Given the current state of the financial crisis, projects all around the city have ground to a halt. Some high profile buildings like the Spire or Waterview Hotel have come to epitomize the fantastic fall from the heights of a real estate boom. But beyond all the intangible atrocities of the derivative markets are real, concrete structures waiting to serve a purpose.
So what happens when these skeletons of buildings become the armature for new spaces? When the voids are filled with nature, people, or sculpture instead of vanilla-boxes and stock analysts? Of course all of this should be done with the minimum of financial backing. Grass-roots urbanism.
What happens when the hole left by the Spire is finally abandoned? Local artists steal chairs from outside restaurants and on snowy side streets and arrange them into a theatre-in-the-round.
Or a disoriented architect, in homage to Alvaro Siza, plugs up all the drains and creates a very deep swimming pool, reflecting the canyons of the city beyond.
Entire floors of the Waterview could house sculpture gardens. Or urban agriculture. Plug-and play apartments for the richest and poorest citizens could be inserted using shipping containers and tents to give each floor plate its own communal feel. New projects will not be presented in front of board members, but by Tweeting in haiku:
Made of Bones of so many,
Buildings lost to funds.
excellent locations to
meet and greet your friends.
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