Spatial Choreography

Abstract

The site of this year’s Urban Architecture graduation studio was the Friche Josaphat. This is a terrain vague of 24 hectares in the northeast of Brussels, in the neighbourhood of Schaerbeek. In the 1920’s a marshalling yard was built on the site, however when marshalling yards were not needed anymore in the 1990s, it closed. It was cleaned and covered with sand and is now overgrown with vegetation. The program I proposed is located on the northwestern border of the Friche where it is bordered by a stretch of trees, behind which lays a long row of houses.
At one point this row of buildings leaves a gap which opens up the border of the Friche. Because of this gap and the big unused space, this site has the potential for a sequence of spaces connecting the neighbourhood and the Friche with a small public square and a front square.
The motion of the sequence and the sequence of spaces sparked my interest early this year. Therefore the research that I did throughout the year focused on understanding sequences, not only in architecture, but also in other art disciplines. To understand what makes existing urban spaces with sequences work well and liveable, I explored the sequence of spaces of four sites that illustrate a sequence. These are often spaces that have evolved over time and have gradually developed into comfortable spaces to be in.
Furthermore, I researched art disciplines that use sequences such as music, dance, film and animation. In these disciplines anticipation and suspense are often created to evoke a certain feeling in the spectator. Through this research, I wanted to explore how this could be translated into architecture. This resulted in the choreography of a new sequence of spaces made of the features that I found in the different sites I analysed, as well as the findings into the creation of anticipation and suspense in other art disciplines.
This choreography ultimately resulted in the composition of a sequence of spaces in my design, which consists of a connecting street, a small public square, a front square, an entrance with a sightline, a garden on the hill and the Friche.

As Brussels is struggling with a housing crisis and many eviction problems, I chose a program that provides home and purpose for homeless people and brings the community together through gardening and farming activities. By choreographing this sequence of spaces and creating anticipation and suspense, people in need of a home and others from the neighbourhood can be attracted to the site and brought together. In that way, an intimate, human-scale, and safe space can offer comfort to diverse groups of people.