Environmental Flows

Site Analysis

Design Question

We chose Devka beach as our site because the new construction practices of the promenade have largely emerged from ignoring the interconnected flows between all the life forms and their ecologies, there was a  disconnect and it was in a state of alienation, void of any life or activity. It was an active zone for many human and animal activities such as hawkers and shacks which have been forced out. As an effect the local economies and everyday life have suffered an impact, one of them being physically and visually cutting down the experience of the beach from the small shops and life on the Devka beach road. The site was also covered with building debris. The blur, dynamic edge condition that merges the city life, Saru tree buffer and beach has been alienated from each other. Even though the beach is a public space it has become obsolete of any overlaps which were existing before. How can the hard-edged boundary of a public space be reimagined as a permeable space to restore the connectivity between them? Can the remains of the past be used to recreate the life and experience of the beach?

Program

The basic idea is to house new experiences and connections from older ones, reusing debris and new materials to build memories of a flow that used to exist so that people can engage. To create a dynamic experience, not a static one. To allow design to embody a certain degree of movement, flow.  To reinstate connectivity and patching up the old and new by rethinking the existing aquarium structure in an ecological manner which would be a much more softer response. 

Design Iterations

Final Design

The existing structure on site was used to house the aquarium brick mound which was pouring out of it to invoke a sense of mystery. A marine biome was added to give the viewers an experience of the marine life that existed there prior to the new promenade. It is an attempt to create a new physical organic connect from road to road, a public thoroughfare which makes the beach easily accessible. The deliberately done contours and step seating generate an experience of the sea waves and give a sense of being washed away or flowing smoothly through the site.