Shanghai's Rooftop : Plateau, 2013
Placemaking intervention in Shanghai, China
For Central Saint Martins and Tongji University
Collaborators: Luca Ponticelli, Manasi Pophale and Cedric Van Paris, Jessica Njoo, Angela Mathis, Chloe, Anna, Aixi
China has been rapid construction in the past several decades, while most of the cities and spaces created are described mainly as short-sighted makeshifts, and the traditional spaces of Chinese human interactions are somewhat lost.
Recently, issues like creative industry, recreating urban heritage, and grassroots movements have risen in design professions, and thoughtful conception of design using curatorial techniques and placemaking strategies might serve as an answer to those pressing issues.
A one month workshop between students from the Narrative Environments course and the Tongji University, looked at these case studies and a real place to explore how design and placemaking strategy can be positioned within a contemporary Chinese context. Operational approaches, were discussed through the workshop, which showed how creative placemaking brings together precisely the constellation of residents, designers, and stakeholders that makes urban change happen; and showed how art and design-driven placemaking depends on a deep engagement with the design disciplines to catalyze the public realm.
China has undergone rapid urbanisation in the last years, adding to public space pockets of unused non-places, 2016
Shanghai, China, 2016
'The Plateau is a narrative space intervention located on the roof of the D&I center of Tongji University. Developed simultaneously with two other locations ('The Wall' and 'The Angry Birds Park'), the aim of the project was to re-activate the space by encouraging its use and facilitate social interaction through its unnoticed . It is necessesary to allow a space to develop a history itself by promoting student's self expression, make them own the space in their own personal way. This slowly grows an identity for the space itself produced by the multiple faces and identities of its users: the students of the D&I center.
Intersticial spaces at Shanghais new developments, Tongji University, 2016
The Plateau invited students from the Tongji University to paint an intervention at the rooftop of a study centre, where white idea clouds invited for reflection, 2016
Definition: In geology and earth science, a plateau is an area of highland, usually consisting of relatively flat terrain. Plateaus can be formed by a number of processes, such as the erosional processes of glaciers on mountain ranges, leaving them sitting between the mountain ranges. The city is made of skyscrapers. These are the mountain chaines, the roof is a plateu in the valley of Shanghai. The plateau shows the identity of Tongji to the neighborhood, it has a flexibility that makes the space changing with the different users and gives freedom to reconsider the edges of their expressions.
The workshop look at these case studies and a real place to explore how design and placemaking strategy can be positioned within a contemporary Chinese context, operational approaches, will be discussed through the workshop, which will show how creative placemaking brings together precisely the constellation of residents, designers, and stakeholders that makes urban change happen; and will show how art and design-driven placemaking depends on a deep engagement with the design disciplines to catalyze the public realm.