Domesticating towers: remaking space for a multiplicity of everyday uses by Julie Plichon

DOMESTICATING MODERNIST TOWERS: REMAKING SPACE FOR A MULTIPLICITY OF EVERYDAY USES. UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON FACULTY OF THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT BARTLETT SCHOOL OF PLANNING

Julie Plichon BA Political sciences MA Public policy management

Word count: 7352

Being a Major Project in Urban Design and City Planning submitted to the faculty of The Built Environment as part of the requirements for the award of the MSc Urban Design and City Planning at University College London, I declare that this project is entirely my own work and that ideas, data and images, as well as direct quotations, drawn from elsewhere are identified and referenced.

Contents : chapters

Introduction

1.1. History and context

Literature review

p.1011

2.1. Tower blocks: exploring a typology p.16

p.12

2.1.1 Understanding the preference for towers 2.1.2. Issues linked to the typology 2.1.3. Moderating factors 2.1.4. Case study: London College of Communication and Vancouver

p.17

1.2 Problematic 1.2.1 Building blocks for social sustainability 1.2.2. Lack of sense of community 1.2.3. About social capital

p.12 p.12

1.2.4. Communities that are p.13 increasingly diverse 1.2.4. Look into the p.13 commonplace 1.2.5. Research question p.13

p.17

Acknowledgements p.6 Abstract p.7

3.1. Methodology

p.32

4.1. Conceptual framework

p.40

3.2. Design summary

p.33

4.2. Tool-kit

p.41

3.3. Criteria extracted

p.34

4.3. The site

3.4. Case studies p.18 p.20 p.21 p.22

5.1. Summary table

p.64

5.2. RAG Table

p.64

5.3. Conclusion: first, space?

p.65

3.4.1. Cotton gardens Estate, p.36 Lambeth 3.4.2. Evelyn Court, Hackney p.37

4.3.1 St Georgeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Estate, Shadwell 4.3.2. Context and features

p.42 p.45

4.4. Interventions 4.4.1. Site specific approach p.47 4.4.2. Domestic buffer zone 4.4.3. Domestic yard

p.48 p.50

4.4.4. Orchard

p.52

4.4.6. Community yard

p.56

4.4.5. Community buffer zone p.54

2.3. Domesticating space: what for? 2.3.1. Everyday Urbanism

Assessment and conclusion

p.17

2.2. Domesticating space: what space? 2.2.1 From residual to social and public space 2.2.2. Domesticating space: a continuum of publicness 2.2.3. A gradient of publicness 2.2.4. A typology of open spaces for Modernist estates

Design process

Reflection

p.24

2.4. Domesticating space: how? 2.4.1 Tactical, plot based p.26 urbanism 2.4.2. Completed at a more p.27 strategic level: working on the edges 2.4.3. Scaling up: the social p.28 dimension 2.4.4. Establishing a market: p.29 network thinking applied

4.4.7. Market: scale up

p.58

4.4.8. Unveiling networks of p.59 actors p.60 4.4.9. New masterplan 4.4.10. Sections

p.62

References p.66 Appendix p.68

Contents : figures 1. Introduction F1. Pruitt Igoe, St Louis F2. La Courneuve, France

p.10

F28. Big and efficient impacts of tactical urbanism F29. Books covers: Massive Small, 2011, the Plot, 2012

p.26

F16. Surfaces and materials F17. Open spaces analysis

F3. Trancik, R (1986) Lost Space, book cover

F30. Plot based urbanism

F18. Edges analysis

F4. Margaret Thatcher creates the ‘Right to Buy’ in the 1980s

F31. Container for community uses, Gillett Square

F19. SWOT map

F32. Groundwork Men in Shed project

F20. The podium as an informal play area

Space by Oscar Newman

F33. BUS architecture mobile playground

F21. Concept map: interventions

F6. The street artist Banksy mocks the negative signage used in

F34. Design as part of an ecology, interpreted from Wise and Ve-

contested open spaces

layutham, 2014

F7. Oscar Newman creates the concept of defensible space and a new

F35. Network mapping in Lanarkshire, Willie Millier

typology for the open spaces

F36. The Prince of Wales junction market in London

F25. Intervention B: domestic buffer zone, before and after

F37. Modular market units: THR green market stall in Praha

F26. Intervention C: domestic buffer zone, before and after

F5. Book covers: Utopia on Trial by Alice Coleman and Defensible

F8. Displacement map following the regeneration of the Heygate estate

p.11

p.12

p.28 p.29

F22. Concept: the open spaces typology interlocks as a jigsaw F23. Intervention A : domestic buffer zone, sections F24. Intervention masterplan for domestic buffer zone

in Lambeth

F27. Intervention: domestic yard, masterplan

F9. Design for social sustainability

F28. Intervention: domestic yard, before and after

2. Literature review F1. Le Corbusier F2. London College of Communication F3. Robson Street, Vancouver F4. Books covers: Behaviour in Public Places, Erwin Goffman, 1963, The Fall of the Public Man, Richard Sennett, 1977 F5. Domestic qualities F6. Domestic spaces, extracted from Saunders, 1990 F7. Domestic qualities, icons F8. Community qualities, icons F9. Ownership/use/enclosure/openness F10. Assemblage thinking F11. Red Brick Estate, Old Street

p.16 p.17 p.18 p.20 p.21 p.22 p.23

F12. Shuna Walk, Islington F13. Cotton Gardens Estate, Lambeth

p.24

F6. Concept map of the Cotton Gardens Estate, Lambeth

p.37

F7. 3 Photographs of the Cotton Gardens Estate, Lambeth F8. Concept Map of Evelyn Court, Hackney

p.26

F12. Current masterplan F13. Land use map F14. Road hierarchy and access map F15. Massing

p.50 p.51 p.52 p.53

F33. Orchard visualisation with work units F34. Intervention: community buffer zone, masterplan

p.54 p.55

F36. Interventions: community buffer zone B, before and after F37. Interventions: community buffer zone C, before and after

p.56 p.57

F42. Concept sketches, community yard

p.43

F43. Intervention visualisation, community yard F44. Photographs: Saturday Market, Wellclose Square F45. Reactivating heritage, Wellclose Square F46. The market on September 3rd F47. Photographs: Saturday Market, Wellclose Square F48. New masterplan F49. Longitudinal section: 1

p.44

F50. Longitudinal section: 2

5. Assessment and conclusion

F1. Gehl: first life, then space, then the buildings

F10. Governance and estate management in St George’s estate

p.25

p.49

F41. Photograph, as existing, community yard

4. Design process

F11. Concept map highlighting the land pressures in the area

p.48

F40. Sketch of the community yard, after

F10. Sketch by Erect Architecture

F7. Historical map of the estate, 1943

p.47

F32. Sections: orchard, before and after

F39. 3D of the community yard, before

F9. 2 photographs of the Evelyn Court, Hackney

case study to comment on the negative effect of the Right to Buy policy.

F31. Photographs: orchard, as existing

F38. Intervention: community yard, masterplan

F9. Infills built during the 2006 regeneration of St George’s estate

F23. Buffer zones: everyday urbanism design principles

a conversation with the residents

F30. Intervention: orchard, masterplan

F35. Interventions: community buffer zone A, before and after

F8. Historical map of the estate, 1973

F22. 3 activities, Jan Gehl

design thinking in tactical urbanism

F5. Stall held during the event: free coffee, tea, juices and books to start

F6. In 2008 the Guardian used the generic design of the estate’s towers

F21. Routines, third places and urban occupation

F27. Books covers: Tactical urbanism, 2015, Urban acupuncture, 2014,

p.36

F5. George Finch and the estate in the 1970s

F18. Coin Street, Lambeth

F26. Examples of everyday urbanism objects

F4. Tower Hamlets Tenants and Residents Associations’ logo

F4. Density measurements of the site

F17. Clapton Park, Hackney

F25. Yards: balance between enclosure and openness

F3. East End Homes logo

F3. Socio economical data of St George’s estate

F16. Limborough Gardens, Poplar, Tower Hamlets

F24. Yards: quality at eye level

F2. Architects for Social Housing’s logo

p.32

F2. Aerial view of St George’s Estate

F15. Flaxman Court, Camden

F20. Urban occupation and banal locations

F1. Sketch of the chosen site, St George’s Estate, Tower Hamlets

F1. Location map and figure ground, St George’s Estate

F14. Hemsworth Court, Hackney

F19. Book cover: Everyday urbanism

F29. Intervention: community buffer zone, adjacent to domestic yard

3. Reflection

p.46 p.46

p.45 p.46

F2. Re-interpreting Gehl with the lessons learnt

p.58 p.59 p.60 p.61 p.62

p.65

Contents : Tables 1. Introduction T1. Governance and different scales of privatisation over social housing in the UK T2. A typology of open spaces, following the Defensible Space strategy, with results in a complex assemblage of fragmented spaces

p.10 p.11

T25. Design modulates, extracted from Wise and Velayutham, 2014

T17. Intervention summary

T26. Neighbourhood development

T18. Market evolution

T27. Establishing a market: objectives

p.29

p.61

T28. Design principles extracted for a market

T3. Combined effect of Defensible Space and the Right to Buy on the open spaces T4. Vicious circle described by Ali Madanipour, 2008 T5. About social capital T6. Maslowâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s pyramid of needs, on human motivations, 1968 p13

p.12 p.13

T7: Open spaces as a resource in the context of diversification of the social mix T8. Set diagram: project focus

2. Literature review T1. Main features, advantages, disadvantages and opportunities for tower blocks, extracted and synthesised from Gehl (2010), Cities for People

3. Reflection p.16

T1. Methodology table T2. Design principles summary

and Price and Myers Sustainability, quoted in http://singleaspect.org.uk/

T3. Criteria Table

T.2 Advantages of towers in lowering costs, extracted from the Design

T4. Typology reminder

Catalogue, 2006

T5. Design principles extracted for the Cotton Gardens Estate

T.3 Advantage of towers for architectural expression, interpreted from

T6. Design principles extracted for Evelyn Court

Tarbatt (2012) T4. Design principles extracted for the towers T5. A typology of residual spaces, extracted from Erick Villagomez

p.32 p.33 p.34 p.35 p.36 p.37

p.17 p.18

T6. Lexical field of residual space T7. Social space, extracted from Henri Lefebvre, 2009 T8. Good public places, extracted from Matthew Carmona, 2014 T9. Allowing healthy disorder, extracted from Richard Sennett, 2010 T10. OMAI Model of public spaces

4. Design process p.19

T11. Public spaces as mediators for private life T12. Varna and Tiesdell (2010) model for publicness T13. Domesticating: a tension between defining and allowing disorder

T2. Tool-kit table

p.20

T14. Domesticating space

T17. Completed typology of open spaces for council estates

p.22

T19. Case studies applied to the open spaces typology and design prin- p.23 T20. Tension between extrinsic and intrinsic traces T21. Design principles extracted for everyday urbanism T22. Edges and their qualities T23. Design principles extracted from tactical urbanism and edges T24. Designers and communities: which spatial level

T4. Design principles: domestic buffer zone T6. Design principles: domestic yard

T18. Typology key ciple extracted

T3. Data on the estate T5. Objectives: domestic buffer zone

T15. Territorial performance: how to appropriate space T16. Domestication for a multiplicity of uses

T1. Conceptual framework table

p.25 p.27 p.28

T7. Objectives: domestic yard T8. Design principles: orchard T9. Objectives: orchard T10. Design principles: community buffer zone T11. Objectives: community buffer zone T12. Design principles: community yard T13. Objectives: community yard T14: Design principles: market T15: Objectives: market T16: Actor networks, unveiled by the market

p.40 p.41 p.43 p.49 p.50 p.52 p.54 p.56

5. Assessment and conclusion

T1. Summary crossing the typology and the objectives T2. RAG table: assessing the design process

p.64

p.58 p.59 5

I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Elanor Warwick, for the interesting conversations, informations and clarifications on my topic. Her professional and academic experience have greatly highlighted my problematic and enriched the design process of this project. My tutor at the Bartlett School of Planning, Dr. Juliana Martins, has also provided me with decisive literature and generous advices for my approach to the problem. Attending Architects for Social Housing meetings has been a great inspiration, especially to fuel the social value of the existing estates. This project argues that post war council estates are essential to London and that improving them incrementally is a way to see beyond the Sink Estate narrative. A big thanks to ASH for welcoming me and more generally for the passionate work they do in London. On my site, I was able to lead a project to engage with the local community through a market initiative. I have to thank specially one resident of St Georgeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Estate in Tower Hamlets, John Bell, for introducing me to the estate and allowing me a lot room for manoeuvre to build the community market. All in all, I would like to simply thank anyone who got involved in this project, particularly the residents of the estate. Finally, this work is dedicated to anyone sitting for long hours in the basement cluster at Central House, Bartlett School of Planning, Faculty of the Built Environment, University College London.

6 6

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Most high rise housing estates are here to stay for the decades to come (Kearns, Whitley, Mason, Bond, 2010:227).

In the current context of austerity and lack of public funding, estate regeneration often goes with displacement and demolition of council estates, both of which hinder social sustainability. On the other hand the context of high rise social housing does not necessarily create the sense of trust and community necessary to the formation of common interests. The disused open spaces around the council estates are seen in as a resource to capitalize on for the residents. However these have been fragmented and overly defined by defensible space approaches, while the Right to Buy policy seem to have diffused the nature of ownership in council estates through privatisation. This project focuses on the process of remaking places in the context of modernist high rise towers. The tower blocks floating like “objects in space”, seem to define and interact poorly with open spaces around them which remain abandoned and impersonal, or seen as a setting for anti-social behaviour. To redesign and remaking the space and allow a re-appropriation of space on behalf of the residents who form and increasingly diverse social, economic and culture community, we will use Koch and Latham (2012) domestication concept, which is about creating fine grain interventions in public space for everyday uses. The approach focuses on section I) introducing a gradient of publicness with tactical interventions, following a created typology of open spaces, inspired by Carmona and Minoura’s work (respectively 2014 and 2016). The typology helps identify which spaces have potential for domestic, and community uses, going beyond Oscar Newman’s typology of public, private,semi public or semi private spaces (1972). These different spaces along the publicness gradient are defined by more strategic ‘dynamic edges’ (section II) that allow good space transition without hindering or ‘sanitising’ social interaction. Finally the scaling up section (III) addresses the social dimension and the involvement of the community in inhabiting these spaces, moving the scope from the morphological to the physical and social level, by identifying key actors and mechanisms that can lead to a comprehensive design.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION History and context Problematic

1 99

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

3. Reflection

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

1.1 HISTORY AND CONTEXT 1.2 PROBLEMATIC

F1 Pruitt Igoe, St Louis

F2 La Courneuve, France. Like in many other grand ensembles, the undefined green areas

have been replaced by car parking.

After the Second World War, mass social housing has been delivered As Sendra mentions, the refurbishment of the social housing stock by public authorities throughout Europe to accommodate a rapidly has first dealt with repairing the buildings, rather than intervening on growing population, in a context of a thriving economy. the open spaces, which maintained a low level of outdoor amenities for the local residents. (2012). The movement in architecture and urbanism called Modernism has become synonym for post war mass housing. ‘Coarse grain’ slabs or towers, often standing on open space started forming the architectural language, primarily designed for a more equal and new post-war society, as described in the documentary Equal by Design by Peg Raws and Beth Lord (2016). However criticisms rapidly emerged over this urbanism of “pavilions in landscape’ (Carmona et al., 2003) or ‘objects in space’. Michael Young and Peter Willmott denounced the alienating communal spaces of such grand ensembles (1957), which often existed in open land with very little design treatment. Jane Jacobs (1961) condemned the large scale, car-oriented, master planning approach which created disconnections between the new buildings and the former and complex street networks and urban fabric. Similarly, Roger Trancik, in a 1986 book called ‘Finding lost space’ highlights the undefined spaces, left over after planning that fail to connect the buildings.

No infrastructure given to the residents to develop activities in the public realm.

Pavilions in landscape : just a bit of grass around the buildings 10

F4 1980s: Margaret Thatcher creates the ‘Right to buy’

council to transfer this stock to private entities of public interest: the Housing associations. Created in the late 1980s for rural councils, it was later on extended to the urban councils by the New Labour from 1997 (Pawson, Davidson, Edwards, Morgan, Smith, 2009). This transfer of ownership and responsibility at administrative level has been accompanied by the Thatcherite ‘Right to Buy’ policy from the 1980 Housing Act. This mechanism, still in place, allows the council tenants to buy their home at a discount from the public authority. One can analyse this process as the further privatisation of a formerly public good, or as a social mix measure. Some scholars, such as Lupton and Power (2004) refer to the ‘residualisation within the social housing sector’ that followed the Right to Buy policy, highlighting the negative impact of the policy.

Roger Trancik, 1986: what is lost space? Describes ill defined areas that fail to connect elements

LSVT

GLC

Housing associations

Councils

Right to Buy

So cial mix In London, after years of the post-war optimism for social housing, the public authorities started having difficulty in maintaining the large housing stock built in the post-war period, which resulted in the Greater London Council (GLC)—the former London City Council— transferring its housing stock to the boroughs in 1981. Later on the Large Scale Voluntary Stock Transfer (LSVT) mechanism allowed

Post WW2-1981

1981-1997

Public ownership T1

1997-now Public/private ownership

Governance and different scales of privatisation over social housing in the UK

Typologies

In reality: a complex assemblage

Private garden Semi private fenced green Semi public green Semi public hard surface Formal street

Utopia on Trial by Alice Coleman (1985) and Defensible Space (1972) by Oscar Newman. Two influential books to ‘remake’ run down estates. Tackling social issues with a deterministic design approach.

Nevertheless, it seems that the privatisation of social housing governance and ownership has also come with restrictive urban design policies. In 1972, the American geographer Oscar Newman coins the notion of ‘defensible space’ as he drew a positive correlation between the building height in social housing estates and the crime rate in Yonkers, New York. His argument is that the point typology, allowing too much undefinied public space would remove natural surveillance and safety at ground level. He uses the notion of territoriality to differentiate the open spaces: public, semi pubic, semi private and private.

Buildings

A typology of the open spaces following the Defensible Space strategy, which results in a complex assemblage of fragmented spaces.

Trial (1985). Advising Margaret Thatcher on designing out crime in Modernist social housing, Coleman’s work focused on a physical approach to social issues. As Elanor Warwick demonstrates, Coleman’s Defensible Space has been interpreted in different ways and has led to a fragmented design approach (Warwick, 2015). However, the overall legacy of Defensible Space has often accumulated in fences, negative signage, CCTV surveillance and other anti crime measures. The ‘semi private’ spaces have turned into fenced gardens, creating inactive frontages on the estates.

One can argue that this intention to overly redefine the open spaces Scholars have criticised the lack of clarification in the definition of has ironically led to their failure as public spaces. According to Ali these categories (Marshall, 2014, Minoura, 2016), the defensible Madanipour (2008) public space is currently more used to control space theory has been significantly influential, especially in the UK behaviours that to promote participation and cohesion. with Alice’s Coleman research, assembled on the book Utopia in

Oscar Newman creates Defensible space and a new typology for the open spaces

Defensible space

Right to Buy and housing stock transfers

Fragmented open spaces

Diffused nature of tenancy and privatisation

Social mix

Diversity of demands and different ways of using space

The street artist Banksy mocks the commonly found negative signage in collective spaces

Lack of attachment Poor sense of responsibility

Negative territoriality

Litter Feeling that these spaces are not important for anyone

General neglect

Who is in charge?

Spaces that are poorly used and reflect fragmented communities. Vicious circle of neglect described by Madanipour, 2008 T4

1. Introduction

1.1 HISTORY AND CONTEXT

2. Literature review

3. Reflection

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

1.2 PROBLEMATIC

1 Building blocks for social sustainability

3 About social capital

Diversity

Sense of belonging

Participation

Common values and norms

Current ‘Sink Estate’ narrative: displacement map of the population after the Heygate estate was ‘regenerated’ and demolished. Source: heygatewashome.org

Reciprocity

Citizen power and proactivity

Social capital

Networks: bonding and bridging

Trust and safety

Source: Design for social sustainability, Woodcraft, Caistor Arendar, Bacon, Hackett, 2011

The Sink estate narrative emerged in the 1980s; this deterministic approach links urban form with social problems. The built environment became guilty for social issues The alternative to ‘regenerate’ the allegedly ill estates has often gone with demolition. However these demolitions have resulted in population displacements, scattering the communities (see Figure 8, above). As demolitions threat communities, there are potential issues in terms of social sustainability. Social sustainability is an objective of the National Planning Policy Framework (2012) and is defined by the as Oxford Institute for Sustainable Development as “concerning how individuals, communities and societies live with each other and set out to achieve the objectives of development models which they have chosen for themselves, also taking into account the physical boundaries of their places and planet earth as a whole. Social sustainability stems from actions in key thematic areas (...) which ranges from capacity building and skills development to environmental and spatial inequalities. In this sense, social sustainability blends traditional social policy areas and principles, such as equity and health, with emerging issues concerning participation, needs, social capital, the economy, the environment,

and more recently, with the notions of happiness, well-being and weakened surprise, organic development and urban interaction (Tarbatt, 2012), hindering sense of community and social capital. quality of life.” (Colantonio and Dixon, 2009: 18) The disused spaces that can be found around council estates somewhat embody the ‘tragedy of the commons’, where a benefit (open space) is not managed and ends up being lost (or here fenced). These disused spaces could have a greater social utility and be sustained as a social good. Here the challenge is to overcome the Bourdieusian habitus which are strong structural predispositions that influence the way we see the world, and in this case the way we use and think about social space. Changing the habitus here is about Lack of sense of community challenging the ‘socio spatial status quo embedded in a particular place’ (Tardiveau & Mallo, 2014). Moreover, both in urban theory However, in the context of high rise social housing, literature and practice, little attention has been paid to these interstices (Gehl, suggests that sense of community struggles to emerge (Gifford, 2011; Verstrate, et al, 2013). Thus, the disused open space has the 2007; Walter,1972), often due to a lack of communal space and the potential to be turned into a resource for the community. presence of cold, bland and impersonal public spaces. Jane Jacobs (1961) argues that the large blocks of the Modernist era (or coarse grain urbanism) removed dense street networks and mixed use areas, reducing the circles of acquaintance and casual and visual surveillance. Top down and large scale planning hence would have To face the challenges that come with demolitions and a planning system which is mainly top-down in its approach to regeneration, council estate residents need to foster social sustainability through social capital. Social capital means ‘networks, norms and trust to enable participants to act together more effectively to pursue shared objectives’ (Social Analysis and Reporting Division, 2001:6). This suggests awareness and common interests.

4 Communities that are increasingly diverse Affiliation as a necessary step for participating in society and developing an interest common interests Fulfilment Esteem Sense of belonging Safety and security Physiological needs

Look into the common place

“The tendency of modernisation is towards greater individualisation rather than the generation of greater community spirit (...) we as modern citizens increasingly lack ‘social capital’. We lack that stock of associations and bonds that takes us out of our otherwise solitary existences and places us in a social context where we see how important (...) others are for the realisation of our goals and aspirations”.

Open spaces as a resource for social capital and the emergence of common interests.

The city segregates on the basis of access to resources (Ali Madanipour, 2004)

More diverse social mix: multi cultural and social context

Diversity of needs and ways to use space

(Torney-Purta, Henry Barber, Richardson, 2004: 99) Modern community does not have intensive social interactions with strangers, most of them feel comfortable only within their own social group and do not feel the need to interact with other (Lofland, 1998)

Diversification in the social mix: design for all

Maslow’s pyramid of needs, on human motivations (1968)

This present work seeks to provide a conceptual framework and a design approach for the lack of transition and interfaces between the intimate sphere and public life in the context of high rise modernist estates. The project hence focuses on the territorial production of space, by which space ends up being used or abandoned. In spatial terms this results in unappropriated spaces where there are no interactions between the user and the space. This lack of transition and definition of space generates a lack of ownership on behalf of the residents. However, the increasing social mix, due to the Right to Buy policy and other shifts in tenancy and ownership status indicate that in a high density context, the built environment has to deal with increasingly varied and complex demands placed on its open spaces.

The interfaces and patchworks of subspaces have social potential to sustain variety of uses, and become a platform for everyday life and cohesion. In that sense the open spaces can be the first step through which social sustainability happens.

On the other hand, the over definition in the context of defensible space policies with fences and other hard edges has led to the privatisation and securing of the open spaces, resulting in impersonal and anonymous spaces. Therefore a balance is to be found between inclusion and sense of ownership on behalf of the residents.

Research question:

All in all, this project looks into bonds of solidarity in the commonplace. The familiar, the banal and the every day are the basis to shift habitus and strengthen social capital for the estate residents, placing the diversity of every day experience at the root for social sustainability. Nodes: open spaces

Everyday uses

How to mediate the towers and the public open spaces to sustain a multiplicity of everyday uses? T8

Urban form: towers

Project focus

LITERATURE REVIEW

Tower blocks: exploring a typology Domesticating space: what space? what for? how?

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

3. Reflection

4. Design process

2.1 TOWEREXPLORING BLOCKS 2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.1 TOWER BLOCKS: A TYPOLOGY Main features

Advantages

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.3 WHAT FOR?

Weaknesses

Access to building from the open spaces and courtyard

2.4. HOW? Opportunities

“Understated entrances” that are hard to identify providing a poor sense of arrival

When it is possible, extending the building’s entrance and footprint can be a way to reconcile horizontality and verticality

Large areas of open spaces

Leafy parkland feel, presence of mature trees Daylight and air circulation

Open spaces with poor maintenance and treatment Surveillance issues

Communities to plan, manage and maintain the large areas of open spaces Improve layout, enclose, frame the space

When slab: street in the sky When point: limited footprint, no street in the sky

Walkable and safe (no motorised traffic)

Segregation and poor accessibility

Same levels Visual access by fences, hedges or lower structures

Predominant residential land use

Tranquillity

Lack of activity, dead spaces Dead ground floor frontages

Animate Activate the ground floors

Routes do not align with surrounding street network, given them their own movement structure

Illegibility Retail units cannot thrive because they remain inaccessible

Highlight the key movement routes Improve way-finding

Uniform and consistent style

Bland and oppressive

Personalisation

1 Understanding the preference for towers

bus

ier

Table summing up some literature about the point typology, including Jan Gehl, Cities for People (2010) and Price and Myers Sustainability 2004, quoted in http://singleaspect.org. uk/

Jonathan Tarbatt (2012) describes the tower typologies as “pavilion block” or “solitaire”, a type of freestanding building on an individual plot. Historically, only churches and castles or other buildings whose function is civic or religious are solitaire typologies (Tarbatt, 2012). The table sums up some of the literature read about the point typology.

Mutliple dwellings T2

Economy of scale and vicinity

Reduced cost Multiple services like concierge, elevators The Design Catalogue - Successful examples of high density in Europe, 2006

As the table suggests, the lack of legibility and accessibility that hinders the integration of an estate to the street network is a barrier for retail units or mixed use. The project does not tackle this specific Beyond services inside the tower, in a well-integrated neighbourhood problem, but takes it into account by proposing mixed use based on towers can add to the viability of local shops and services and thus the provision of workspace and temporary urbanism. become an asset for the local economy.

Architectural expression

Man made landscape

Modernists T3 F1

The pavilion blocks allow a great freedom in architectural expression, and this freestranding nature provides flexibility to adapt to changing topography. As we mentioned before, the concern was therefore more put on the buildings rather than the space around them, which weakened the traditional function of streets as places and connectors.

Issues linked to the typology

Lack of street life

Side view

The typical point typology displays only a few flats per storey, hence it does not stick to the ‘streets in the sky’ Modernist ideal that would compensate the lack of street life at ground floor.

Moderating factors

Ground floor matters: increased footprint with slabs and podiums to reconcile horizontality and verticality

Mixed use Mixed use to avoid the lack of vitality that comes with single land use Jane Jacobs (1961)

(Nadler, Bar-Tal and Drukman, 1982).

Nature

Residents of towers would not engage easily with their neighbours, which can be again problematic to develop sense of community is difficult to emerge. Confusion between back and fronts

Lack of enclosure

Increase the footprint of the building

Top view

Lack of sense of community

4 Case study

(Tarbatt, 2012)

The ambiguity between fronts and backs decreases the sense of ownership and territoriality around the buildings.

Nature seems to facilitate social interaction within the high rise context (Coley, Kuo, Sullivan, 1997)

London College of Communication

Restorative effects of natural settings (Hartig, 2004) Landing softly Landing softly (Gehl, 2011) With front yards and front porches F3

Robson Street, Vancouver

Increased footprint: Increased lobby area or addition of a new unit by the tower

If towers are complemented by a plinth or transitional unit that provides a visual and functional transition from tower to street, towers can become distinctive and popular landmarks that improve the identity of an area (The Design Catalogue, 2006). Now, a discussion about public spaces is much needed to understand the way people appropriate space and create life at ground floor.

As the openness seems to be a recurrent issue to develop a sense of ownership, enclosure is seen as a recurring solution. However it goes against the Modernist ‘building-in-apark’ ideal.

Design principles extracted Third place: mixed use, non retail Nature Increase footprint

However, this coarse and mono functional urban grain can be moderated by different factors to enhance sense of community.

Landing softly: sense of arrival T4

2. Literature review

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.3 WHAT FOR? 2.4. HOW?

2.1 TOWER BLOCKS

“...the enjoyment of such scattered green spaces has turned out to be largely illusory. (...). Everything belongs to everybody with the result that nothing actually belongs to, or is enjoyed by, anybody. Their ownership, administration, and maintenance is neither specifically public nor private. They are the left-over voids between gigantic boxes, where sparsely sprinkled adults and children are equally ill at ease.” (Chermayeff and Alexander, 1966: 66) From residual to social and public

space

Residual space Can be meaningful for the everyday and incidental

“Cities that were dense, compact and continuous have become diffuse, loose and discontinuous, (...) with autonomous and atomized elements which do not relate to each other. This shift has been accompanied by a significant change in scale.” (Levy, 1999: 81)

A typology: Erick Villagomez Spaces between

Spaces below

Oversized infrastructure

Void Spaces

Pedestrian

Spatial practice: everyday life

Free

Social

Inclusive

Social space

£ Meaningful

Singular

Social (thus) public space

Representational symbols and perceptions

Ambiguous space

Alexander Stale, 2008

Engaging

Lefebvre, 2009

Avoid

Alice Coleman, 1981

Delineated

Wedges

As we mentioned beforehand, within the modernity, it seems that spaces are less defined. Anthony Giddens (1998) argues that this is the reason why individuals need to redefine themselves their belonging to a place.

Confused space

Good public places are

Carmona, 2015: 392

The fact that the boundaries between public space and public life are blured, Richard Sennett argues that the Modern Man has lost his public identity and simply retreats to the private sphere (Sennett, 1977).

Junkspace Koolhaas, 2000

Public spaces have different functions

Evolving

Representation of spaces: created by designers and architects

Redundant infrastructure

“residual spaces are an opportunity to think differently about public spaces”

Behaviour in Public Spaces, Erwin Goffman, 1963 The Fall of the public man, Sennett, 1977

However space mediate social relations and everyday life, as demonstrated by Dear & Wolch (1989). Public space has to be explored, from its traditional function as a source of amenity or connecting the ‘objects in space’, to a more potential function that has to do with community revitalisation or participatory arenas (Carmona, 2014: 373)

Comfortable

Carmona, 2014

In other words, resilience, responsivity to change, tolerance, diversity, safety, identity, public life and public/private distinction create good public spaces.

Allowing healthy disorder Sociomaterial symbiosis: strangers welcome T9

Uncertainty: spontaneity and improvisation

Disconnections: design unfinished

A balance is to be found between defining space and allowing spontaneity in the way people interact, engage and modify space.

Sennett, 2010, quoted and reinterpretaed by Sendra, 2016

Public space

5 Different dimensions of publicness More public

The new OMAI Model, described by Langstraat and Van Melik addresses 4 dimensions to publicness. Hard factors, easy to assess

Ownership

Accessibility

Many different social groups regard the place as a public space: more inclusive

PERCEPTIONAL DIMENSION

Management

Inclusiveness

Publicly owned space with public functions and public use REGULATORY AND FUNCTIONAL DIMENSION

Less public

Meaning

Ownership

Free use Control

T10

Soft factors, more ambiguous

Public spaces as mediators for private life

REGULATORY, FUNCTIONAL AND SOCIAL DIMENSION

T11

Particular importance of semi public spaces (Jacobs, 1961)

Public squares are an interface between public and private life (Yancey, 1971, Zukin, 1995)

Here, the ownership and management strictly refers to who owns and manages the way in a legal way. Accessibility and inclusiveness are more interesting to explore in the sense that they need to be complemented by other concepts to generate an understanding of appropriation. The graphic extracted from Varna and Tiesdell work adds the notion of civility and animation as key elements to publicness. These two supplementary concepts are useful to understand the multiplicity of public spaces and how the social dimension meets the more regulatory one.

Cared for; well kept; managed in the public interest; management balancing needs or different social groups Provision of facilities Wide range of supports for a wide range of potential uses and activities. Passive and active engagement, active edges

SOCIAL DIMENSION

DESIGN DIMENSION

T12

Well connected and located within the movement system; strong visual connection to external public realm beyond space; without obvious entrances or thresholds Respect of desire lines

Few social groups regard the place as a public space

Privately owned space with private function and private use Overt and oppressive control presence - human and electronic surveillance; highly visible security presence Over or under managed

Civility

Animation

Physical configuration

Dead public space: narrow range of supports for a limited range of potential uses and activities Poorly connected/located within the movement system: poor visual connection with external public realm; with explicit entrances and thresholds

Varna and Tiesdell,2010

2. Literature review

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.1 TOWER BLOCKS 2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.3 WHAT FOR? 2.4. HOW? Domesticating space: a continuum of publicness Defensible space

Domestication

Positive Disorder

A form of becoming at home in the world (Dovey, 2010 and hence unpacking habitus (Tardiveau & Mallo, 2014)

Overly defined functional spaces (Newman, Coleman)

R. Sennett has an approach to healthy disorder (Sendra, 2012) in public space

Stricly defined space and design

Open ended design and porous boundaries

T13

1 Domesticating space

Territorial performance: how to appropriate the

Good public space needs to find ways of accommodating and living with the wide diversity of demands placed upon them (Koch and Latham, 2012) in order to sustain networks of daily practices, that in turn would form routines.

2 space

Minoura (Uncommon ground, 2016) argues that the remaking of space around free standing buildings, in order to recreate urban grid, has led to infill approaches. However, what seems to lack in urban design is a notion of “territorial performance” to understand how people appropriate individually or collectively a space, as a social arena. A socio spatial approach mixes urban morphology and sociology

Inhabiting the city Space, not behaviours, no ‘taming’ (Zukin, 2010) T15

Urban morphology

Flexibility, allowing different uses in public space Find a balance between horizontality and verticality

Sense of pride

Here, urban morphology is used to create a territorial design which can enhance place attachment and social interaction through sense of ownership and appropriation.

Civic housekeeping, civility in public life (Jackson, 2001). Sense of ownership in that sense implies a more permanent relationship to a place and a greater sense of entitlement (Minoura, 2016)

“The hypothesis is that spatial components such as accessibility, enclosure, and size of the spaces framed (both in absolute terms and relative to population) are factors in territorial performance” (Minoura, 2016: 19)

Positive terrioriality

T14

Analysing patterns of movement, use, segregation

s ense

trust

o rt mf

Markers such as hedges or fences communicate a “sense of stewardship” that indicates when one’s responsibility starts or ends (Minoura, 2016:14).

ity

Domestic qualities

amen

Densifying territories through domestication

Domestication could, following Minoura’s proposal, be understood as the densification of the urban territory. As we mentioned beforehand, density of population is increasing in Central London. But densification here is also about occupation and a multiplicity of everyday uses, where the urban space shifts towards the domestic, community and civic arenas. The densification of use is thus translated in terms of co-presence. The dynamic redefinition of what semi private and semi public actually mean for practicality is an opportunity to explore and create further open spaces typologies. We shall explore these notions with the concepts of domestic and community spaces.

Domesticating Territorial performance Intensification

Multiplicity of spaces

Hence, if the ownership is relatively clearly communicated, the space is appropriable and domesticable. Ownership can be communicated through visual clues such as paving and planters.

Multiplicity of uses T16

Introducing a gradient of publicness

Inspired by Carmona’s retheorizing contemporary public space (2014) Domestic space

Community space

Domestic spaces are similar to home territories, where regular participants have a relative freedom of behaviour and a sense of intimacy and control over the area. Privacy boundaries

Territoriality

Boundary controls

Personal space

Inspired by Saunders, 1990

Relaxation

Security: can be closed at night F6

Comfort

Enclosure

Community spaces are interactional territories: areas where social gatherings may occur, these gatherings are generally mobile and fragile. Because of their more social nature, community spaces are more ‘public’ than domestic ones. Community spaces gather a wide range of users, from the young to the elderly, allowing a different range of activities, from playing (Bormat, 2015) to passive participation (street watching). Hence they actively embrace a great choice of ways to participate in public life. According to Carmona, ‘users remain concerned with issues of safety (not least relating to children) and are appreciative of design and management measures that reassure them’ (Carmona, 2014:393). Nature also has the power to enhance interaction (Hartig, 2004)

Safety

Domestic spaces are dominated by residential functions. Therefore they are less inclusive and quieter than other public spaces. They also generate more sense of ownership (Minoura, 2016). They are not communitarian ‘vibrant’ places, but are more used to retreat and relax. Closing domestic spaces at night can help safeguard the peace and quiet of residents Quiet domestic spaces are as valuable, in different ways, as vibrant social ones. Carmona, 2014:392

Adaptable

Shelter

Community & work space Play

Seating

Soft and hard controls

Inclusive Nature

Here, the challenge is to create a community space within a space dominated by residential land use.

Discussion

These two generic categories are general tools to understand how different spaces can be placed along the gradient of publicness. However there is a need for further clarification and explanation of the typologies through new sub categories. For instance, an orchard, where residents and outsiders gather to garden, requires a certain sense of enclosure (Groundwork, 2012), even though it has the power to generate social interaction. This tension highlights how that a more complex typology is needed. 21

2. Literature review

1. Introduction

2.1 TOWER BLOCKS

3. Reflection

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.3 WHAT FOR? 2.4. HOW?

A typology of public spaces for Modernist estates

1 A more complex typology

This completed typology of domestic and community spaces reveals different forms and boundaries, to sustain different activities and users.

2 Ownership versus use? Enclosure

More Private

Domestic

Domestic buffer zone

Hybrid

Small yard

More Public

Community

Orchard

Community buffer zone

Community yard

Domestic

Community

Activities Open front gardens

Open ended use Small gardens Semi fixed features

Gardening Compost Cook

Bike racks, social interaction, third places

Seating, watch, play, interact

Help the building land softly

Form Different paving and materials, well delineated Small surface, open

Small yard (<0.3, >0.5ha) enclosed with an edge which contributes to the public realm (plants)

Large yard (<0.8 ha) 85% enclosed

Small units or surface, open (> 0.3 ha)

Large yard with porous boundaries

Small interaction places, porous boundaries

Residents, quiet

KEY

Openess

Minoura (2016) suggests that for residents, ownership correlates negatively with the use of a place. Ownership would allow more traces of everyday uses to take place, without meaning that people use the place often. This is the reason why we will seek a balance between ownerhsip and use in the research.

Residents, outsiders welcome

No walk through, controlled access

3 Assemblage and interlock

Buffer: relation to the buildings Yard: relation to the residents Enclosed

Open

Residents

Based and re-interpretated from Minoura’s work (2016)

T17

T18

Mainly residents, outsiders through regulated access (like membership)

Moreover, the spaces shall be defined by different boundaries. Here, we will focus on the idea of ‘secondary boundaries’, which are permeable by sight, in order to balance enclosure and openess, hence ownership and frequency of use.

Users Residents, interaction

Use

Ownership

Well delinated

Porous boundaries

More privacy does not necessary imply more enclosure. Signals of privacy can be expressed without enclosing a space.

F10

This typology is composed of elements that get assembled and interlock between each other. Hence, as buffer zones link the buildings to the yard, the typology has to be understood as an assemblage of spaces that complement each other.

4 Case studies

Domestic buffer zone

Community buffer zone

Orchard

Small domestic yard

F11

F13

Rebrick Estate, Old Street: front gardens animate the place.

The domestic yards in the Cotton Gardens estate is completly enclosed and accessible for the residents.

Groundwork and What if: vacant lot: gardening and social interaction, with a good sense of enclosure

F12

F14

F16

Shuna Walk, Islington. The stairs create a front garden Hemsworth Court, Kachney. The enclosure is effect and are a bridge between the public realm and provided by greenery and creates a sense of quiet and relaxation. the household.

T19

F15

Assemble and Poplar Harca in Limborough Gardens: an enclosed courtyard as a horticulture resource for the residents.

Community yard

F17

F18

F17

F18

In Clapton Park, inviting furniture and shelters are invitations to interact. The furniture can be found around yards and offers a good transition to the buildings.

The central courtyard in Coin Street offers porous boundaries, differences in levels that are opportunities to sit and develop passive engagement.

Design principles extracted

Open

Enclosed

Shelter

Porous boundaries

Changes in materials

Planters

Garden

Third place

Inclusive

Planters

Open ended use

Compost

Bike racks

Play

Semi fixed features

Cook

Inviting furniture

Drinking water

2. Literature review

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.3 WHAT FOR? 2.4. HOW?

2.1 TOWER BLOCKS Everyday urbanism

1 Exploring the banal

4. Design process

2 Different people, different uses, different spaces 3 Buffer zones We use space in different ways

Invite, do not repel F19

Leighton Chase, Crawford, Kaliski, 2008

Banal Urban occupation locations Walk through

F20

F22

Body ballets (David Seamon, 2012) Different activities and rhythms throughout the day

)

urg

lde

rt O

Ur ba

Ro s(

Pla

ird

Routines

F21

David Seamon (2012) also argues that place attachment is grounded in habitual regularity. The routines can be generated from the introduction of mixed use of site, to create a connexion between domestic and professional life. 24

Passive contacts allow to feel the presence of others positively

ati on

Everyday urbanism is an invitation to look into the commonplace and see how places embody collective values. Louis Wirth (1938) sees urbanism as a way of life, stressing out the primacy of human experience as the root of urbanism. Everyday urbanism turns urban space as a connective tissue that binds daily lives together, and allows space for flexibility and spontaneity.

Passive participation

Face to face orientation

Active participation

From a site of passing through to a site a situated multiplicity (Amin, 2008) Same level, please

Gehl, 2011

Enabling spaces of walk through to be places of transition and of shared space is a way to promote different types of activities for different users. Tardiveau and Mallo (2014) propose to tackle habitus and social conventions with everyday urbanism to reveal and engage with socio spatial issues. Mobile furniture can be a way to inhabit a space in the first place and â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;a form of becoming at home in the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; (Dovey, 2010). This tactic can turn places of pure necessary activities into spaces of participation and sociability, by changing the way we look at them.

Avoid inactive frontages Rest and relax on good edges

(Gehl, 1971)

F23

Buffer zones are spaces that relate to the buildings, such as front gardens or entrances (Minoura, 2014)

4 Yards

5 Everyday urbanism and its traces Da

ov e r:

ete er d

r m i n a ti o n o f u s e s ( S e n n e

Extrinsic traces Places to rest and for passive participation (street watching)

Positive sensory experiences Variety of materials and details

Tension

Top down, institutionalised traces, often places by public authorities via planing and urban design. Provides a framework, more than objects

tt, 2

010

)

Intrinsic traces Bottom appropriation, the people.

up from

T20

Play and exercise

Human scale

Avoid negative signage

Avoid big empty areas

F24

The tension between extrinsic and intrinsic traces of use in open space in the residential context indicates that semi fixed features should be prefered over fixed features, with an open ended use (Minoura, 2016)

Gehl, 2001

Quality at eye level

Examples of everyday urbanism objects

24m

48m

Limit to facial recognition

Tea, coffee F26

Photographs

Play

Design principles extracted

Tardiveau and Mallo, 2014

1. Third places (mixed use and rhythm) 2. Inviting furniture

3. Inclusivity

Comfortable distance F25

Everyday urbanism being an objective and an approach, there is now a need to explore tactics and strategies to achieve appropriation and multiple uses of the open spaces.

Rasidi, Jamirsha, Said, 2012

4. Open ended use

Balance between enclosure and openness

5. Semi fixed features

Yards are open spaces that relate to the residents (Minoura, 2014) T21

6. Soft edges 25

2. Literature review

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

2.1 TOWER BLOCKS

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.3 WHAT FOR? 2.4. HOW?

Tactical, plot based urbanism

1 Tactical urbanism and urban acupuncture

2 Plot based urbanism

3 Repairing coarse grain through fine grain small units

F29

F27

Books such as Tactical Urbanism (Lydon and Garcia, 2015), or Urban Acupuncture (Jaime Lerner, 2014) present interesting approaches to ‘scale down’ and create incremental urbanism instead of pure masterplanning. However, morphological issues or questions of territoriality must be solve more strategically.

Massive Small (Campbell, 2011) and the Plot, designing for Diversity (Tarbatt, 2012) are two works that can complement Tactical urbanism by offering a plot based approach to urbanism.

Small increments can produce large changes for urban spaces and for innovation and knowledge. (Graham and Thrift, 2007) According to Bishop and Williams (2012) the sum of small-scale actions can have a big and very efficient impact. They have the advantage of being of easy and quick implementation, so their cost might not be very high. The tactical, as opposed to strategic, smallscale action are intended to make citizens realise that a disused space could be instead a public open space. Easy and quick implementation

Cheap F28

The power of small scale actions

However, in the context of free standing buidlings, the lack of edges can be problematic to delineate open spaces. This calls for a more strategic approach to simple tactical solutions. The plotbased approach highlights that plots, as small units, can produce the edges that reconnect the buildings to their open spaces. The approach also reconciles coarse grain urbanism and a more incremental and evolutionary urbanism (Tarbatt, 2012).

The activities taking place in the small units can also have a social value, by sustaining activities that promote social interaction, as seen in the two following examples.

F31

Not too invasive, easily adopted

Big and efficient impact (Bishop an Williams, 2012) In that sense, ‘scaling down’ could transform places without disruptive elements that could endanger social sustainability. However, tactical urbanism is not the only approach that should be promoted to create positive territoriality and a multiplicity of every day uses in residual space. 26

F30

Inspired by R. Sennett (2010), the interventions can be flexible and modular places made by the small scale interventions could take the form of a skeleton for different possibilities around the buildings

F32

F33

Groundwork ideas for sociability and retrofit, could be hosted within small and modular structures, such as this container (top left, Gillett Square, found in Sendra, 2012).

BUS Architecture: a mobile playground that can define space and be moved easily along an edge for a transformative space

The first example mixes the simple shape of a container found at Gillet Square in Dalston and the Med in Sheds project, inviting the community to collaborate and sharing skills through DIY.

The second example is more modulable and responds the demand for playability. A modular small unit can provide a range of activities and define spaces in an original way.

Completed at a more strategic level, working on the edges

Edges

Soft edges for transitional experiences

Membrane: porosity (Sennett, 2010)

“Life grows from the edge and towards the middle” Jan Gehl, 201 1

Modular and Participatory (Rapoport, 1968)

“If the edge fails, then the space never becomes lively”. Christopher Alexander (1977:600)

Privacy regulator: Exposure and enclosure balance

At small scale, edges also help clarifying territories, especially with individual dwellings. Efficient edges provide residents opportunities to regulate contacts and interact. According to Jan Gehl, a ‘wellproportioned transition zone can keep events at a comfortable arm’s length’ (Gehl, 2013: 103).

“Soft edges signal to people that a city is welcoming. In contrast, in streets with retail, where solid metal shutters close off shops outside opening hours a sense of rejection and insecurity is produced” (Gehl, 2011:99)

Frontage

Boundary

Small work space

Therefore, changes in pavement, landscaping, furniture, hedges, gates and canopies can mark where public space ends and transition zones begin. Height differences, steps, slopes and staircases can also mark the transition zone, providing critical prerequisite for the important function of soft edges. Soft edges create friendly ground floors, surrounded by human activity. Traces of everyday life such as furniture, flowers, parked bicycles and forgotten toys are a comforting witness of life and proximity to other people. These signs increase the feeling of safety in the public spaces.

Interface (Minoura, 2016)

Small units contribute to the maintainance of the estate in exchange of discount in rent

T22

Design principles extracted

These units could also be rented at a low cost for small businesses. Following the Holma case in Malmo where residents, in exchange of maintaining of the open spaces get a discount on their rent (Minoura, 2016), mixed use on the estate could generate stewardship through a win-win financial system. This idea takes us to the following section to consider how urban design must follow the delicate ecology of the social dimension. T23

1. Modular units 2. Plot based urbanism: small units 3. Temporary interventions 4. Texture changes 5. Slopes 27

2. Literature review

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

4. Design process

2.1 TOWER SPACE: BLOCKS 2.2 DOMESTICATING WHAT SPACE? 2.4 DOMESTICATING HOW?

5. Assessment and conclusion

2.3 WHAT FOR? 2.4. HOW?

Scaling up: the social dimension

1 From the patchwork to the network Bottom up meets top-down

2 Design modulates

Scale up

Networked thinking (CABE, 2009) This section considers elements to avoid piecemeal interventions in the process of remaking places, in order to achieve a comprehensive and holistic design process. Only a multilayered approach for designers can avoid piecemeal interventions (Berghauser Pont & Haupt, 2009).

Design is a first step to remake places. It has to be completed by other elements, such as policy, animation of places and social conventions and practices.

Community

Neighbourhood development

2) underpinned by policy 3) Enhanced by material objects and amenities (animation)

Locates space

4) Ordered and facilitated by the evolution of social conventions and practices

Designers

T24

The networked approach clarifies why involving residents in the development is key to remaking places (Price & Myers Sustainability, 2004)

1) Design modulates and intensifies interaction

Morphological level

Physical level

3 Neighbourhood oriented

T25

Directs design

Facilitates approval

Wise and Velayutham, 2014

Solicits business

Minoura, 2016

As individuals and organisation are more than the sum of the parts, mutually supportive connections must be consolidated.

Enjoys projects

The actor network highlights how different bodies, from individual to collective, institutionalised or informal, participate and relate to each other. This is a way to go beyond patchwork interventions to create a network of places.

T26

F34

This approach unveils a delicate ecology between the residents, the amenities and the design.

Chase, Crowford, John, 1999

In the context of increasing diversity in the social mix, the actor network theory can also the highlight different relationships residents have with institutions. For instance, leaseholders do not have their say with the housing associations in terms of governance, but they could be seen as home owners, having more interests in their homes and the management of the estate than social tenants, for questions of formal ownership.

Establishing a market: networked thinking applied

Action research: establishing a market to scale up

Uncovering social networks: horizontality

5 Case study: the Prince of Wales junction

u as

Mackie (2008) suggests that it is hard to make links where there are more than two degrees of separation between participants in a network. This could suggest that vertical organisations would not be the best to create supportive social networks. A horizontal, participatory organisation based on local groups could create more shifts in behaviour to domesticate space (Ormerod, 2010).

men

loy Emp

Functionality Com

fort

cia

F36

bil

ity

Watson, 2009

Micro businesses

Invitations and inclusion

Politicise

Memorialise

Entrepreneurial

Constellations of

Reclaim space,

Story telling and

And community

invitations

challenge

place

territoriality

attachment

Discuss

Evolve

The Prince of Wales junction in London (Lock and Latham, 2012)

minded

F37 F35

Source: https://www.williemiller.com/tag/network-mapping

The aim of the action research here two folded. First, we will use the market as a learning tool to explore the social dimension and the layers of actors within an estate which is managed by a housing association. Second, the spatial possibility of the market and its advantages will be explored in the design intervention, it is a way to generate activity on the estate. In management terms, the market is seen as an emergent process rather than a prescriptive measure. It is generated in real time through actions and relationships of actors at different levels.

Example of simple modular units: THR Green Market Stall in Praga

Koch and Latham (2015) report on the case of the Prince of Wales junction project. The project, initially from a grassroot initiative, has been turned into a way to demand from public authorities major improvements of the built environment: traffic calming measures, new paving, improved accessibility. The market is also an opportunity for generating activities that are also non commercial in order to over come the neo-liberal frame which consists in addressing social problems only by fostering economic activity (Koch and Latham, 2012).

Inclusive

The Market gathers qualities that can be found in Matthew Carmona’s ‘good spaces’ criteria, repeated from p.18

Design principles extracted 1. Information 2. Small modular units: recreate new edges easily

‘Many partial or time specific active engagement can be as (or even more) productive than a few, person specific active engagement’ K.T. Shine, 2006:86)

Participatory T27

3. Memorialise the place T28

REFLECTION

Methodology Summary of design principles extracted Criteria for assessment Assessing and learning from case studies

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

2. Literature review

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

3.1 METHODOLOGY 3.2 DESIGN SUMMARY 3.3 CRITERIA 3.4 CASE STUDIES The literature review has been accompanied by other methods to come up with the full project framework. The choice of the site, a regenerated estate in Tower Hamlets, was motivated by its the tower typology, confused open spaces, the presence of a residents projects, and an interesting variety of frictions and collaboration points with the housing association, East End homes.

Literature review

Observation

Interviews

Action research

Case studies

Semi directive interviews 30 minutes to 1h30

Setting up a Saturday community market

• 20 case studies of high rise council estates have been reviewed and visited. • Creation of an open spaces typology, fed by different authors and exemplified in case • 2 were retained for assessment with the analytical criteria elaborated through the studies. literature review. • Creation of analytical criteria to explore further • The assessment is used to create a final toolkit, that informs the design process. case studies.

Site • Photographs, sketches, conversations and meeting with the residents.

• Conversation with Geraldine Dening about the Cotton Gardens Estate • Attended 2 meetings about regeneration process affecting council estates to understand the wider London context • Interviews and correspondence with Paul Wilson, regeneration officer for the Estate • Conversation and attended one meeting led by Glen MacMahon, an independent researcher, involving residents to question the management of the housing association.

• Reviving the history of the area to create a new narrative around the estate • Door to door leafleting • Creating a civic platform for people to express their visions for the estate • Non commercial activities: swoping stall, community development, composting and recycling. • This market is used as a learning tool to understand the different actor networks.

• Interviews with 5 residents, involved or not in the residents association T1

Stall held during the event: free coffee, tea, juices

F5 and books to start a conversation with the residents

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3.1 METHODOLOGYEXTRACTED 3.2 DESIGN SUMMARY 3.2 SUMMARY OF DESIGN PRINCIPLES

5. Assessment and conclusion

3.3 CRITERIA 3.4 CASE STUDIES

This section is a summary of the design principles previously extracted through the literature review.

Plot based urbanism

Temporary intervention

Different textures

Open ended use

Sense of arrival

Slopes

Inclusivity

Third place spaces

Semi fixed features

Planters

Enclosure

Same levels

Compost

Work place

Third place spaces

Legibility

Publicness: orchard

Garden

Nature

Publicness: domestic

Different textures

Towers: exploring a typology

Increase footprint

Modular units

Everyday urbanism

Mixed use

Tactical urbanism: edges

Cook

Delineated

Publicness: community

Inviting furniture

Information

Nature

Scale up: market

Modular units

Information

Memoralise the place

Drinking water

Porosity

Bike racks

Play

These design principles will be completed after reviewing two case studies and will be reworked to dictate the further interventions. Shelter T2

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

2. Literature review

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

3.1 METHODOLOGY 3.2 DESIGN SUMMARY 3.3 CRITERIA 3.4 CASE STUDIES Domestic

Nature has restorative effects for quiet and calm, and can also foster social interaction.

Nature

Planters Legibility

Green infrastructure Garden

Animation

Sense of arrival

Animating spaces provides different temporalities and rhythms throughout the space. It also reinforces the sensation of publicness or privacy.

Community

Legibility has a positive influence on safety perception. It includes way-finding and a clear definition between the public and the private spheres.

Compost

Third places

Temporary Modularity interventions

Slopes

Information

Lot based urbanism

Sense of arrival echoes the idea of reconciling the horizontality of the life at ground floor and the verticality of the towers.

Well delineated

Planters

Invitation

Multiple invitations to use a space must be provided. Spaces must be engaging to sustain different uses. The invitation says â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;yesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; to outsiders

Shelter

Sense of safety Increased footprint Entrances

Orchard

Cook

Porosity

Drinking water

Natural and informal surveillance, along with a good sense of enclosure enhance the sensation of safety. The pyramid of needs of Maslow (introduction) indicates that safety has to be achieved as a first step to then develop social life and sense of community.

Same levels

Furniture

Variety of textures and materials

Same levels

Bike racks

Play

Natural surveillance

Enclosure

Assessing case studies

REMINDER of the open spaces typology, p.20. More Private

Domestic

Domestic buffer zone

Hybrid

Domestic yard

Orchard

Open ended use Small gardens Semi fixed features

Gardening Compost Cook

Community

Community buffer zone

More Public

Community yard

Activities Open front gardens

Bike racks, playability, social interaction

Seating, watch, play, interact

Help the building land softly

Form Different paving and materials, well delineated Small surface, open

Small yard (<0.3, >0.5ha) enclosed with an edge which contributes to the public realm (plants)

Large yard (<0.8 ha) 80% enclosed

Small units or surface, open (>0.3 ha)

Large yard with porous boundaries

Small interaction places, porous boundaries

Users Residents, interaction

Key for map:

Residents, interaction

Mainly residents, outsiders through regulated access (like membership)

Residents

Residents, outsiders welcome

Buffer: relation to the buildings Yard: relation to the residents Enclosed

Well delinated

Open

Porous boundaries

The categories on the previous page sum up the different objectives extracted from the literature review. They will be overlayed with the open spaces typology to explore and refine a toolkit which will then be applied to the site.

1. Introduction

3. Reflection

2. Literature review

4. Design process

5. Assessment and conclusion

3.1 METHODOLOGY 3.2 DESIGN SUMMARY 3.3 CRITERIA 3.4 CASE STUDIES Case 1: Cotton Gardens Estate, Lambeth

DY Clearly defined spaces

The case study focuses on the built form, the orange outline features the elevated podium.

Geraldine (ASH and resident)

This estate has an elevated podium, which restricts the relationship to the street and the number of outsiders within the estate. The podium responds to the function of domestic yard: it is an overlooked quiet space. The community buffer zones here are the main entrance and community centres on the podium. Community yards are found around the estate, at ground floor level.

The filtered entrance on the podium makes the site impermeable and restricts its relationship to the street. However, the enclosure of the podium allows a greater sense of ownership on behalf on the residents. Permeability in that sense may reduce the control and interaction residents have on a place

Once again, this justifies that permeability is not seen as an objective in this project.

Design principles Domestic yard

KEY POINTS

Clearly defined spaces and boundaries

Impermeable

Regulated access and enclosure for domestic yards

Community yards more inclusive and linked to streets

Semi fixed features in domestic yards

Small gardens animate the domestic yard

1. Enclosure 1. Sense of arrival 2. Semi fixed features

Community buffer zone

3. Small gardens

2. Shelter

Case 2: Evelyn Court, Hackney Reconnecting the space with a work on the morphology, improving legibility and invitations.

Evelyn Court, a high-density housing estate in Hackney, lacked usable communal open space. The only existing green space was disconnected and fenced off, situated adjacent to the estate at raised level. Our main objectives for the playground design were to open up the whole of the green space for users of all age groups and to create playable connections between the green space and the estate. (Erect Architecture, online: play/142-p-evelyn-court.html)

http://www.erectarchitecture.co.uk/projects/

Community yard

During the visit, the author was directly perceived as an outsider, and had to explain the object of the photographs taken to a resident. This informal surveillance is a sign of the place being lived, and that the residents feel a strong sense of ownership over the space. However, only the small section of open spaces along Amhurst Road offers a natural and social setting. The rest of the estateâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s open spaces is occupied by car park and offers a sterile mediation to the buildings.

F10 F9

Design principles

Domestic yard

KEY POINTS Residents regulated access: informal surveillance

Porous boundaries

Community yard: activities, invitation to play and watch

Domestic yard more restricted

Community yard

1. Enclosure

1. Play

2. Semi fixed features

2. Slopes

DESIGN PROCESS Conceptual Framework Toolkit The site Interventions

4 39

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK 4.2 TOOLKIT

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Literature review Domesticating space

f p u b li c n

A diversity of every day uses

Domestic spaces Community spaces

Hybrid: orchard

Tactical urbanism Plot based urbanism

Scaling up: the social dimension

dges e c le

o nt

How?

Delineate and integrate

Sca

Domestic spaces Community spaces

Conceptual framework

What for?

How to mediate the towers and the open spaces to sustain a multiplicity of everyday uses?

What space?

Dyn

Research question:

A gra di e

Problem

Action research: Community market

3. Approach

Domestic buffer zone

Domestic yard

Orchard

Community buffer zone

Community yard

Refined toolkit

Listen to the residents: attend

Open

The toolkit translates the conceptual notions into practical proposals

Enclosed

Small surface (>0.1 ha)

Small yard (>0.5ha)

Relationship to buildings

Relationship between residents

80% enlosed Large yard (<0.8 ha) Relationship between residents and outsiders

Open

community meetings

Small unit or surface (>0.3 ha)

Large yard (<0.8 ha)

Invite the community:

Relationship to buildings

Relationship between residents and outsiders

free on the market

Open spaces typology T1

Market

leafleting and providing space for (tables, gazebos) Test different layouts and be flexible to follow different demands

March April May June

Weekly meetings on the estate

July August September

3 Saturday markets

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4.2 TOOLKIT

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT 4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Domestic spaces

Buffer zones

Yards

Open front gardens

Yards

Must allow freedom and quiet for the residents. Sense of ownership.

Semi fixed features

Third places to animate during the day, closed at night

Marking the entrances: legibility

Same levels

Community spaces

Buffer zones

Yards

Small size, relationship to buildings

Inform and discuss

4m 24m

Bike racks

48m

Balance between exposure and enclosure

Signage

Drinking water

Nature

Play

Hybrid: orchard

Informal surveillance (eyes on the street, without a street) T2

Cook

Garden

Community spaces

Buffer zones

Improve the entrances

Plot based urbanism

Yards

Reconcile vertical and horizontal with small units

Shelter

Slopes and steps

Porous boundaries

Hybrid: orchard Consider for all:

Compost

2. Dynamic edges

1. Gradient of publicness

Face to face orientation and invitation Small gardens

Good enclosure (80%) with secondary boundaries (see through)

Third places and mixed use

Leave the design of the space unfinished Unbound points of creativity and resistance (Deleuze, 1996)

More enclosed than other places and quiet than other places

Different textures and soft transitions

Inviting furniture

5. Assessment and conclusion

3. Scaling up: market and social dimension

Buffer zones

4. Design process

3. Reflection

Memorialise the place Get all the ingredients

Actor network Inform and discuss

Small and modular units

Mixed use for stewarship and a maintainance model

Plot based urbanism: small units Temporary interventions 41

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4.1 CONCEPTUAL 4.3 THE SITE: ST GEORGE’S ESTATE FRAMEWORK St George’s Estate

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.2 TOOLKIT

1 Data

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

2 Genesis Cable Street

Scale: 1/1750 20

100

120

140

160

180

200m

Current figure ground

Location: Tower Hamlets, Shadwell, E1 Built: 1970 Regenerated: 2006, infills Refurbished: 2012 by Rydon Total surface: 12,413m2 Units: 307 Total floor area: 28862m2 T3

% ol 40 aseh le

60% Social Tenants

Main issues 1) Car parking 2) Litter 3) Dealing Very low crime rate

Source: St George’s, a neighbourhood plan, East End Homes, 2015

Plot coverage 18% F2

Units/hectare 246

Floor area ratio 2.3

The estate was built between 1963 and 1970 by George Finch for the GLC and LCC, following a generic design of towers.

In 2008 the Guardian used the generic design of the estate’s towers case study to comment on the negative effect of the Right to Buy policy.

The estate was built by the Greater London Council, it is designed north-south which reflects the old street pattern. The main part of the estate started in 1963 by the LCC and was finished in 1970 by the GLC. The architect, George Finch repeated a generic tower design within the estate, which can be found is other locations in London. Pevsner, architectural historian, describes it as a “confident Brutalist composition with ranges of maisonettes and lower housing, making use of contrasting textures of dark brick, pebby-faces concrete, and white boarding” (Pevsner, Cherry, O’Brien, 2005: 487). In the 1970s, the estate was isolated, both physically and geographically. The layout disconnected the place from Cable Street, making the access an “assault course”, according to some longstanding residents. Second, the area was surrounded with obsolete docks. In the 1990s and the early 2000s the estate was extremely rundown. Tower Hamlets was not providing enough maintenance, and according to John Bell from the residents association, the decay process was deliberate and followed the Sink Estate narrative inherited from Thatcherism and pursued by Tony Blair’s government. The regeneration that took place in 2006 adopted a defensible space approach to the issues in the estate. The staircases that

3 Evolution and regeneration

1973

Aldgate

m 10 walk tes inu

tes inu m

lk wa

Fenchurch Street Site

Limehouse Bassin Tower of London

St Katherineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Docks

The area in 1943, characterised by small scale Victorian terraces: the buildings on the current site are highlighted in black.

The site in 1973, after the original estate was completed. In the 2000s, the estate was regenerated and infills at market rate were built along cable street (red circles). These increased the density of the estate and modified the social mix, as they are not belonging to the council. ÂŠ Landmark Information Group Ltd and Crown copyright 2016. FOR EDUCATIONAL USE ONLY.

Scale 1:1000

100 m

Projection: British N ational Grid

were aligned along Cable Street were demolished, and new market rented infills were erected. However, the open spaces have still remained underused. Fences create the rhythm along the podium and open space is treated in a way that discourages appropriation. As territoriality here has been seen as a negative element, the design of the estate has restricted the use and ownership on behalf of the residents. Although demolition would have been a very likely scenario for St Georgeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s estate, a regeneration without residential demolition happened in 2006/2007, when Tower Hamlets transferred the estate to the housing association East End Homes in the frame of the stock transfer mechanism. East End Homes was composed from the start with former workers from the council. The social tenants of the estate could choose the housing association which would manage the estate but could not choose its staff. Interviews with residents have revealed tension against the management of the housing association and suspicions of corruption.

F11 Jun 11, 2016 11:17 Julie Plichon UCL

Scale: 1:7500

100

120

140

160

180

200m

This map highlights the current strategic location of the estate in Central London. Well connected, at a walking distance to the city or the Tower of London, the estate sits in a context of great land pressure.

Regeneration in 2006: stair case towers demolished and replaced with market price infills

2006

Nowadays, the estate seem to be located in an area where the land pressure has rocketed for the past few years (Figure 11)

Estate management Transfer to the housing association East end Homes F10

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

Current masterplan

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

F12

Scale 1/750

The site boundary does not take into account the totality of St Georgeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s estate. To focus on the towers, the long slabs that create different spaces on the eastern part of the site have been removed. Two slabs have still been integrated to the site, it offers an interesting contrast to compare how slabs define the open spaces around them/

50 m

Features

Context Mono land use: residential use is predominant on the estate

Massing

F13

Sitting in a disconnected street pattern

F15

Bland, cold open surfaces on the podium... Cable Street

1 Despite a good variety of materials Railway acts as a barrier The Highway

F14

Pedestrian path

F16

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

Open spaces

7 3

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

4.2 TOOLKIT

Edges Community spaces

Railings as defensible space

4 6

Poor entrances from Cable Street

Orchard and composting

Community spaces Confused In between spaces Domestic spaces (fenced)

Confused space

In between spaces

Access to podium: ramps or stairs

6 3

3 Flower beds... Or empty plots

EET

CABLE STR

2 Domestic space Lower ground ﬂoor

Ground ﬂoor Podium (pedestrian) Stairs and ramps Fences

F17

Fenced private gardens

Main pedestrian paths Tower entrance Access to podium

F18

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

Site specific approach value whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s there

4.2 TOOLKIT

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

nurture the possible

From latent to emergent

SWOT

5. Assessment and conclusion

Concept: applying the typology of open spaces 420m2

275m2

880m2

Strenghts

890m2

Walkable Orchard

Weaknesses

Domestic buffer zone

Impermeability In between space

Domestic yard

Uninviting space

Opportunity

Orchard

Obstacles as playful edges

Community buffer zone

Disused units Social mix

Threat (not represented) Top down estate management

F19

1300m2

Community yard

F21

The bed flowers edges are informal benches. Similarly, the podiums ramps and stairs, which were analysed are drawbacks in the first place are seen as assets here, which slow down pedestrian movement actually present potential to stay and play. 7.8m

ÂŠ Crown copyright and database rights 2016 Ordnance Survey (Digimap Licence). FOR EDUCATIONAL USE ONLY.

Scale 1:500

Projection: British National Grid

The podium works as an informal play area

50 m

Aug 01, 2016 17:38 Julie Plichon UCL

The blank areas on the podium are areas that could respond to the function of street pattern and are generally more transitional spaces. They are not directly treated by the open spaces typology. Instead, positive features (edges along the flower beds, playful ramps on the podium) are retained and improved specifically.

F22

As previously mentioned in the literature review (p. 23), the different typologies interlock and complement one another to connect the buildings and sustain different types of uses and activities. F20

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

3. Reflection

Domestic buffer zone DB

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4. Design process

4.2 TOOLKIT

1 Design principles

A gradient of publicness

Face to face

Sense of safety

Green infrastructure

Natural and informal surveillance, along with a good sense of enclosure enhance the sensation of safety. Safety has to be achieved as a first step to then develop social life and sense of community.

Different textures

In practice, it also reconnects the buildings to the open spaces by creating new doorways and same levels. This process is also designed to make the space more inhabited by reinforcing the presence of the residents and traces of everyday life.

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Objectives

Same levels

Dynamic edges

The domestic buffer zone seeks to avoid the confusion between the back and the rear of the towers as ground floor flats have their front door on the podium.

5. Assessment and conclusion

Nature has restorative effects for quiet and calm, and can also foster social interaction.

Legible entrances

Textures

Legibility Legibility has a positive influence on safety perception. It includes way-finding and a clear definition between the public and the private spheres.

On the masterplan, the domestic buffer zone is seen with the cobblestone texture in two colours: cream and turquoise. On interventions A and C, connections have been built to reassociate the towers to the ground level, by creating steps and balconies that give access to the household from the podium.

C 48

After

F23

After

F24

Scale: 1:500

3 Interventions B

Before

F25

F26

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

Domestic yard DY

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT

1 Design principles

A gradient of publicness

Semi fixed features

Sense of safety Natural and informal surveillance, along with a good sense of enclosure enhance the sensation of safety. Safety has to be achieved as a first step to then develop social life and sense of community.

Dynamic edges

The domestic yard allows residents freedom and quiet, hence it is more enclose than other spaces. It does not correspond to any vibrant intention. The design has been kept simple to allow appropriation and sense of ownership: semi fixed features and small gardens are a way to invite residents in a flexible way, The change in level is overcome with a soft slope. A domestic buffer zone on this visualisation interlocks with the yard along the slab. The relationship to Cable Street is created with planters and trees as a green wall.

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Objectives

Small gardens

Planters

5. Assessment and conclusion

Well delineated Can be closed at night

Site specific adaptation: Green infrastructure

Third places to animate during the day and on the edge: the yard is here completed both by domestic and a community buffer zones

Nature has restorative effects for quiet and calm, and can also foster social interaction. T7

The domestic yard interlocks with a possible community buffer zone at the entrance of the estate from Cable Street. The big scale entrance, created with the 2006 currently presents defensible space features. It is re-humanised in scale and design with a cafe.

DB DY

F27

Scale: 1:500

3 Interventions A Before

Before CB

F28

F29

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

Orchard

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT

1 Design principles

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Objectives

A GRADIENT OF PUBLICNESS

Sense of safety

Compost

Cook

Natural and informal surveillance, along with a good sense of enclosure enhance the sensation of safety. Safety has to be achieved as a first step to then develop social life and sense of community.

Garden

DYNAMIC EDGES In the orchard, the 80% of enclosure as a design criteria is achieved by setting up some work units (10x5m2 each) and tree planting to delineate the space. This enclosure is designed to ensure a sense of ownership and some privacy in gardening.

Nature has restorative effects for quiet and calm, and can also foster social interaction.

Animation Work space

Plot based urbanism: small units

Animating spaces provides different temporalities and rhythms throughout the space. It also reinforces the sensation of publicness or privacy.

Re-used garages for community uses Cooking devices: animation

Small work unit

Green infrastructure

F30

Scale: 1:500

Interventions

Curre

nt edge

F31

F32

F33

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

Community buffer zone CB

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT

1 Design principles

A GRADIENT OF PUBLICNESS

Signage

Inviting furniture

Inform and discuss

Bike racks

T10

The aim here is to reconnect the buildings to the open spaces by increased the footprint of the buildings. This typology is a good option to improve the entrances around the buildings and reconcile verticality and horizontality through multiple invitations. In zone B, the deficient flower bed has been transformed into a sheltered seating area, and relates to the tower to constitute a soft transitory element

Invitation

Sense of arrival

Third places

Sense of arrival echoes the idea of reconciling the horizontality of the life at ground floor and the verticality of the towers.

Shelter

C 54

F34

Scale: 1:500

Multiple invitations to use a space. Spaces must be engaging to sustain different uses. The invitation says â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;yesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; to outsiders

Legibility Legibility has a positive influence on safety perception. It includes way-finding and a clear definition between the public and the private spheres.

T11

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Objectives

DYNAMIC EDGES

Plot based urbanism

5. Assessment and conclusion

Before

After

F35

F36

Before

F37

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

Community yard CY

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

1 Design principles

4.2 TOOLKIT

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Objectives

A GRADIENT OF PUBLICNESS Exposure/enclosure balance

24m

Invitation

Green infrastructure

48m

Multiple invitations to use Nature has restorative effects a space must be provided. for quiet and calm, and can Spaces must be engaging to also foster social interaction. sustain different uses.

Drinking water

Nature The intention here is to connect the fenced off green area which sits in the middle of the estate.

Animation Play

The design uses the morphology to create two functional access to the green yard, via big steps that allow seating. The slopes create a playful edge. The yard can receive different activities that animate the place: a sandbox, ping pong tables, a water foutain to create interaction and animation.

T13

Masterplan

DYNAMIC EDGES

The space is overlooked by the towers, the slab (northern edge) and the community buffer zone on the east edge. Slopes and steps

Porous boundaries

T12

F38

Scale: 1:500

Animating spaces provides different temporalities and rhythms throughout the space. It also reinforces the sensation of publicness or privacy.

F39

Intervention

Before

F40

After: sketch

F41

Before

F42

F43

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3. Reflection

Scale up: market

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT

1 Design principles

Inform and discuss

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

Objectives

Memoralise the place

Small and modular units Wellclose Square Saturday market has been held in St George’s estate in the frame of the project on Saturdays 20th, 27th August and Saturday 3rd September.

Animating spaces provides different temporalities and rhythms throughout the space. It also reinforces the sensation of publicness or privacy.

Actor network

The inspiration for the market came from a resident, John Bell, who wanted to revive the once thriving Wellclose Square as a market place.

Temporary interventions T14

Generating temporal activity and involving people required a great flexibility in the way the market was laid out. This flexibility in use also created a civic space, where residents and outsiders could gather freely. Offering generous seating, music, free coffee and tea are approaches that create an accessible environment. Stalls were also set up close to one another to create a sense of enclosure were people do not feel any pressure in participating.

Invitation

Get all the ingredients

Leave the design of the space unfinished: healthy disorder and flexibility

The location on Wellclose Square, one of East London’s most ancient squares, is an opportunity to revive a former town square and generate a sense of pride. The fascinating history of the Square was displayed on board during the market, to develop an alternative narrative about the place.

opportunities to provide social Open spaces as projects, a civic space and employment

The market as an evolving design process is also the scene for uses of disorder (Sendra, 2016) and spontaneity in public space.

EVENT

Come along for a free coffee or tea and suggest/take part in what’s on in the estate! Compost

Recycling

Animation for children

Pedestrian path

F44

F45

Wellclose Square

Swedenborg Gardens

Historical Landmark

Animating spaces provides different temporalities and rhythms throughout the space. It also reinforces the sensation of publicness or privacy.

T15

ON ST GEORGE’S ESTATE PODIUM AND WELLCLOSE SQUARE

Gardening

Animation

F46

The market unveils networks of actors

Community market

Invitation and trust

Legal liability

Research programmes

Community Interest Company

East London Genes and Health

Public Projects, managed by residents of the estate

Core of success

Community workers Glen McMahon

David Burrowcluff Genia Leontowitsch

Community groups

Julie Plichon

Informs about issues on the estate Politicise

Women attending English classes Micro businesses Compost and garden

Community cafe

Food

Trees for Cities

Crafts

Swop stall

Everyday objects

Charities Re-Use network

Funding and financial incentives

Tea

Cycle workshop

Photographs

Coffee

Public bodies Department for communities and local development

Tower Hamlets East End Homes Council

Partnerships programmes and grants Neighbourhood green

National Award Scheme

Green Flag Award

Private companies

Philantropists

Green Rewards

Christine Avlon

Checks and balances

Donated ÂŁ100 to purchase materials for the women from the community to develop microbusinesses in the market

Community Tower Hamlets Federation

Residents association

Public Projects CIC

Control and permission Landowners Tower Hamlets Council

East End Homes, National Housing housing associaFederation tion

The actor network analysis helped uncovering latent interests of the residents. The market unlocked participation and allowed people to connect, get to know more about the estate and its activities (composting, gardening) and take part. In that sense, the market became a civic space for people to interact freely. That fact that it remained an open ended and flexible project, changing incrementally with peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s interests and open to all kind of participation has been a major benefit. F47

T16

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3. Reflection

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

New masterplan 1

4.2 TOOLKIT

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

7 6 3

5 4

F48

50 m

The masterplan is accompanied by the visualisations seen previously. On the map, the M caption indicates where the market is happening. The O caption with the associated new work units is an example for a second possible orchard.

10 O

T17

11 M

T18

Evolving market layout: stalls and seating put close to facilitate interaction and passive participation. In 3 weeks the residents gradually took part in the market and ended up running their own stalls: second hand objects, food, bookshop...

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

4. Design process

3. Reflection

Sections

4.1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

4.2 TOOLKIT

5. Assessment and conclusion

4.3 THE SITE 4.4 INTERVENTIONS

The orchard is not crossed by the section lines. However, a section of the proposed orchard is to be found p.53.

Building Podium Private garden Undefined grren

Cable street Park

Flower beds

Before

10.5

1.5

2.5

17.5

Building Podium Flower beds Domestic buffer zone Domestic yard Community buffer zone Community yard

After Reduced car parking space F49

to create a domestic yard

Scale: 1/300 0

10m

15m

20m

15.5

3.5

Ramp In between space Building Podium Private garden Confused Flower beds

Before

Building Podium Flower beds Domestic buffer zone Domestic yard Community buffer zone Community yard

After Scale: 1/300

F50

10m

15m

20m

Summary table Legibility

Invitation

Sense of safety

Sense of arrival

Animation

Green infrastructure

DB DY O CB CY T1

Remaking place for a diversity of everyday uses

RAG table:

Does not meet the objective

assess the design process

Open spaces typology

•

Typology does not

Meets the objective

Meets the objective partially

•

solve the relationship

Typology could be more

•

Strategic and tactic

comprehensive, specially in

• •

Avoid piecemeal interventions Provides equal access to high

dealing with in between spaces

between the estate and

quality open spaces

its surroundings and the •

disconnections with the

ASSESSMENT AND CONCLUSION

thinking

street pattern

Different levels of publicness Dynamic edges

•

Could integrate more analysis

•

on multi cultural practices •

Enclosure and the

•

Avoids inactive frontages

territorialisation do not explore

•

Interaction used to regulate safety instead of defensible

networks or accessibility.

design •

Market can be a first step to tackle social issues within the

opportunities T2

•

Adds a social dimension

•

Uses temporary urbanism as ways to recreate space

estate by creating a meeting place and providing employment

Considers different uses and ways to use space

the relationship to street

Scale up: action research and market

Typology allows assemblage

•

Uses the open spaces as opportunities to provide social projects, a civic space and employment opportunities

Transferability

The typology of open spaces is theoretical enough to allow transferability to other estates or housing developments. It participates to the debate that revolves around defining publicness and domesticity in cities, by seeing beyond the common ‘semi public, semi private’ blurred distinction. The assemblage thinking that proposes the typology, where the different open spaces interlock to one another, is a another key element of the work.

LIFE

SPACES

But what if space actually creates life when buildings are already in place?

Conclusion: first, space?

In the context of increasing social mix and demands placed upon open spaces, remaking the spaces around Modernist towers is a challenging place-making practice. Enclosure and openness, edges, are factors that influence the way we inhabit and develop a sense of ownership on places. To stimulate appropriation, a balance is to be found between defining the private and the public, and allowing spontaneity and interaction within open space. Open ended design is a good example of that balance. The creation of an open space typology is a useful way to explore different types of public spaces, varying in degrees of privacy and publicness. The typology has included and different factors that regulate privacy and interaction, and clarified some relations. For instance, some commonplace relations, such as enclosure and privacy can be deconstructed and challenged, as shown with the domestic buffer zone typology. The typology also highlights the limits of remaking place in the context of towers. For instance, creating the domestic yard in relation to the towers is difficult as it requires a great enclosure, this is the reason why the slabs along Cable Street have been chosen for this category. Second, remaking space helps understanding the value of fine grain urbanism at the very first stages of place-making. The open spaces typology developed here is applicable to new developments and is an insightful way to understand how buildings must be integrated to the urban fabric. This project values urbanistic quality at eye level and life at ground floor.

BUILDINGS

As Gehl argues, the process of remaking places is highly challenging.

“First life, then spaces, then buildings, the other way around never works” (Jan Gehl, 2010:70)

When the buildings are already in place and that demolition threatens social sustainability, analysing on site where the activities already happen highlight where they could be developed. However, in this project we have argued that space generates activities and uses as it mediates interaction and privacy. When that space is remodelled in an incremental way, life can emerge, even when buildings are already in place. This approach stresses out the generative role of space in the first place.

Creating the missing connexions between the buildings and outdoor activities is possible with the typology thinking and helps being more strategic in allowing the multiplicity of activities to develop and avoid piecemeal interventions. All in all, the typology is a strategy, reinforced in the detail by tactical interventions.

a Sp

The market has been used in this project not only as a learning process to understand the networks of actors, but also as a spatial attribute to define space in a dynamic way. The modular units are indeed a way to recreate edges and buffer zones in a context of undefined open land.

Spaces as

ce sa generators sm il bu edia e h t tors b etween the life and

di ng s

The notion of gradient of publicness is also a way to consider that publicness encompasses both private and public realms.

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IMAGES

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Google Street View, 20 A1199, London, England, May 2016

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Heygatewashome.org

A special thanks to John Bell, residents of the estate, for providing me with old photographs of the estate, that therefore

http://www.unurth.com/Banksy-No-Ball-Games-London

come from his personal data base.

http://www.maidahillforum.org.uk/gallery/around-maida-hill.html

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http://inhabitat.com/czech-green-market-stalls-create-greater-connection-between-vendors-and-shoppers/trh-market-stalls-edit-architecture-2/

Network of actors around the Swedenborg gardens orchard: compost

Stockholm House

APPENDIX 1

Tower

Philantropist: David

Residents Association: Genia

Network of Muslim Women from Stockholm House: Facilitator

Green rewards: Financial incentive

Viable model East End Homes: provides support and material

Stewardship

Edible gardens

Market

New landscaping?

At the moment, the Community Interest Company (CIC) Public Project is in charge of the compost and orchard initiative, wants to create entrepreneurialism throughout the estate with the market and negotiate with East End Homes for the use of run down garages located besides the orchard.

Compost

Edible gardens

Compost

Landscaping

Tower

APPENDIX 2

Photographs of the market