I thought I would be brave and post first to get the ball rolling with the blog as its ever so empty!! !I have uploaded four images of my research background so far.
My research and focus so far for the project has been on the abandoned heritage structures located in the deep crevasses of the Valley of the Mills in Sorrento, Italy formed thousands of years by volcano eruptions thousand of years ago - that are becoming more and more frail as time passes.
The structures have failed due to industry decline tourism increase, maintenance costs and population loss and are becoming blackened and covered with decay. My research has looked into urban exploration and the fascination of the aesthetics of abandonment that today is relatively
common and this has inspired me to explore the Valley of the Mills myself, through urban exploration - accessible to the local public.
My background research has found that heritage legislation in the Sorrento area has been established but the national government lacks funding and pressure to rescue such heritage assets. Furthermore, the Soprintendenza (regional heritage department) lack materials and enthusiastic to do anything to protect such structures as knowledge is minimal across the area. My study has found over 250+ architects in the region and no design school and institutes to promote historical regeneration of such structures are available, apart from a summer school approximately 750 miles away.
My initial proposals are to propose a design Institute to promote the principles of preservation, conservation, adaptive re-use of architectural gems like the mills- that would be available to built environment professionals; architects, conservation officers, craftsmen that would enable them to learn ways to design with the buildings as well as learn the traditional building techniques that surround Sorrento for restoring buildings.
The proposed site is an abandoned 8th century flour mill in the heart of Sorrento, that lies 52 meters down on the Valley of the Mills floorbed that has now become abandoned due to the disconnection from the sea and river formed by the construction of the main Piazza Tasso in 1855 in Sorrento.
Any feedback would be great.
Thanks,
Lucy :)
Beautiful work Lucy, and a lot of it. Great to see the depth of research into the 'whys' and 'hows' as well as the 'whats', which all seems to have lead to a very convincing and grounded proposal, which I'm sure will continue to grow and develop as your research continues. Your dropbox folder dated 140831 is empty. IS it meant to be? amongst whatever else you've planned, I suggest you also start on very detailed section and plan drawings. I imagine the sections in this case will be particularly revealing. Start now - they will take a very long time to do based on all the information you have to hand, includign photos, maps, memory, etc. You might also bring in some aretfacts from the site, and begin to play around with scales and time-shifts maybe. Interpret this how you like.
ReplyDeleteHi Sam,
ReplyDeleteI am working up my site plans at the moment- they are taking a very long time. I have added all tree specimens to the plans- however I was just wondering to what extent do I need to show the algae, moss, grasses etc? Can I show for example, a ledge of shrubs as the overall shape of shrub or do I need to show each individual shrub. The bottom of the valley floor is just completely covered with thousands and thousands of individual plants.
Lucy
I'd say you can probably find beautiful ways to denote zones of different kinds of planting. Try having a look at some flora/fauna diagrams. Borrow from Natural History books! Let's make these the most beautiful drawings EVER!
ReplyDeleteand yes, they WILL take a long time, but good drawings will serve you well, not just as graphic records, but as a tracing of your knowledge of the site. You have to know it to draw it, as I'm sure you've discovered.
Could you upload the file so we can have a look?