Architectural Association School of Architecture
Sofia Croso Mazzuco
A RETREAT FROM MECHANICAL LIVING
Spring Semester Programme London 2011
Different technologies are now deeply inserted in our daily needs in order to keep the fast paste of the contemporary city.
Upon depending on these various technologies, communication between people is becoming fragmented and the citizen, even in the middle of thousand of people, becomes isolated.
We are machines reliant on other machines, and never reall fully aware of the environment around us.
The busy citizen lives a routine that is now mechanical and defined by repetitive and bland events.
The life of big cities like London is the dream destination for many people who are looking for better opportunities related to work, study and knowledge. Nevertheless, this big search for the metropolis makes of it a space of high density, competitiveness, traffic, polution, between other issues that, sumed up, lessen the life quality.
Isolated Bodies: The Fast Pace of Living in Big Cities
The fast paste of the contemporary living is also characterized by eating habits that are reduced to short breaks during the working routine.
The ritual of preparing food and eating is now obsolete.
Fast eating
A mass of isolated people
Technology contributing to isolation
Many spaces of the big cities are perceived as a left over when they are not eqquiped with additional infra-structure. It is essential to engage our routine with natural elements, using the natural ground to host activities that are intrinsic in our everyday life and needs.
The investigation of my project is not to radically exclude technology from the contemporary life but instead to create an Architecture which is more passive than assertative. In this way, the space would not be complete in itself but will serve to mediate between people and nature
An Approach To Nature
The elements of light, water and vegetation would also be ,at times, the inititators of spaces where the citizen might inhabit.
Infrastructure for Natural Events:
My project is based on a minimum level of design which is meant to act as infrastructure tha allows the invasion of natural elements.
Blending the Retreat With the Environment
Via floor and ceiling, the retreat takes the natural elements of sky, water and vegetation and blends them all to create a space that relies on an interdependant relation between people and environment.
Nature Invading the Infrastructure of the Retreat
Capturing sky, water and vegetation
Architecture as a rigid envelope
Rain water is collected from the cell and is directed to the two lower floors of the retreat where it will be distributed to attend the different activities.
Capturing Water
1 st floor: Water is distributed
Sewer cover in London
Ground floor: water directed to allotments
On ground floor the water is used to grow collective allotments, while it also is directed to the existing piping network of London.
2 nd floor: Water is collected
London sewer covers were taken as the departing point for the design of water collectors in the retreat.
Looking up (9.0m above ground level) Looking down (9.0m above ground level) Looking down (2.0 m above ground level)
The cell is the space for a single individual. It is almost as a religious space.
The aperture to the ceiling is the only connection to the outside world. Not with the noisy world of the city but with
The cell being the main and essential space of the retreat is also the space that with its architectural elements collect light and water that are directed to the allotments below.
Section and axos of the overall retreat
The Cell
The Ceiling
The sky is framed and invades the individual cell through an aperture to the ceiling.
The retreat is articulated in three main levels. The hierarchy of spaces ranges from the lower level with more communal space to the highest level where the space is intimate and isolated.
The Cell: Second Level
The retreater is now exposed to the nature also by the presence of four individual allotments at ground level.
The house extension provides an opportunity to be outside and at the same time in a private space.
Ground Floor
First Floor at 2.50m
Second Floor at 5.40m
The Room Retreat
The retreat with the open rooms at first level extend the enclosed home to the outside environment.
House Extension : First Level
Ground Floor
The access to all levels is from the city and you move from the collective space at the ground level to the isolated cell at the highest level.
On ground floor, the main space is the communal kitchen open to the city. At the first level there are only some common services, while at the first floor the monastery is open only to the sky.
Second Floor at 5.40m
First Floor at 2.50m
The Monastery
The average time for retreating is one month.
City Studio
The individual studio is a one week retreat that offers a chance to escape the rigid routine of work.
Here the retreater has a space where he can work and breathe fresh air while vulnerable to the environment of nature.
Ground Floor Second Floor at 5.40mFirst Floor at The2.50mIndividual
The Living Room to the City
The space on first floor is purely functional, while at the second floor the cell instead of being completely isolated, it is partially exposed to the neighboured cell.
On the ground level, the open living room create a continuos space with the city and with the allotments.
Ground Floor Second Floor at 5.40mFirst Floor at 2.50m
This is a retreat for one night.
The Allotment : Ground Level
Transition Borders
The daily routine of the retreater is now dependant on the elements of nature, since the food is grown in the Technologyallotments.isnotplaying a big role anymore, a fact that directs people to making use of the natural resources which are spontaneosuly present.
The Differerent Retreats in the City
The different reatreats are now organized in between the city, sometimes connected to the existing infra structure and sometimes isolated.
The different configurations of retreats offer the citizen a place to stay imune from the fast rhythm and in silence without having to be away from the city.