ARTery_A Practice of Space Sealant

Abstract

Driven by the curiosity to explore how I interact with a given space and what makes me interact with it this way, my journey starts with a misinterpretation of the practice of space in Mar Mikhael. In a context where the physical reconstruction of the strip is taking place, I started thinking that the spatial reconstruction of the strip goes way beyond just a physical one. In order to explore the matter I decided to examine the shoreline cluster located in Mar Mikhael right at the edge between the port and the city. The site specific revival strategy consisted in turning the cluster into an adapted artistic hub that would be enhancing its past function while embracing what has become of it: ARTery. The project unfolded to become an example of how representation methods become an architectural design tool and answers the question of whether we can replicate the organic urban setting of the strip by using a structure that would hold the old while building the new. ARTery is not about preservation but more about readaptation, it is about saving the last bits of buildings by looking at the existing architecture not from a nostalgic perspective but as something that can be manipulated and that can be intervened on.