Narratives #1

Abstract

We have selected seven contributions for this issue of Spool, four from the Eastern Mediterranean basin (Istanbul, Beirut, Acre and Jaffa) and three from Atlantic Europe (Bodø, Matosinhos and Gafanha da Nazaré).

Roula El Khoury and Paola Ardizzola address the post-civil war reconstruction of Beirut in Lebanon and reveal how neoliberal models of development resulted in a generic city.

Adem Erdem Erbas uses the Istanbul port heritage area in Turkey to showcase how GIS helps to consider underground cultural inventory from a historic landscape perspective within the framework of the conservation plans.

Ana Jayone Yarza Pérez explores the potential of adaptive reuse evaluation procedure in the Old City of Acre, Israel, as a means to deal with development and gentrification in this World Heritage site.

Komal Potdar explores the historical evolution of the old town, cultural geography, and the current state of exclusion and gentrification in Jaffa, Israel. She underlines the need for discourse on socio-spatial analysis and assessment for decision-making processes for urban heritage design.

Diego Inglez de Souza and Ivo Pereira de Oliveira reconnect architectural history with social and industrial accounts as a strategy for understanding the relationship between infrastructure, fishing, and urbanisation by studying the emblematic case of Matosinhos, Portugal.

André Tavares seeks to trace the links between fluctuations in the natural cod resources, the technologies used by fishermen to catch and process the fish, and the development of coastal landscapes and the urban form of the fishing port Gafanha da Nazaré, Portugal.

And finally, Fatma Tanis uses an interview with architect Daniel Rosbottom from DHDR to provide insight into situated architecture in port cities by addressing a library and concert hall project realised in Bodø, Norway.