After the final review of Housing Alternative Project, I spent free time watching a cute animated movie “Bee Movie.” Though it is an animated comedy film, it pointed out an important hypothesis that if there is no insect pollinating honey, the chain of the entire ecological cycle will be destroyed. Whilst, Einstein had said, “If…
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Restructuring of the world economy and the process of global industrial production centers shifting in 1970s – 1980s have become a reason to search for new ways of use the large-scale engineering structures, both in cities and beyond. There is an understanding of industrial sites as historical and cultural heritage. “Rotermann CITY” (“Rotermanni kvartal”), Tallinn,…
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Detroit got the nickname ‘Motor city’ when it was the centre of the American automotive industry. However, due to the decline of its dominated automotive industry as well as white flight, Detroit has suffered from dramatic population loss, economic decline and urban blight since the 1950s and announced its bankruptcy in 2013. A variety of…
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This Tuesday, we finally finished the Housing Alternatives module, which enhanced our understanding of current housing forms in the UK, like custom-build, co-housing, modern methods of construction, future homes and so on. But one missing alternative among all is social housing. I happened to visit an exhibition, named “A Home for All”, held by the…
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Hi Sophie, really like the scope of your research as I find a lot of our work when it comes to designing for the future, needs this standpoint to learn from the past. I totally agree with your points made and it was a shame that such a promising concept and programme was somewhat ill-fated….
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Following on from my last post, we continue with the theme of urban renewal and reclamation of abandoned spaces, in this post we will discuss The Baltic Triangle, an award-winning Cultural Cluster development set in the heart of Liverpool City Centre named one of the coolest places to live in 2017. Image: The Sunday Times…
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The success of New York’s Highline has inspired a new wave of urban renewal projects and sparked imaginative discussion on how we can best tap into unused and derelict spaces. Amongst these discussions an interesting concept emerged that stood in stark contrast to the elevation of the Highline, that is; We have a highline, why…
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Affordable housing plays an important role in achieving social stability as it unites people of different socio-economic, educational and cultural backgrounds, which promotes diversity and reduce racial tension and discrimination. Public housing in Singapore, also called HDB flat, is one of the most successful public housing programmes in the world. While many other Asian countries…
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Thank Sophie very much for sharing this article with us. From Jan Gehl’s books or articles, we can see that he is a derivative of a pedestrian or bicycle city, and he has always advocated sustainable travel. For example, Copenhagen and Venice. This reminds me of previous reports that the City Hall of London, the…
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Hi, Laura! I feel so excited that I know more about the tactile paving, also called Tenji blocks, after reading your blog. Tenji blocks are designed for visually impaired people those are unable to move around independently without any guides (DETR, 1998). It is one of the useful strategies towards urban universal design and has…
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