San Polo 3082, Venezia
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Democratic living against urban siege
Durban - shortlisted
The Corner between Ingcuce Rd. and Johannes Nkosi St. is a place characterized by a double urban dimension. Two sides of the area point a part of the city marked by a complex overlapping infrastructures, and by a utterly absence of public spaces. Otherwise, the other two sides point toward an inner street: a minor urban protected pattern, where its human dimension represents the fulcrum of the local social life. The building we propose is thought as a huge defence machine. It is a sort of arena that roll up around the main daily living social space, a free-to-the-inhabitants-use inner courtyard combined with a public washing pool and signed by a change of material of the pavement. Externally it appears like a fortified tower with a few openings and, a series of vaults of the roof protect the façade from the rainfall.