IMMAGINATION OF HOPE

Location

Duration

Project Tutor

Gaza Strip, Palestine Design E Studio 11, 2022 (Master of Architecture)

Rejunevate of Junktopia

Marijke Davey

Software Utilization

V-ray Revit

Hand-Drawing

Photoshop

Illustrator

Escape

It was a story about imagination of hope in Palestine. There were a bunch of palestinian talking about their dream and hope in a bar. Thinking how together they can open up rich possibilities in terms of how they think the future will be? The artist and the architect tried to visualise the ideas of their imagination of future in Palestine.

“Imagination is a powerful force”

Living under a high intense of pressure and unstable environment which makes people to hope and wish for a better place. A site in Tel al-Hawa ("Hill of the Wind") is a neighborhood in the southern part of the Palestinian city of Gaza. Founded by the Palestinian National Authority in the late 1990s, Tel al-Hawa is one of the more affluent areas of the city. It was the scene of some of the fiercest fighting of the war which made the place as a symbol of lost hope and disconnected of the junkyard.

This proposal will be designed with a series of story, understanding the surrounding site and how will the imagination of architectural intervention changed the scenarios and create a higher employbility, more connected and a new marking on site.

Part 1: Immagination and Inspiration

There are five mechanicals sitting at the same table simultaneously chatting about recent happening in Gaza. These topic leads the conversation to how theyimmagine and rethink about the transformation of Palestine in the future.

Did the issues solve? How the Palestinians’ lives will be? Did the confiicts stillhappening? More and more questions keeps appeared in their minds.

The collections of questions and ideas combined together to form the creation of a drawing of reimagining the relationship between the junkyard, people and the nature. In this conversation, which were conceived collaboratively by the fivemechanicals as a part of the creation of “Junktopia” to develop a shared vision of a future creation from an underdeveloped and underinvested country in Gaza Strips.

Later on, they begin to get some drinks from the bar. They were getting more excitedas the conversation kept on going. The narrative begin with the abandoned junkyard in Tel al-Hawa. Farid said he lived there before. Nothing much on that site, just a hugejunkyard. Many palestinians were leaving there because the situation of the site were terrible. Scrap threw everywhere, water get polluted, open burning occured which would caused the releasing of poison gas that affected human health.

Suddenly, Abu Gharaba asked why not to rethink and create a better environment forthe future. They use the junkyard as their site and transform the abandoned towers into a dreamscape. Reuse and recyle those material from the junkyard to make morecars to achieve their dreams. Here, the junkyards for all of the materials needed for constructions and the creation of a system of permaculture. A livable imagine place for mechanicals to work and live by connecting more things up which makes future richer of urban life.

Part 3: Visualisation of Junktopia

After a couple hours of conversation, Munir had a good idea and wanted to invite themvisiting his house. To celebrate the moment which they had a long conversation aboutthe dreams and aspirations, Munir wanted to design and make a model from the conversation they had it just now. He will keep the models and drawing as a part ofhis collections.

Five mechanicals were excited to visit his house. They found there were so many amazing collections in his garage and he did mention that most of the things he collected from the junkyard. Some of the parts could be reused as a components forvehicles or machinery. The dreams and ambitions kept Munir alives and gave him a lotof motivations for creating more possibilities in the future.

“If you don’t dream, you might as well be dead”. by George Foreman

Meeting at his garage for modela making, they enjoyed the conversations with some coffee. It was so amazing how moments of meeting new friends and encourage each others to live with their dreams, not just survived.