A collection of images, including 24 photographs taken the day after the bombing of Nagasaki, were up for auction this week at Bonhams. According to the auction house, these are the only thorough record from the scene of the August 9, 1945 destruction. Twelve of these photos are though to be prints from original negatives belonging to the photographer, Yosuke Yamahata. The album was expected to fetch between $ 25,000 and $ 35,000 at auction. Read more
[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]
No hoax, it is happening – 20,000 occupants of Kiruna, Sweden, are being forced to pull up stakes and relocate their entire urban center to avoid having it fall off the face of the Earth.
The existing settlement is situated alongside a vast mine that fuels the local economy, but which also responsible for the huge fissures snaking their way toward the heart of the city. As the miners dig deeper, an increasing area of ground is threatened with collapse – at least 3,000 buildings are not expected to survive. Starting immediately, a multi-year effort is underway to shift everything away from the danger zone.
Relocating a whole urban populace is no small feat. As reported by the BBC, “The number of people involved in a project of this scale exceeds the thousands and includes city planners, architects, landscape designers, biologists, urban designers, civil engineers, demolition and construction experts and builders, as well as social anthropologists.” In some cases, whole buildings (like a century-old church) will be deconstructed, moved and reassembled on new sites.
The pressure has been building for some time with citizens having to make difficult decisions about buying real estate and building businesses with this growing threat looming in the backs of their minds. In a way, the definitive decision to break ground on a new town center is a relief to the population, who can now plan their lives around a new known reality. In some ways, too, it is a chance to start over – to build a city from scratch with lessons learned from the existing layout.
Still, there are many questions without clear answers, including: how does the city evaluate the parcels held by existing landowners who have to move, be they residents or business owners? “The Stockholm-based architects White Arkitekter AB, which won the contract to design the new Kiruna, envisages a denser city centre with a greater focus on sustainability, pedestrians and public transport than automobiles.” With a freshly-constructed center, one thing is certain: everything will change – the focal point for the entire built environment of the region is shifting and the future of the city remains uncertain.
It took 1 year, over 1000 photographs and extensive archival research to construct The City of Ruins, a digital stereoscopic reconstruction of Warsaw, Poland …
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Germany may be known for its green political party and sustainable energy focus, but this daring plan to eliminate the need for automobiles entirely across the …
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Playful yet thought-provoking, this project asks: what do we do with small leftover spaces in cities … particularly in urban areas where even a few …
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[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]
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[ By WebUrbanist in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]
It took 1 year, over 1000 photographs and extensive archival research to construct The City of Ruins, a digital stereoscopic reconstruction of Warsaw, Poland in its most devastated state. With over 60,000 3D-modeled structures (detailing what remained), this incredible undertaking brings home the scale of destruction with stunning visual details and remarkable historical accuracy.
As illustrated in the trailer above and images below, over 85% of the buildings in the city were ultimately destroyed between urban combat and systematic leveling. Its creators note that this is the first rigorous large-scale attempt to rebuild a war-ravaged city in digital form.
The Polish Resistance staged the Warsaw Uprising in 1944, which, lacking promised Soviet support, fell hard to German forces over brutal two month period. Thus Warsaw, previously a of nearly 1,000,000 people, was reduced to a habitat for less than 1,00o.
The extent of its demolition is hard to picture, hence the creation of this model and flyover video for the Warsaw Rising museum. Without anti-aircraft capabilities or the ability to receive sufficient aid and support from the West, defenders in the city fought but ultimately fell or retreated through the sewer system.
Hundreds of thousands of fighters and civilians alike perished in the conflict. The destruction of structures and infrastructure was documented piecemeal, the scraps of which were assembled formed the basis for this disturbingly realistic model and film. More on the remaking of the ruins below.
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