F.a.U.L.T. : For an Urban Landscape Transformation

Add To Collection

Other Projects by 1/9d

Add To Collection

Harlem R.I.D.G.E.

F.a.U.L.T. : For an Urban Landscape Transformation

Firm

1/9d

Type

Residential › Private House Multi Unit Housing
Commercial › Office Retail
Hospitality + Sport › Hotel Restaurant
Cultural › Gallery Cultural Center Memorial
Government + Health › Community Center
Landscape + Planning › Public Park
Transport + Infrastructure › Parking

The design process starts with the main idea of the “F.a.U.L.T.”, an artificial gesture enable to establish a sort of microclimate environmental eco system –Mediterranean Shrubland- where built and open space, nature and artifice can delineate a process of integrate and balanced reactions.
The fault is a fracture which breaks the superficial continuity of the ground to reveal and involve its underground structure, the unknown and mysterious power of the earth, that’s a strong element considering tectonic and geography of the Island and the ancient tradition of the “Nuraghe” as well.
The specificity of the selected site, a sort of “ribbon” constrained between hilly surrounding, brings in the design proposal this geological and morphological element as potentiality to create new spaces with and through it. The main central space, gradually engraved from North-East to South-West, opens to the understanding of the complexity of the layered ground and clarifies, through the gap, the space of “between”, tension and possibility of dialogue of the two opposite sides, which are different in terms of morphology, program, identity, even though clear and precise are the cross interactions: the new links, physical as well as visual and geometrical, established through the design strategies. The bridges, breaking the assigned thresholds of the selected site, are enabled to insert and connect the design area in its extended contest, underlining main directions, textures and modularity of it. Two pedestrian bridges and a main road for car circulation, related to building textures coming from the existing surrounding, represent the main cross system, while a more articulated and “natural” one along the “F.a.U.L.T.” mostly pedestrian and for bicycles, follows the longitudinal direction connecting the several episodes related and structured by the fault itself, which in this way becomes an “eco-armature”, the spine that articulates, divides and connects simultaneously the several spaces around it. The two sides of this armature have different identity, being the South one along via G. Bosco defined by a manipulation of the existing contour lines in and around the site, in other words, by the fluidity of the tectonic structure; while the North side, along via S. Pertini, is determined by the rigid geometries of the urban settlements closer located to the site, by their directionality and measurements, which originate balconies and public terraces, opened towards the green of the fault, where there is also a water path. Beyond that, still on the South side along via G. Bosco, is the soft manipulation of the new green “duplicated ground level”, which contains service and parking spaces.
Related to the “F.a.U.L.T.”, and ending it almost at the South corner of the design area, is a sank piazza with a pool in it, which is the lowest point of the project due also to the topography around. This is where all water from the crick, which collects also rain water and humidity created and protected by the new microclimate system determined by the wild Mediterranean vegetation in the fault, get purified in the re programmed existing building, and redistributed to the new built settlement: a sustainable integrated system is created. Going more west of it, there is a series of preserved building for public or semipublic programs as sports and related facilities on the North side, while commercial and tertiary programs are on the South side.
Going towards North-East of the sunk piazza, along the sides of the “F.a.U.L.T.”, are the main developing areas: a mostly residential one the North side where are the two row of differently sized housing settlement and the system of public terraces; a mostly tertiary, mixed uses and services (commercial business and parking) on the South one. Here the two selected existing building textures are enable to define their volumetric solutions through folding and cuts. The same mix of civic combined to residential uses is on the extreme Nort-West corner of the area along via Marongiu, where the F.a.U.L.T. starts with its water tower, pedestrian, bicycle and car paths. While the water and the pedestrian paths will develop within the fault itself, the bicycle and car ones will follow the Southern edge of the fault, exposed to that in the case of the bicycle path, mostly underground for the car one, which reaches the underground parking system underneath the area of the main public buildings, with exit along the same road but at the opposite side of the entrance in the “F.a.U.L.T.”