa Crater Overlook, Jorge Andrade Benítez
Links:
https://www.righttoroam.org.uk/
The Ramblers.
“Shelving of right to roam report” London: The Guardian, 2022.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/apr/22/uk-minister-defends-shelving-of-right-to-roam-report-ahead-of-kinder-scouttrespass
Endnotes 1 Virginia Woolf - A Room of One’s Own 2 https://www.righttoroam.org.uk/ 3 https://www.ramblers.org.uk/get-involved/campaign-with-us/past-campaigns/right-to-roam-crow.aspx 4 https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/aug/29/greenpolitics.ruralaffairs 5 https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/aug/29/greenpolitics.ruralaffairs
