Arrival Lobby
In response to these debates, FABRICations + Bureau LADA, in collaboration with René Boer from failed architecture, aim to create a special social zone in Amsterdam where, through experimental policies and speculative design, a space of arrival for these migrants could be carved out, spurring interaction between the newcomers and the current inhabitants. But how to define an ‘open city’? What resources can make newcomers a dynamic urban class? And how can design help absorbing incoming flows without developing into an economic toy for exploitation? As part of the international social housing festival 2017, this research has taken the wittenburg area in amsterdam as a case study examining the possibilities of the densification of this residential area by merging new social housing and working typologies with existing public buildings, actors and agents.
The outcome is a social zone where refugees have special legal permissions to operate and actively participate in the urban socio-economic environment. Within the zone, the new socio-spatial elements would be densifying the existing tissue, connecting and enriching existing programs with 50% new working and living units. Spatial frames, designed for progress and able to be filled in by their users, stimulate interaction and new forms of co-living. This basic structure forms the base for further infill throughout time. All frames present basic features and the same material, carrying the ability to be actively engaged.
Equipped with the right political and architectural infrastructure, Wittenburg could become a unique welcoming ‘red carpet’ for Amsterdam’s new arrivals. Not a closed area of exclusion but an openly accessible area for experimentation where self-building and new social policies result in new forms of collective, affordable housing and shared working environments. Empowering asylum seekers to make their waiting time more useful for themselves and for the city, allowing undocumented refugees to access housing and work opportunities, allowing companies, universities and institutions to provide opportunities for newcomers beyond existing restrictions, stimulating each arrival to let their talents blossom, for their own and the city’s benefit.