Exhibition: Aging Dragons

New updates available about The Boring City research project (a project I started last year together with architect and friend Inge Goudsmit). After various publications and lectures by Inge in december and january, we were invited to contribute some of our materials to a very exciting exhibition that kicks off next month in Seoul, connected to the ‘Beyond Big Plans’ symposium for urban planners: ‘Aging Dragons’.

It’s an exhibit about post-growth prospects of the well-developed Asian cities Seoul, Singapore, Taipei, Tokyo and Hong Kong. Our part will focus on the effects of the boring city and hyper-efficiency in Hong Kong’s housing estates like social distance, segregations and lack of upward mobility. We’re working on the panels as we speak. Keep you posted. And… if you happen to be in Seoul… take a snapshot for me:).

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Summer Projects #6: MONU Article / Inforgrahpics

I wrote about the Boring City Project before, remember? It’s a research project on Hong Kong’s housing estates that I’m doing with Inge Goudsmit since we’re both interested in topics at the intersection of architecture and psychogeography.

This summer we heard that our proposal for a big article in MONU (an international architectural magazine) was accepted. So we re-worked our data into an article about the relationship between housing estates and indoor urbanism (the overall-theme for the october-issue).

Hong Kong is a dual city; a metropolis where numerous parallel indoor worlds co-exist alongside the traditional, intense and vibrant city. It was fascinating to dive into the history of why/where this urban fabric originated and how it influences Hong Kong’s citizens.

This is one of the infographics that we included in our set of images.

The Boring City

Yesterday I had a wonderful day working on the Housing Estate research project I’m doing with Inge Goudsmit, a very talented architect (OMA Hong Kong). Our key-question: how does the homogeneous typology of housing estates in Hong Kong influence their demography. Are estates and the so called ‘new towns’ simply repetitions of functional containers, filled with one-of-a-kind residents or is there more to it.  What will an area lose in the process of reaching hyper-efficiency? And is there a connection between living in a ‘boring city’ and our psychological state of mind? Why are there for example a lot more suicides in one estate compared to another?

I find it fascinating to gain data on this intersection of architecture and psychogeography. And of course, to find out more about the history of housing estates and (the very well-organised) social housing schemes in Hong Kong. Keep you posted on the results:).