introduction

Informalism is the online presence of an international research project, 'working with the informal, learning from the informal', which seeks to explore the way architects and other urban practioners engage with the the informal city, the city as built by people themselves. The project has been jointly funded by the NSW Architects Registration Board through the Byera Hadley Travelling Scholarship and the University of Melbourne Asialink Centre through the Dunlop Asia Fellowship.

According to recent international estimates more than 900 million people are living in informal settlements (slums, shantytowns, favelas, poblaciones etc.) worldwide . That translates to almost 1 in 3 city dwellers who are housing themselves without access to basic services or secure ownership of land. These informal settlements are a massive and growing urban phenomenon that architects must come to terms with if we hope to be of relevance to the city and its inhabitants. We must acknowledge and seek to ameliorate the hardship and exclusion faced by people living in these conditions. We must also recognise and learn from the ingenuity, resourcefulness and cooperation manifested in the building of such environments.

The aim of the research is two-fold.

1. To learn techniques of engagement and collaboration practiced by architects and other urban practitioners working with marginalised communities in informal settlements.

2. To gain an understanding of the dynamics at work in the creation and development of informal settlements and how these dynamics can inform the shaping of settlements and cities more broadly, even in the so-called developed world.

I seek to achieve this by engaging with a selection of communities of informal settlers and the urban practitioners who work with them (architects, planners, grassroots and advisory community organizations, academics, artists and government agencies). I hope to learn from the integration of many different disciplines and especially from the communities themselves. I have chosen three distinct and specific sites to carry out this research.

Site 1. Thailand (6 months): I will work with CASE Studio (Community Architects for Shelter and Environment), a group of architects founded by Patama Roonrakwit in 1997 who work closely ‘with communities as participants in a process to improve their shelter and environment’ . CASE studio have completed numerous projects across Thailand ranging from rehousing underbridge squatters and upgrading large and complex informal districts on site, to finding new life for abandoned marketplaces and pioneering cooperative housing models for middle class city dwellers. In all projects CASE studio’s approach is based in genuine collaboration with the communities involved. Roonrakwit studied with Nabeel Hamdi at the Centre for Development and Emergency Planning. CASE studio’s methods are influenced by Hamdi’s notions of Action Planning, of small, specifically tailored interventions based in an inquisitive and open-ended conversation with a community . CASE studio has also worked with CODI (Community Organisations Development Institute), an affiliate of Slum/Shack Dwellers International.

Site 2. Caracas (6 months): I will engage with the Comites De Tierras Urbanas (Urban Land Committees), grassroots organizations of people living in the immense improvised settlements (barrios) of Caracas. Recent governmental land reforms have allowed people to gain ownership over the land that they occupy for housing. By granting security of tenure and removing the threat of eviction a fertile situation has been created where incremental improvements of the barrios can occur under the guidance of the communities (through the CTUs) and with the assistance of a wide range of urban professionals, including architects.
Also in Caracas I will engage with the Caracas Urban Think Tank (CCS-UTT), a research based NGO that seeks to explore the potentials of the informal city and envisage new ways for architects and urban planners to engage with it. CCS-UTT has previously engaged a diverse range of contributors to critically examine the situation in the barrios, generating new perspectives and strategies for this poorly understood urban reality.

Site 3. San Diego/Tijuana (6 months): Engage with Estudio Teddy Cruz, an architectural practice whose work transcends the border between the two very different yet intensely connected world of Mexico and the USA. Cruz takes inspiration from the ingenuity and resourcefulness of Tijuana’s informal settlements. Through a combination of teaching and practice he explores notions of collaboration, ambiguous infrastructure, migration and density, micro-urbanism, retrofitting suburbia and ‘what adaptive architecture can learn from shantytowns’. He seeks a renegotiation of the poetic and the political, the utopian and the real.
Caracas. (6 months) I will engage with the Comites De Tierras Urbanas (Urban Land Committees), grassroots organizations of people living in the immense improvised settlements (barrios) of Caracas. Recent governmental land reforms have allowed people to gain ownership over the land that they occupy for housing. By granting security of tenure and removing the threat of eviction a fertile situation has been created where incremental improvements of the barrios can occur under the guidance of the communities (through the CTUs) and with the assistance of a wide range of urban professionals, including architects.
Also in Caracas I will engage with the Caracas Urban Think Tank (CCS-UTT), a research based NGO that seeks to explore the potentials of the informal city and envisage new ways for architects and urban planners to engage with it. CCS-UTT has previously engaged a diverse range of contributors to critically examine the situation in the barrios, generating new perspectives and strategies for this poorly understood urban reality.

Through the project I will seek both to contribute to the practices and communities with which I will work and to gain skills and knowledge to be incorporated in my practice as an architect and shared with others. I will use the techniques learned in all my work as an architect, especially in the service of marginalized communities, both abroad and particularly at home in Australia. I will share my experience at the 2008 Global Studio in the People Building Better Cities forum. I will work with universities and professional organisations to organize talks and workshops which seek to encourage others, particularly students, to become interested in the global urban condition and active in exploring the social potential of architecture and its practice.

Throughout the duration of my research I will be continuously documenting and displaying my experiences (primarily through text and photographs) on this blog. The contents of which will be the raw material from which the final report will be drawn. I hope that the blog will significantly broaden the numbers of people who have access to the research and will allow mentors, advisors and colleagues to comment and contribute throughout the process.