Urban reality; informing the project: An Environmental Center in the Houston Ship Channel

In the introduction to his research on "The Contemporary City" Rem Koolhaas observes, "the unavoidable fragmentation of the existing city, has led to a displacement of the centre of gravity of urban dynamics from the city centre to the urban periphery."$\sp1$ City peripheries now...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Currimjee, Salim Carrim
Other Authors: Pope, Albert H.
Format: Others
Language:English
Published: 2009
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1911/13559
Description
Summary:In the introduction to his research on "The Contemporary City" Rem Koolhaas observes, "the unavoidable fragmentation of the existing city, has led to a displacement of the centre of gravity of urban dynamics from the city centre to the urban periphery."$\sp1$ City peripheries now display common characteristics: an apparently erratic juxtaposition of seemingly incompatible building functions and types. Here the unknown can be rethought; there is no model. Opportunities for experimentation present themselves in fields of tension between empty spaces and isolated bodies which are not subordinate to any anachronistic concept of order, but accept separateness and divergence.$\sp2$ The forces which shape the city of our times should be reinterpreted as the forces which generate the content and expression in our architecture. The objective is not to camouflage the unresolved situation; but to deal with the City as it is.