Citadel Communities Block 1 in Proposed District.

The Citadel Community encourages as many domestic, production and commercial tasks to be performed in groups, by providing a variety of large functional spaces that surround a central gathering space - like the layout of Islamic Citadels. The dwellings are organized based on individual and group activities and the many terraces surrounding them provide opportunities to socialize and grow as a community.

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Citadel Communities - District in Context.

Glasgow faces the challenge of finding ways to function more sustainably and create less waste whilst housing and providing work for an expanding population. By encouraging communities to live in organized neighborhoods whereby neighbors can support each other with domestic and laborious processes: resources can be shared amongst many citizens and waste can be reduced.

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Citadel Communities Block 1 and Residential Cells.

The ‘Acoma Pueblo’ in New Mexico housed a society that lived harmoniously with each other and the natural world. Emphasis is put on spaces where domestic and production activities were performed in groups, these are shared by many multi-level dwellings which are efficiently organized. These layouts have informed the separation of activities in the residential cells of the Citadel Community and allowed more space for public, commercial and production areas throughout all the levels of Block 1.

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Citadel Communities - Section through Block 1.

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Ana is a 4th Year Student of the Bachelor of Architecture with Honours. She is of English and Guatemalan descent and has worked for architecture practices in both countries, as well as volunteering in Guatemala City for the ‘Fundamental’ initiative and taking part in architecture and design community engagement at the Lighthouse in Glasgow.

Following taking Urban Design courses during her ERASMUS Semester in the Escuela Tecnica Superior de Arquitectura in Madrid, she developed an interest for multi-scale master planning in social and historically complex urban contexts. Her first experience of working with these conditions was with the multi-disciplinary firm ‘Taller Ken’ in Guatemala City, where she was involved with a project to build upon and improve informal housing occupied by climate change refugees. From the inception, the design was community led and the engagement of the residents was paramount in order to seamlessly weave the proposal into the complex pre-existing social and urban fabric. This led to Ana working on the regeneration project of a historically important post-modernist bank building, into the Cultural Centre ‘Mil y Una’ located in the commercial centre of the City. The creation of public space and community engagement was at the heart of both projects and where invaluable examples of how bottom-up design can work to alleviate problems in socially complex regions of the developing world and megacities.

Working for Donald Insall Associates, a practice specializing in historic conservation and urban regeneration: Ana was able to continue working on community led projects in historically complex urban sites, such as the conservation of Lincoln College in Oxford and Master planning for Bournemouth Council. These projects have all served to inform the design decisions in her academic portfolio, as she has learnt to use historic research, cultural trends in society and social discourse as tools for designing at different scales.

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I, as a graduating student at the Glasgow School of Art, would like to state my support for the Pause or Pay Campaign.