Housing Clusters, Productive Landscapes and Connectors as catalysing neighborhood strategies

The studio emphasizes on reading and re-interpreting these rural, urban or rurban landscapes, by implementing design strategies on the scale of architecture that can initiate an upgrade on other levels of scale. The stratification in architecture is more suited to explore and grasp the complexity of the everyday building practice and inhabitation, then the abstract levels of urban planning. We aim for a profound dialog between all these levels, starting out from the architectural one.

The locations we focus on in our research differentiate themselves by accelerating political, social, and spatial conditions. The built space and the position of its inhabitants within are profoundly in transition. The researched locations are the district Candelaria in the center of the capital Managua and Ciudad Sandino, which is a newly developed town next to Managua.

6 design theses conclude the studio:
- Cluster housing to ensure social control.
- A productive landscape for Nueva Vida.
- Ciudad Sandino and its causes, connectors of landscapes, places and people.
- Housing as a catalyst to redefine La Candelaria
- Re-envisioning a neighborhood
- Acupuncture of Agroforestry