Local Identities Global Challenges
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EVER AFTER 77 Ever After: Speculations on Public Space in Iceland THOMAS FORGET University of North Carolina at Charlotte INTRODUCTION ing the first phase of the competition, and it informed both the premise and the details of our competition Iceland lies on the periphery of the civilized world. entry. When our proposal was shortlisted as a finalist Its architecture and urbanism appear normative, but in the competition, we examined the nature of build- buildings and spatial networks operate differently ing in Iceland more closely and attempted to devise there. Nature is a physical force that exerts limita- strategies that were suitable, both culturally and tions and a cultural authority that regulates social technically, to Reykjavík and Iceland. engagement. Over the past decade, overinvestment in name brand works of architecture and urban plan- The second part of the paper summarizes the objec- ning has upended the nation’s modest but sophis- tives and the findings of a recent urban design re- ticated traditions of building. Global economic and search workshop on the Reykjavík Capital Area. April cultural aspirations superseded local influences, such Arkitekter, a progressive design firm based in Oslo, as the landscape and a specific, regionally influenced Norway, conducted the workshop in conjunction with interpretation of Modernism. Then, in the wake of the Iceland Academy of the Arts between August 22 and banking crisis of 2008, the economy collapsed and September 2, 2011. The project belongs to a larger sent the practices of architecture and urban planning initiative called SCIBE (Scarcity and Creativity in the reeling. Conventional design work became scarce, Built Environment), which is funded by HERA (Hu- and as communities confronted needs normally ad- manities in the European Research Area). SCIBE dressed through construction, new methodologies of conducts research in four cities (London, Reykjavík, spatial engagement emerged as challenges to nor- Oslo, and Vienna) on how an insufficiency of re- mative practices of space making. This paper inves- sources may motivate architectural and urban acts. tigates the stark contrast between the design culture Due to the timing of the workshop in Reykjavík, the that preceded (and perhaps contributed to) the crisis conference presentation of this paper in October, and the innovative strategies that are rising from its 2011, will include materials from April Arkitekter that ashes. were unavailable in September, 2011, when these proceedings were published. The first part of the paper is a critical reflection on my participation, in 2007, in an urban design competi- As a conclusion to the paper, I will outline plans for tion for the redevelopment of central Reykjavík. With a travel studio that will bring architecture students my design partner, Jonathan F. Bell, I responded to from the United States to Iceland for a collabora- a competition brief that envisioned Reykjavík as an tive design-build project in a remote area of island. international metropolis on par with the greatest Eu- Inspired both by the pre-crisis competition and by ropean capitals. Coincidently, I had visited Iceland the post-crisis community involvement fostered by shortly before the competition was announced. My SCIBE, the design studio seeks to engage issues of preview of the nation’s architecture, urban planning, community, identity, and construction in a pedagogi- and infrastructure was an invaluable advantage dur- cal context. 78 LOCAL IDENTITIES GLOBAL CHALLENGES CITY OF SEAMS development, these references were considered as a way to mediate the potential incongruity between The commissioners of the competition to redevelop the new and the old capital. the Vatnsmýri area of Reykjavík (currently occupied by a domestic airport) sought detailed strategies to City of Seams translates the power of the geological create “a contemporary and robust urban fabric with rift at Þingvellir into an urban context. Urban seams the flexibility required for research, technology, and are the inherent discontinuities and juxtapositions knowledge based enterprises mixed with significant found in every city. Like Þingvellir, they have the po- housing, services, and residential forms.”1 The com- tential to accommodate public spaces and to gener- petition brief included unusually specific parameters ate collective meaning. In the nineteenth century, and information that provided entrants with a thor- Haussmannian planners sought to erase urban seams ough understanding of the urban and regional condi- through the homogenization of the street facade. In tions of Reykjavík. The specificity of the brief was a the twentieth century, Modern planners scarred the sign of the seriousness of its aspirations. It included city through a disregard of context and an exaggera- the results of community workshops on the objec- tion of seams. Our project seeks a middle ground. It tives of the project, as well as technical information rejects both the seamlessness of boulevard urban- on various stakeholders in the project. Unlike some ism and the severity of urban renewal. City of Seams “ideas” competitions, the Vatnsmýri competition was indulges the heterogeneity of urban life, both socially based on extensive research and on a firm belief that and formally. Social precedents include high density, Reykjavík would soon emerge as an innovative hub mixed-use urban fabrics, from the medieval cores of in a new global economy. Throughout the process, European cities to contemporary developments that the scale of the project seemed unrealistic to me. grow around transportation hubs. Formal precedents Especially since I had recently analyzed built envi- include both vernacular and pre-historic housing ty- ronments throughout Iceland, it was difficult for me pologies, such as cave dwellings and turf houses, as to imagine the realization of such an ambitious plan. well as awkward and abrupt edges that are typically Nonetheless, we followed the parameters of the brief perceived as problems, when in fact they offer us and developed a design proposal that would have solutions. Infrastructural networks, such as the geo- dwarfed the existing city of Reykjavík and trans- thermal energy pipelines that hover atop the Icelan- formed the area of the capital into an unrecognizable dic landscape, also inspire the seam strategy. megaregion. Programmatically, seams allow us to embed infra- The conceptual inspiration for the project, which we structure into densely populated environments; call City of Seams, is Þingvellir, the first significant they also shelter us from weather conditions, such work of architecture in Iceland. Stretching along the as the harsh winds that infiltrate Reykjavík during Reykjanes Ridge (the American-Eurasian Continen- the winter. Experientially, seams provide material tal Rift), Þingvellir is a geological seam that accom- richness, adventure, and unpredictability. modated the world’s first parliament in 800 A.D. The transformation of the raw site into a work of archi- The signature objective of City of Seams is to create tecture was an act of occupation, not construction. a new entrance into the capital of Iceland. Inspired The site was recognized as a special moment in the by (but not indebted to) nineteenth-century train landscape, where tribes from across the island could stations, Tengiberg (Connection Rock) is a proposed meet and devise the rules of their society. At Lög- transportation hub that punctuates a dramatic new berg (Law Rock), issues were debated and rulings arrival sequence into Reykjavík. It is conceived as were pronounced above a vast plain, in front of a the primary seam of the capital – a Þingvellir that giant shear in the landscape. At Þingvellir, the early cuts through the middle of Reykjavík. Around the citizens of Iceland beheld the eternal power of the globe, sprawl is erasing the physical integrity of ur- earth and the ephemeral strength of their commu- ban boundaries, and in the capital region of Reyk- nity. Architecture and urbanism today are rarely that javík it is becoming increasingly difficult to discern dramatic or effective. Þingvellir offered us a model precisely where the city begins. Tengiberg serves of space making that was rooted not only in the his- as a gateway for both air travelers and regional tory of the nation, but also in the culture of the land. travelers arriving by car or public transportation, Given the enormous scale of the proposed urban re- and it ensures that visitors, as well as Icelanders, EVER AFTER 79 immediately sense the physical integrity, as well tity, albeit a modest one. Ráðhúsið is a relatively as the international significance, of Reykjavík. At subtle public building, despite its Modern forms, the same time, the hub does not announce itself as which stand apart from the surrounding fabric of the focal point or a clearly definable monument. Like city, and its intrusion into Tjörnin, an artificial lake the rift in the landscape at Þingvellir, and unlike that is an iconic landmark in the city. Its elegant the nineteenth-century train stations that inspire it, concrete composition is reminiscent of the apologet- Tengiberg is a linear organization of spaces that op- ic Modernism of Tadao Ando. To complement these erates as a vibrant, multi-functional public space, understated forms, Ráðhúsið is permeable and per- permeable from all directions, both vertically and missive. It thereby dismantles one of the stalwarts horizontally. Tengiberg blurs the distinction be- of Western