Detroit unreal estate agency

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The Detroit Unreal Estate Agency is an organization that monitors the public plans, personal and artistic initiatives and other events in the derelict area of central Detroit. It has American and Dutch integrants and sponsoring. It features many rundown buildings and vacant lots,  role model neighborhoods of modernist planning,  urban poetry and ‘un’real estate offered at the price of  a mere $3432.12

http://detroitunrealestateagency.blogspot.com

“Detroit Unreal Estate Agency will produce, collect and inventory information on the ‘unreal estate’ of Detroit: that is, on the remarkable, distinct, characteristic or subjectively significant sites of urban culture. The project is aimed at new types of urban practices (architecturally, artistically, institutionally, everyday life, etc) that came into existence, creating a new value system in Detroit.
The project is an initiative by architects Andrew Herscher and Mireille Roddier, curator Femke Lutgerink and Partizan Publik’s Christian Ernsten and Joost Janmaat.
In collaboration with the Dutch Art Institute and the University of Michigan, generously funded by the Mondriaan Foundation.”

Abandoned Michigan Central station, 2004

Lot 13015 Back

Abandoned property

Russell Yard

Short documentary on the idealist neighborhood Lafayette Park, Detroit, designed by Mies van der Rohe and Hilberseimer

Nova Detroit SJC, Brazil

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In the industrial and technological city of São José dos Campos, State of São Paulo, Brazil, there is a neighborhood called Jardim Nova Detroit. Like the ‘old’ Detroit, Nova Detroit is inhabited by industrial workers of the General Motors plant nextdoor.

The difference is, even with the late automobile crisis, that ‘old’ Detroit has been in  a phase of abandonment for decades, while the new Detroit is still growing. What happens when GM also starts cutting jobs in Brazil, no one knows, but São José dos Campos seems to have plenty of alternatives to the automobile industry.

Back to the land below sea level

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After more than five years in Brazil, I have recently moved back to the Netherlands. For the moment I´m living in Rotterdam. The Projetos Urbanos website and email will continue to function normally.

Port of Rotterdam

North-South connection of Rotterdam over the river Maas

New mixed use developments on the south bank

Zeche Zollverein revisited

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Zeche Zollverein is part of the greater regional plan Emscher Park for an obsolete industrial region in the German Ruhrgebiet. The plan is supposed to attract leisure functions, culture, innovative companies and design firms to the green postindustrial setting. The Zollverein project, with master plan by OMA, is still running with lack of funding. The design academy with a brand new building by SANAA went bankrupt for lack of students. On the one hand parts of the complex, such as the Kohlenwäsche and the public space in front of it, are being beautifully renovated for cultural events and museum use. On the other hand, most tourists seem to prefer the rundown parts of the Kokerei, dusty, rusty and derelict.

Map of the premises: the Coking Plant, Mining Shaft XII and Shaft 1/2/8

New walkways through the main railway yard of the coal mine

The Coking Plant (Kokerei)

The Coking Plant (Kokerei)

The Coking Plant (Kokerei)

Mining carts in the old workshop


Short video impression of the complex by Mark van der Schaaf (2006)


Read more:
www.projetosurbanos.com.br/2007/05/13/zollverein-essen-germany/

Building for Bouwkunde

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This week the results of the open ideas competition for the new architecture faculty of the TU Delft were presented. During the ceremony at the Nai in Rotterdam minister of culture and science Plasterk handed out the prizes. Liesbeth van der Pol, head of the jury, presented the 8 nominees. All projects are displayed in Nai Rotterdam (Gallery 3) from 15 march to 7 june 2009.

Projetos Urbanos was among the projects included in the so-called longlist of 50 projects in the second phase of the juration. In total 466 projects were evaluated.

Read more:
Nai – Building for Bouwkunde competition
Archined – the nominations

Model of the old building, displayed at the Nai exhibition

Project: Educational Landscape
Architecture: Merten Nefs and Vanessa Grossman
Company: Projetos Urbanos
Year: 2008
Gross floor area: 60.000 square meters
Evaluation: jury selection for longlist

“The Bouwkunde site is located at the transitional space between the urban and rural zone of Delft. The project is conceived as superposition of both scales. The ground floor is treated as a patchwork of activities, which are distributed in parcels and can continuously be redistributed and appropriated by the Faculty’s users. These parcels are covered by a flexible greenhouse structure.
Three serving buildings emerge from this landscape channeling the flow of people, the way anthills do, towards the studios. These “anthills” are in their singular form a pile of earth and vegetation with excavated service chambers.
The studio slab and the office tower represent an important contribution to the existing skyline of the city.”