Street Life
2022.
with Irena Bakić
Tallinn Architecture Biennale: Edible Urbanism - competition entry
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We’re proposing a multi-layered operation that would simultaneously organize life in this urban block and make it a bit wild.
one: free the streets - generate a center.
All of the parking spaces are removed from the sides of the streets and translated to a new parking megastructure in the center of the neighborhood.This move generates an incredible amount of traffic in the center of the neighborhood. The critical density creates, over time, a central public space.
two: cover the roofs
The unused planes of Laagna’s flat roofs are taken over by plants. The wild rooftop gardens are messy, big, unkept: they are here to relieve some of the tension of the precisely planned block.
three: life sets in
The street is now a territory, freshly cleaned, ready to take on new assignments.
The modules of bygone parking spaces become occupied by small pavilions that strive to provide the streets with a reimagined facade and identity. This is the metabolism of the home, of the building, of the block, and it is given a leading role in the newly conceived street life.
The greenhouses take most of the former parking spaces. The street lights are hacked to provide the right light spectrum needed to facilitate food growth. Adjacent to the food production objects are community pavilions, free to become whatever the residents need them to be.The waste pavilions reinforce the position of the existing trash containers on the streets. By giving them a slightly exaggerated form, and a designated position, they become the core of the street. The presence that these containers have transform performing simple tasks into participating in neighborhood activities.
