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Along the edge of the main Olympic site in the east end, a zone of transformation can be found between the A12 and the Lea River, taking in Hackney Wick, the Lee Navigation and Old Ford Lock. Over the past year the area has been a place of significant academic enquiry by students in London and further afield. The exposition showcases the coincidental diversity of thought and endeavour by the next generation of architects, designers and writers in time for the London Architecture Festival 2012. Organiser: Colin Priest
Participants: Architectural Association, Bartlett School of Architecture, Cambridge School of Architecture, Canterbury School of Architecture @UCA, Chelsea College of Art and Design, Greenwich University, Kingston University, Oxford Brookes University, Royal College of Art, South Bank University, Sheffield University, University of East London, University of Westminster. Overview
The prospect of urban change and the everyday negotiation of regeneration can be uniquely witnessed in Hackney Wick. Cut off by the infrastructural margins of the A12 highway, the Lea River and the Greenway, the area has become a peripheral periphery – a working island within the boundary of an event island. Significant as an influential creative urban community on the edge of Olympic transformation, it is simultaneously a curiously solitary place on the brink of irreversible change. From a fuddled urban past of fish smokeries, out-of-the-way industrial complexes and extensive consultation processes, residents await an urban renaissance and immanent initiation of legacy. As a resident the transformation of the place has been most apparent in the disruption to everyday street life and the binary consolidation of its diverse communities. It was on regular check-up walks I bumped into a number of former students coincidentally assigned the area as a theoretical site for study. With further enquiry and word of mouth a further eleven design studios were found – all unknown to each other. Percolating over the coming months a plan emerged to organise a rare exposition of sorts showcasing the work undertaken by all these different institutions in time for the London Festival of Architecture 2012. Contributing as an exposition, tabled dossiers and drawings open to the public, to a larger local discussion about how the next generation of architects and designers see this critical landscape. The designated area of enquiry sits vaguely between the Lea River inside the heart of the new Olympic site and the A12, taking in Three Mills to the south and Mabley Green to the north. Inside this area the transformation and stasis of urban renewal can be found and perhaps a motivating force for the breadth of inquisition. As this critical landscape paces towards legacy, the speed of change necessitates a sense of immediacy to enquiry, decisive opinion and representation of ideas for an alternative future. Where academe offers a space for speculation and imagination, potentials emerge that may contribute to how one envisages participation beyond the recognised status quo. Across the spectrum of experience, from year one to post-graduate study and discipline, film to architecture comes a larger challenge, how will the characteristics of this landscape remain and evolve? Wick Sesson 05: Picking up the pieces, Tuesday 3rd July 2012
'Picking up the pieces' will bring together makers and cultural producers from the Hackney Wick area exploring issues around, recycling, reuse, and the collective production of public situations. Organised by the Wick Curiosity shop, supported by publicworks and r-urban. Speakers included: Bruce Ingram (artist), Martino Gamper (product designer), Takeshi Hayatsu (architect), Assemble (architect), public works (art/architecture). The exposition was hosted by Sugarhouse Studios with the generous support of Assemble CIC at Sugarhouse Studios, Blueprint Magazine, and London Legacy Development Corporation. |
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