Context There is no venue for a “concentrated” experience of urban fellowship as the one provided by the system of public transportation that places everyone in the same wagon so to speak! From Paris to London and New York and from Daumier’s famous sketch of early Paris omnibus riders characters, to Davidson’s photographs of the …
Preliminary note When I started to examine the way the physical city set the table, so to speak, for patterns of urban sociability, I spoke of settings, pathways and rituals as the main social-spatial figures articulating those patterns. I wish to highlight these figures in the exploration of the spatial and social dimensions of the …
The Duplex is the nearest thing to a Montreal “vernacular” building type: a two units, two stories plus basement and/or garage building, found in just about every district of the city since the late 19th century till today; it has the specific particularity of each unit having its own street civic number, its own street …
General considerations. In my last two posts I examined the relationship between cityscape and landscape in terms of limits, linkages and memory figures, whereby the land and the history of its urban settlement contributed to the qualification of those figures. I have become interested, since then, in the question of the physical articulation of entry …
CITYSCAPE and LANDSCAPE: Points of Entry and Epicentres (1) Read More »
Words as memory markers Mention the words “road”, “fort” and “mountain” to a north American and he/she will probably think of a Western movie setting. Mention the words “village” and “orchard” to a Russian and she/he will probably think of a Chekov play. Mention all these words in sequence to long time Montreal residents and …
Introduction I hope you will agree when I state that without its people, a city is nothing but a ghost town, an archaeological remain. You and I, with the “things” around us, by our sheer co-presence, as in the featured image above, and by moving and gathering in the city, are the ultimate measuring rods …
What is it about a stair landing? One does not often linger on a stair landing and even less so on the landing of an exterior stair, usually serving as an emergency means of exit. Because of this instrumental destination, such a landing must remain free of obstacle to a quick exit and, given its …
“Many will look, but a few will see”. Professor Philip Thiel, in architecture school, would use that expression to differentiate the act of looking, as casting one’s eyes on something or someone, from the act of seeing, as understanding that thing’s or person’s essential traits, character or form. That level of understanding is what he …
Leave The Car At Home Day On Leave The Car At Home Day, the city forgoes the returns on a few paying parking spots to the benefit of pertinent projects for their occupation. On that occasion a group of students from the nearby Université de Montréal have set up a public “street level balcony” of …
Context The domain of the sacred in most cultures deals with the narrative of origins and identity of humanity, and/or of the group, and is considered holy and untouchable along with its rituals. Think of the Bible or other sacred texts. Conventionally, certain aspects of the natural or man-made landscape are amenable to be held …
INTRODUCTION Since my retirement from teaching environment and behavior courses to aspiring designers and architects I have directed my attention to the physical city, analyzing what I see as agents of urban sociability. My friend and classmate, the cultural geographer Falken Forshaw, went as far to describe urban sociability as “the core of life in …
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