Towards an uncertain future - Design Research by Nathan Belarbre

Towards an uncertain future Nathan Belarbre

Environmental design research thesis : The sea level rise as a case study of the effects of climate change on the way we live, the way we live together and the way we design.

Research work in design under the supervision of Ann Pham Ngoc Cuong, Sophie ClĂŠment & Catherine Pradeau DSAA eco-design specialized in environmental design at Raymond Loewy school in La Souterraine in 2019

TABLE OF CONTENTS 5

Preface

Introduction

15 I. Rising seas around the world: What demonstrations ? Which answers ? 25 II. Research, prospection and personal productions: Possible alternative solutions? 39 III. Back to fieldwork! 45 Conclusion 46 Bibliography 48 Acknowledgments

Eté 2007, plage Océane, Le Verdon-sur-mer. © Nils Belarbre

From my sandbox to the big beaches of the Atlantic coast, through city-builder and life-simulation video-games, I imagine means to build, to live in various environments. I am considering my role as an environment designer as an opportunity to look at the world with a curious and acute eye in order to find creative ideas to tackle ongoing stakes in societies? If we take the idea of collapsing that is occurring currently as an opportunity to go towards a better alternative future, this thesis appears as a call to raise awareness and to widen our perspectives on a changing world, it invites us to question our environment in a realistic way. This work explores my practice and my approach in design, my research with its key points, my certainties and my doubts that have fostered my reflection over these two years of study. It is also a collective call to tackle the issue together, because, obviously, I am not able on my own to face all the work, and I am very sure that we could find solutions to buckle down to tackle catastrophic phenomena if we gather our skills. I am for open source, that is why my research approach is plural and why I use many different kinds of media to share my work. My wish is to work with other motivated people in the near future whose approach is close or complementary to mine.

To complete the research of this thesis please follow the QR code below or this link : https:// survivrealamonteedeseauxdanslemonde. wordpress.com/

Impacts of climate change, GIEC, 2018 Â© DR

INTRODUCTION According to the 2018 IPCC (International Pannel on Climate Change) report, if we do not limit global warming to 2 degrees, it will have irrevocable effects on the planet: acceleration of melting ice on the poles, increase of meteorological phenomena and natural disasters (hurricanes, droughts, forest fires, tidal waves...) +1m of surging seas by 2100 etc. Added together all these consequences would have a deep impact on humanityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s well-being and life development. Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s hope to limit that figure to +1.5 degrees until the end of the century but is it enough? In a world in which mankind is permanently endangered, in which peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s safety is always strained, and where the possibilities of disasters surge and get human beings to live in a stressful atmosphere, designers have to play their role at a brand new level. In a changing world, the place of designers and their role in society should be reconsidered.

Surging seas Today, humankind has to proceed toward a catastrophic future. In order to carry out research work on the ability of humankind to live in a changing environment, I chose to work on the issue of rising seas. Why choose surging seas? This is a natural phenomenon that occurs in coastal and delta areas everywhere on earth. This kind of places have always been fertile and attractive lands due to their closeness to the water. Indeed, Water is of great benefit to human settlement: such an ecosystem is a fertile land to harvest, to grow 7

plants and vegetables. It allows people to travel and transport goods (food, materials, etc...) and then to commerce and exchange with each other. But, when did the oceans and the idea of rising seas start being considered as a problem for human well-being? This issue was first considered when humans decided to build strong infrastructures, when they decided to make the soils waterproof and to put a protecting coat on the land. But a land is by definition a place in constant evolution. The sea is rising almost everywhere on earth, this phenomenon is accelerated by climate change as the ice is melting, especially around the two poles and is related to the subsidence (subsidence is a geographical process caused naturally or by human infrastructures that makes the ground sink). For example, a coastal city like New Orleans (Louisiana) exerts pressure on the ground that causes the city to «sink».

Living To live, an entity requires many things. First, water, then food, then a shelter are needed to protect oneself and one’s private and collective goods. So here is very briefly how people’s housing has evolved since prehistory. People established themselves near rivers and wildlife spaces that could provide fresh water and food, then they built their houses (to provide shelter/ a roof) and get protected from the weather. Then they built walls to hide from the outside, have some privacy and protect their own goods. (Interpretation from L’architecture de survie : une philosophie de la pauvreté from Yona Friedman, 1978) But today, living in the world is much more complicated than that. There are many inequalities between countries, and even within countries, there can be huge differences between wealthy people and those whose living conditions are precarious.

Google Earth screenshot with the Surging Seas Climate Central plugin, showing an extreme scenario of rising seas of 2,4 meters in 2100 in Miami. ÂŠ DR

New Orleans after Katrina in august 2005. ÂŠ Carlos Barria - Getty Images

Steigereiland - Ijburg - Amsterdam, August 2018. ÂŠ Nathan Belarbre

A designer is a person that has to tackle topical issues, and, thus, be very aware of the environment in which humankind is evolving in order to detect the threats and the opportunities to develop projects that will ensure a more sustainable future for people. That is why one of the main things for a designer is to thoroughly document a subject, to travel abroad and to meet different people to understand other ways to live, other ways to think and to live together. With all this research work, the idea is to compose a visual map of what has been done, of the current trends, and of what can be done tomorrow. We are going to research the ambivalence of the notion of water, then we will see how people live with water around the world and how buildings used to be built, how they are today and how they may look like tomorrow through the creation of fictions and utopias. In the last part, we will see that the issue of sea level rise may have to be taken from a human angle to raise awareness and to involve people.

World map showing the places threatened by a 80 meter high sea level rise and the urban areas of the 50 biggest cities displaced. In Europe, London, Venice, Amsterdam may found new territories to rebuild. Map designed by Richard Weller, Claire Hoch and Chieh Huang http://atlas-for-the-end-of-the-world.com/world_maps/world_maps_sea_level_rise.html

Venice under 1,5 m of water the 29th october 2018 ÂŠ Reuters/Manuel Silvestri 14

I. RISING SEAS AROUND THE WORLD What demonstrations ? Which answers ?

Noah’s Ark on Ararat Mount, 1570, 114 x 142 cm, Simon de Myle © DR

Water is a complex element that we have to cope with, it has ambivalent meanings in our cultures and in our societies, it can mean either life or death depending on its forms, its property, its characteristics. Today we have to tackle two paradoxical water issues on earth: water stress and rising sea level that both endanger life on earth. In this part we are going to study how water is demonstrated in art and literature, then we will see how people used to build and how we design today to live with it and then we will analyse the development of utopias.

1. The Meanings of water Water has always had an important place in our cultural representation. It is the core that brings a living being to life, it is as necessary as air or sun to develop and grow things. Our societies have developed alongside rivers, lakes, the sea to provide fresh water, to irrigate lands, to commerce and exchange with others

Water, A symbol of life and death In our collective consciousness, water can mean many meanings. In our different religions it is related to birth, life, purification, benediction, especially in Christianity with the holy water in which newborns are baptized. In islam, ritual ablutions are meant to wash and purify the soul. But water can also evoke death, as it is highlighted with the Flood myth, from the Genesis Book, in which people had to face a drastic flood on earth driven by deities to wash away their sins.

Water, an object of dreams When it is calm, water gives rise to a dreamy state, it erases doubts, fears, anxiety. That idea is revealed in the biography Reveries of a Solitary Walker, Fifth promenade by the Genevan philosopher and writer Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in which he tells that he took a small boat to go in the middle of the lake to have some 17

rest and disconnect from the rest of the world, to be alone with himself. This attraction to watersides is still true today, people are attracted to coastal areas and to rivers or lake sides that provide a great living environment. So, today, where are established those water communities around the world?

2. Lakeside and water communities? There are plenty of cities, towns around the world that have learned to live with the aquatic milieu, defying the norms, their urbanism and their vernacular organization appears as a real state of art and a pattern to build in a hazardous environment. From two case studies, we will see the threats and the opportunities to build on a water related site.

Tonlé Sap, Cambodge, living with the monsoon The Tonlé Sap lake is situated in a wide trough in Cambodia where a part of the Mekong river flows. It is a very dense area that provides an ideal environment to develop agriculture, to fish and to promote and to preserve biodiversity, that is why many Cambodians settled down on the evolving soils by the lake. Due to its particular location, the lake has two faces in a year, depending on the monsoon periods. With a normal depth of 1.5 meters during the drought period, and a depth of 2.5 to 3 meters during the wet period, people had to organize their homes with that climate particularity. Their home is built on stilts and some of them also have floating structures below to float if the stilts are not enough to preserve the habitat from floods.

Ganvié, Bénin, stilt town The great town of Ganvié in Bénin is almost entirely built on stilts on the banks of Noukoué lake. The locals built the first homes on this site during the Trian18

La grande vague de Kanagawa, 1831, 25,8 x 37,9 cm, Hokusaï © DR

Floating houses on Tonlé Sap lake during monsoon periods © Graphicobsession

House on stilts in Ganvié, Bénin ©Iwan Baan

Makoko Floating school© Iwan Baan

gular trade in the XVIIIth century when Africans took refuge on the sacred lake. The houses are built on wood stilts pushed in the mud in the lake. Most of them are built half above the land and the water. The little town spreads in a vernacular organization along the riverbanks, the little islands are preserved to harvest food for the community. But this fragile town has had to face extreme weather and hurricanes that endangered the sustainability of the life in the area. So towards which future is the GanviĂŠ community going as the sea is rising and the storms are getting stronger and more devastating? Are those two cases the last remains of water communities?

3. Living near water? Should we go to the high lands to build our cities on mountains? Or can we still build on waterside, by building our homes above, below or near water, while conceiving new ways to live? Does floating architecture open new perspectives to answer the topical stakes of our societies?

Floating and amphibious projects For some years, floating and amphibious projects have risen up in vulnerable places all around the world to face sea level rise. In Makoko slum in the suburbs of Lagos the locals that canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t afford a place in land had to find new strategies to build on fragile stilts despite storms and hurricanes in the Gulf of Guinea. To meet the issue of overpopulation and rising seas, the Dutch-Nigerian architecture studio NLĂŠ Architects designed a floating school in 2012 as a first part of a bigger project that plans the whole expansion of the slum floating in the bay. Its triangular shape provides a strong structure to withstand storms, wind and water flows. The place was well received thanks to the social inclusion of the future users in the construction site and to the use of local materials from the early stages 21

of the project. The architecture studio also argues that 70% of the world capitals are built on coastal areas so it seems necessary to question urgently what the future of these cities might be.

From myth to utopia, an odyssey towards new means to live together The Deluge myth or Noahâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ark inspired many scriptwriters, designers, architects to imagine life on the water. Whether short or long lasting, those projections offer utopian visions of society that are completely disconnected from the earth. One of the biggest examples of such utopia over the past years is the project of the Seasteading Institute which promotes a sustainable lifestyle for its inhabitants to live on the sea. However, this project is about creating a heavenly city accessible only to wealthy people who have invested on the project. The Dutch architecture studio Delta-Sync designed the project, it consists in artificial islands that can interconnect with each other to form a bigger city. This project is supposed to be developed in an incremental process that can be built first in an urban harbour and then grow, step by step, in the bay to go further and grow over the sea when it is completely autonomous. But this project appears as another gated community for the elite like in the science-fiction movie Elysium where wealthy people create a space station to get away from the polluted and devastated earth. From this state of the art, the idea was to carry out research on the different ways to respond to the sea level rise issue as it will question the way cities are built, the way society is organized, the way the environment is considered and the way resources are respected. it seems now time to analyze and assess my research work.

Concept art of the floating city ÂŠ Seasteading Institute

Sour waters, february 2019 ÂŠ Nathan Belarbre

II. RESEARCH, PROSPECTION & PERSONAL PRODUCTION Possible alternative solutions ?

Criminal fire

Landslide

Downpour

Drought

Tsunami

Forest fire

Les habitats face aux catastrophes, Sketches of catastrophes , 2018, ÂŠ Nathan Belarbre

The second role of the designer is to practice, to work and to develop ideas that will emphasize the research in order to find his own path, and to develop his own theory. In my case they were not really clear as I started my research one year ago, so in that way I feel that while I was studying and working on that topic, I built my ideas, and all the documentation and work have fostered my work. Here, I wish to evaluate my work to analyse and measure my practice. From the creation of stories to the development of alternative projects or through the exploration of the role of utopia and dystopia, it gives me some keys to consider a project in the field.

1. Artistic practice With artistic practice, designers can break loose from their usual design process to tackle different issues: they can work on models, scales, colours, forms etc. This kind of work can sustain the theoretical research as several concepts and issues are connected, which gives another sense to their design work as a whole.

Living after a disaster? That research started after reading about another passion that I developed in ruins and abandoned buildings. Indeed, this kind of spaces, which are currently disused, appear as opportunities to come back to life as they are just empty built shells full of a past history. Therefore, I began to create models that represent disaster-simulated events, in order to observe and see how those spaces could find other functions or abilities to be useful. Not every part of our devastated buil27

dings may be used as they used to, but it could be a way to tackle the issue of lack of space and overpopulation. The idea was also to measure if it is possible to endure a disaster and rebuild after that event, which I can link to the sea level issue. What will happen to the drowned homes or cities? Can we build on the remains of our former cities?

Floating objects I modelled floating sculptures with different materials, wood, cardboard, plaster, cement to evaluate their buoyancy and their resistance to water. I made many objects to see how they interact in the water, if they attract or if they repulse each other if they are stronger together or separately. What if our city were completely floating to withstand sea level rise?

Eco-fiction Using fiction is a great process to reveal the threats and the potentials of our current situation. By using the trends and the global facts that happen all around the world I developed an Eco-fiction related to my topic about rising seas, in which I showed 3 pictures of one of the societies towards which we could go in a near or far future. This fiction is a response to the fact that the ocean is polluted by plastic debris that slowly form what is now call the 7th continent, but itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s also founded on the rising seas issue and other threats related to it, such as climate refugees, or the emergence of floating projects all around the globe.

Objets flottants à la dérive, 2018, © Nathan Belarbre

À la dérive, triptych realized during the Eco-fiction workshop with Estelle Hary from Design Friction, 2018, © Nathan Belarbre

2. Living adrift Living adrift creates a new paradigm in which we could think that if nothing is done by our governments, maybe that we should shape our own future to bear the issue. In this project I worked on the development of a floating house for an architecture contest, tackling the innovative ideas that allow to live in an autonomous way. How can this home host people like climate refugees or new members of the family? In this project the idea was to create a home for a family whose choice was to handle the rising seas to come as a challenge to experiment new ways to live. The spaces are organized in order to provide enough space for 2 to 4 people and can be divided into other spaces to host more people if the family grows or if they host climate refugees. But this project cannot be untied from a society, so how can it appear in a community?

Marine fictions, what possibilities to live adrift In Les ĂŽles dâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Auvergne by Franck Watel et Paul Basselier, the rising seas stabilize at around 1000 meters and force the last earthlings to take refuge on the mountains. following that philosophy, I tried to develop different scenarios in which I imagine new ways to live in a flooded world; my narratives are based on three double-parameters: Dependency/Autonomy, Solitary/ In society, Drifting/Sailing. Those fictions helped me to define the margins of my work, in order to organise the living space or to produce energy, water, food, to manage waste and to interact with others. In a way, it means measuring what are the best ways to sustain life on sea.

From fiction to drawn ideas One of the main roles of designers is to present their own ideas and reflection to the people with whom they work. They have to use different mediums, different tools to be understood and discuss. But does a designer have the entire power to suggest ideas? What is the place of users in a project that includes them? Is it possible to involve people in a co-creation approach? In this research the goal was to develop a drawn representation of a floating society that develops on seas, while taking into consideration all the steps to be completely autonomous and build a feeling of belonging around a town organization. However, it is tough to design ideas when they are not really efficient or do not work well, thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s why designers should be helped by scientists, engineers or architects to develop projects of that scale. The second part of this abstract shows the personal work achieved these past two years in order to raise new questions and issues about the subject. They enable me to evaluate my work as a real design project and to tackle the issue with my own resources as a designer. Nevertheless, using fiction as a tool to develop new imaginaries, new paradigms and new ways to live in society seems to be a good means to raise peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s awareness and to gather them around a common issue. Now it is time to get back on earth and examine where rising sea threats are likely to occur first.

III. BACK TO FIELDWORK ! Towards a methodology applied to an environmental design project

Dwellers: From apathy to involvement After documenting the topic and working on ideas, the point is now to work on a real site, to find a context where this research work can be implemented. It is time to focus on a specific place, where I can meet people, do research and propose many ideas to the locals, while bearing in mind that it is a sensitive topic. One of my main goals would be to make people aware in a good sense; I do not wish to scare them out of doing anything, on the contrary I want to give them hope and make them aware of what they can imagine and what they can do themselves. To do so, it seems necessary to re-enchant peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s imaginary, by designing new futures, new projections to escape the anxious world towards which we seem to be going, in order to show some new directions that should be taken by communities.

Erecting dikes against the oceans? Currently, the answer is always to put some distance, to erect obstacles between us and worrying issues like rising seas. But this solution is just a blind act as the problem is not really dealt with but only hidden behind a big temporary wall whether real or symbolic. By doing so, people are not projecting themselves in the future and cannot really deal with the problem in the long run. So, working locally in a community would be a first step to get in touch with the population and measure how involved they are in the process, and how they can involve more and more people to take action. What if we could think about other things than just walls? 41

What about a stilt-town? Or elevated buildings? Or a sponge-city that absorb waters? There is so much more to do than just dikes and walls.

1. Application field The coastal area, a threat in between The coastal areas are the places most exposed to rising seas, there are many ecological, economic or social stakes. By 2040, coastal areas are expected to attract even more people with its pleasant living environment, especially for the elderly population looking for a peaceful retirement. But what if those places were endangered by surging seas?

Isle of Rhé, what behaviour in a vulnerable place? As I was looking for a particular place to study for my diploma project, I was offered the opportunity to work on the isle of Rhé. This island is surrounded by La Rochelle bay to the east and the Atlantic Ocean to the West, it is a very flat land with a “peak” at 20 meters high. Centuries ago, the island used to be composed of an archipelago of isles that have been polderised to make one big island but the islanders took that opportunity to create salt marshes that are still renowned nowadays. Today, the island has two “parts” the southern part, which is very densely populated with major towns composed of sand beaches, forests and activities like vineyards, farms, oyster production, etc. The northern part is famous for its little towns, its salt marshes, its agricultural activities like vineyards, oysters, donkey milk, bees. But today the island economy is based on tourism and leisure activities.

P.A.P.I. protection in Loix, ÂŠNathan Belarbre

Since Xinthia Storm in 2010, towns and institutions have taken protection measures against the natural risks that may occur like floods, but such protections will not be enough in a century if the level of water reaches 1meter high. Therefore, what if, as a designer, I could give tools to coastal communities to discuss the issue, find and develop innovative ideas to imagine a new future in a co-creation process? How to create another way to think about the future in the long run? How can we empower and involve people in choices for their children or grandchildren and above that for the posterity? Indeed it is also a matter of how to hand down a territory that will change in a few decades.

CONCLUSION This thesis has followed a long winding path over these past two years of research. The events linked to climate change are already happening everywhere on earth but it seems pretty hard to get people to realize that the life they enjoy today will not be the same tomorrow for their children. So one of the main goals for a designer who works on climate change is to understand what the current threats are, and to try and reveal the levers to create new paradigms for the future. The subject of this thesis appears at a global scale and it seems urgent to tackle the issue, if we donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t want to go under or wet our feet.

BIBLIOGRAPHY The followong bibliography was elaborated to sustaine a piece of research carried out in french

Books • Ferrier Michael (2012). Fukushima récit d’un désastre. Paris, Éditions Gallimard, Collection Folio. P.155 ISBN 978-2-07-045047-3 • Friedman Yona (2016, publication originale 1978). L’architecture de survie, une philosophie de la pauvreté. Paris, Éditions de l’Éclat, Collection Eclat/Poche. P.224 ISBN 978-2-8416-2384-6 • Rumpala Yannick (2018). Hors des décombres du monde : Ecologie, science-fiction et éthique du futur. Éditions Champ Vallon, Collection L’environnement a une histoire, P.263 ISBN 979-10-267-0724-0 • Servigne Pablo et Stevens Raphaël (2015). Comment tout peut s’effondrer. Paris, Éditions du seuil. Collection Anthropocène Seuil. P.389 ISBN 978-2-02-122331-6 • Willemin Véronique (2008). Maisons sur l’eau. Paris, Éditions Alternatives, Collection Anarchitecture. ISBN. 978-286227-546-8 • Watel Franck et Basselier Paul (2017). Les Îles d’Auvergne Manuscrits d’Imago Sékoya. Éditions WB RÉCUP , La Belle Étoile. P.208 EAN : 9782918051107

Press • Et si tout s’effondrait, Socialter Hors-série n°5 – déc.2018-jan.2019. ISSN 2270-6410 • Climat : l’état d’urgence, Le un n°171 – mercredi 27 septembre 2017. ISSN 2272-969

Filmography & Video documentaries • Sardi Laurent (2018) Nomade des Mers, les escales de l’innovation, ARTE France • À la rencontre des peuples de mers Une série documentaire avec Marc Thiercelin Réalisée par Nicos Argillet, Stéphane Correa, Pierre-François Didek, Aleksandar Dzerdz, Thibault Ferie, Ludovic Fossard, Jean-Luc Guidoin, Matthieu Maillet, Julien Naar, Bruno Victor-Pujebet Coproduction : ARTE France, Découpages (2018, 20x26mn) Reynolds Kevin (1994) Waterworld (2h15) Bloomkamp Neil (2013) Elysium (1h49)

MANY THANKS TO My supervisors Ann Pham Ngoc Cuong and Sophie Clement for their availability, for their kindness to me and their patience. I also wish to thank the DSAA teaching staff for their supervision. Simon Calone for supporting me this last year and to my parents for their constant support, their help through my research and my residence on Rhé Island. Everyone that helped me reach my goals and develop my reflection, my classmates, Charlotte Andre, Marie Thérèse Andre, Nicolas Rocle, Boris Masseron, Surfrider Foundation, Pierre Boulanger, Françoise Forget, Laurent Duchesne.

Writing & Graphic Design : Nathan Belarbre Paper : Amber graphic white 120g Cover : Rives Sensation paper Fonts : Grotesque 6 and Freight Printing : Pôle Supérieur de Design de Nouvelle Aquitaine, Cité scolaire Raymond Loewy, La Souterraine, 2019 Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders of materials produced in this abstract. Any rights not acknowledged here will be acknowledged in subsequent editions if notice is given to the research student.

Towards an uncertain future What if dikes were not able to restrain the sea level rise to come ? Since thousand of years, people built their homes, their life around water and around coastal areas to provide food, commerce, exchange and travel. We were nomads societies that evolved depending on our our needs, our will our cultures. But then we became settlers who built cities. Nevertheless we disconnected from nature and forgot that our earth was a living element and that our territories were in a perpetual change. Today, catastrophes and disasters reveals our weakness to face mother nature. Everywhere in the world, communities have to deal with these natural hazards and the climate change. Peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s awareness is rising all around the world as a call to a big change in our societies. How designers can involve people in a design process to sustain life with those systemic changes. What will we protect and what will we leave behind?