ETHOS Chapter 1. Introduction

For a long time, new developments have been driven mostly by their financial viability and their need to be lucrative for all the stakeholders involved. Similarly, government bodies have minimised their involvement in the city, outsourcing their responsibilities and reducing their already tight budget.

This portrait leads to developments that are not truly aimed to the people that will inhabit them, but as a materialisation of investing assets and financial operations. The priorities of future communities are in many occasions jeopardised by the market of today, driven by short-sighted economies. But designing is a forward-thinking discipline, planning for the future in light of current understandings of the world. Designers have the power to solve the problems of today tomorrow and avoid further ones in the future, by shaping people through space.

We design our spaces knowing that these will not be adequate in the future. Why do we, knowingly, carry on delivering spaces with little expectation of success? Why do we still make the wrong decisions? Why do we still contribute to carbon into our atmosphere? Aren’t we already conscious of the implications to climate and health? Why do we still plan our cities around car usage? Why do we contribute to self-centred environments? Aren’t we aware of increasing rates of people loneliness in cities? Why do we continue treating nature as ‘another thing’, not us, or as a mere place to visit? Haven’t we realised that it is that disconnection to nature what risks our health and even our own existence?

There are many questions to which we know the answers to or at least we have a way forward. But decisions are still being made against common sense and not in the interest of future communities. This design proposal will take a stand on good principles and aims that are thought to be the correct ones when thinking on designing for future communities.

A degree political, legal and economic realism is positive in the design process, and these are in the conscience of this designer. Nobody should be blind to these if the intention is to succeed, but simultaneously, any design proposal should challenge these constantly if it is in people’s interest.

The site in question (Shoreham Cement Works) is an abandoned quarry and cement plant, which has been tied to the landscape for a long time, speaking of the area’s history and geology. It is a scar in the natural landscape but that has created its own cultural landscape, and still provides a great opportunity for restoring some of the natural qualities of the past.

The position for designing an intervention starts by working with the existing landscape and the natural processes within, to ensure that future communities could benefit from it. A space of high quality, thinking on the needs of people in the future and the expectations of a low-carbon society. This intervention aims to work with the existing constraints, rather than starting with a tabula rasa, and to create a space worthy for people to inhabit.