Design Ethos and Interests

a typical urban pocket in Paris, summer 2010

In recent years, my core focus in architecture has been to contemplate on the meaning and function of existing characters of the environment we inhabit in and to establish new relationships between them and the everyday life of the contemporary society. 

I've had the privilege in working closely with many refurbishment/restoration projects in the UK - learning technical ways in which we can start to bring life to forgotten/poorly maintained/destroyed architectural elements from the past.  Subtle adjustments and re-instatment of existing characters could add so much joy/sense of place to the space and insertion of contemporary language could provide new meanings and intents.

My largest speculative project to date, 'The Meaning of a Constructed Landscape' was an exploration on defining the 'constructed landscape' we exist in and how architecture become vehicles in creating evolving relationship with the users of the environment.

Depiction of a 'Cognitive Lace Market of Nottingham', The Meaning of a Constructed Landscape, 2008

The term ' constructed landscape' refers to a world we live in - it clarifies the relationship between landscape and nature. Where man assume that beautiful landscape consist of nature, it could be argued that things we perceive as nature nowadays are man-made and are results of cultivation. To create a memorable landscape in contemporary environment, we need to accept and contemplate on the ready-made sceneries and seek for meanings attached to such constructed landscape. The overall objective of the project was to design architecture with meanings and functions that has its place in the constructed landscape we exist in and allow the interventions become tools in an urban setting that fulfills the transformation of shifting our perception of a city-scape. 

Fragments of architectural interventions were designed for a typical city context of Nottingham. These would become 'urban furniture' pieces that emerge in existing environment as forms of architectural adjustments and additions that convert individual urban spaces into places with new meanings and intent. They may draw observers into certain landscapes and originate various journeys for them to navigate through the city in new ways. As a result, particular places of activities become part of the memory of city landscape and overtime become more familiar. Contemplation into such constructed landscape enables people to have a personal understanding of what the 'authenticity' of the city is.

details of 'interventions' to follow...

-lenga910