DPU Summer Lab

Bucharest and Rome Workshops

Bucharest Workshop: 22-27 August
Rome Workshop: 5-10 September

The Development Planning Unit of the Bartlett Faculty at UCL is proud to announce the inaugural DPU summerLab: a short certificate course developed as a natural extension of the MSc Building & Urban Design in Development (BUDD) course at UCL.

This new initiative seeks to establish a unique rotating platform for in situ immersion and experimentation in contested and transient urban environments where the boundaries of spatial agency are actively tested, hinging upon critical analysis and spatial knowledge development. Drawing on the extensive resources of the DPU in collaboration with local partners, DPU summerLab leverages the reality of the city as a laboratory for developing socially responsive design measures that provoke, stimulate, strategize, and reconsider the role of designers in furthering spatial justice.

Facilitated by DPU staff in collaboration with local partners (see list above), DPU summerLab leverages the reality of the city as a laboratory for developing socially responsive design measures that provoke, stimulate, strategize, and reconsider the role of designers in furthering spatial justice.The fee per participant is: £600 for the Bucharest workshop, £600 for the Rome workshop, or £1000 for both. These fees do not include travel or accommodation, so each participant needs to cover these costs.The deadline for completed applications is now Monday, 18 July 2011. Once offered a place, further instructions will be provided regarding the full payment of fees, additional logistics, and visa information.DPU summerLab is a natural extension of the MSc Building & Urban Design in Development (BUDD) course in the Development Planning Unit.

BUCHAREST  - Spaces of Unrest

22-27 August, 2011

The recent history of Bucharest is one of placated pressures, where the struggle of powers has always been softened by a certain inertia of the political apparatus: the urban environment we can see today tells its story of failed attempts and discontinued wills, and is a highly fragmented one. Between 1982 and 1986 it underwent profound changes when President Ceausescu ordered the demolition of great portions of the urban fabric to make space for monumental buildings, which would celebrate the communist regime’s magnificence. Nevertheless, even the totalitarian regime was unable to achieve its aims thoroughly, and traces of this unfinished operation are still visible today: neoclassical axes remain incomplete, empty areas dot the city centre, urban landscapes inevitably disconnected.

Following the regime’s fall, these interstitial spaces were colonised by the poorest strata of the population, a multitude of people that could not afford renting a place and set aside of the vast population inhabiting the vast complexes of social housing, creating the basis of today’s conflictual city life.

The current process of transformation is forgetful of the many realities of the urban whole: real estate speculation has replaced urban design and planning is just conducive of an increased economic activity, further widening the gap between the wealthiest elites and a multitude of urban poor. As authorities’ aspire to give international touristic exposure to the city centre and to drive powerful flows of capital toward areas object of regeneration projects, many inhabitants are forced to leave.

In this context of chaotic growth, nonetheless, planners, urban designers and members of the civil society are trying to raise up their voices: a pact for Bucharest has been signed up three years ago to look for an alternative urban strategy, but the path is still long. Bucharest summerLab will try to unpack the complexities of the current urbanism challenges in the city, and to interpret the latency and the potential of contested spaces in this context. The participants will hear a multitude of different voices (community based organisations, planners, NGOs, politicians) in a continuous interactive workshop run on streets and in peculiar spaces, where the summerLab will conceive a new Manifesto for Bucharest’s urban transformation.

ROME - Occupation city
5-10 September 2011

(This programme has been devised with our local coordinators but may still change due to logistical issues)

Currently there are nearly sixty squat-occupied spaces throughout Rome, previously abandoned buildings that are now inhabited by communities of both Italians and immigrants who cannot afford renting a house. Their network is administered by highly politicised organisations often in conflict with each other: in spite of the lack of a common vision, the occupations have often been successful and are now putting forward a new model of resistant urbanism. Their network keeps growing and the oldest ones are starting to be integrated in the surrounding areas.

Rome summerLab will analyse the potentialities of these spaces working at these two different scales. Firstly, a particular focus will be on designing collective spaces that can contribute to re-connecting these urban fragments to the surroundings, enabling a positive interaction with the city as a whole. Four significant squat-occupied spaces will be visited:

-  P.F., a building originally conceived to host armed forces and then ten years ago squatted by a very heterogeneous community of migrants: its central location contrasts with a very low permeability that renders its presence almost invisible in a very dense and lively area;

-  2 occupations as part of the Action movement, where the communities have opened up the spaces creating a great interaction with the surroundings through events and services provision;

-  Metropoliz, two dismissed factories occupied two years ago by the group called BPM (Metropolitan Precarious Blocks), a community of immigrants and a Roma community, for the first time integrated in an occupied space.

At the same time, participants will work on the functioning of the whole network, understanding its present strengths and weaknesses and its future critical opportunities.

The occupations will be visited in the first three days of workshop (along with a few important example of social housing in Rome, including Corviale, a one kilometer long building often cited as the symbol of the wrong housing strategies carried on by the government in the 80s): students will meet the squatter communities and other stakeholders and will try to interpret their aspirations and to devise strategies for their future emancipation.

A series of lectures on the current situation in Rome will be held at the Faculty of Architecture and in the occupations themselves, by academics and squatters. The presence of Francesco Careri will be certainly important to try an alternative reading of the present and future of these spaces and of the possible interaction of the students/practitioners with the communities: on the third day Metropoliz will be reached through atransurbance, a long walk through the empty spaces of that portion of the city, where the students will meet adifferent Rome, culminating with the encounter with the Metropoliz’ reality.

MORE INFORMATIONS AND CONTACTS:
www.dpusummerlab.com
www.ucl.ac.uk/dpu
To apply please e-mail your CV (with images if desired) and the application form to Andrew Wade (andrew.wade@ucl.ac.uk).