My thesis addresses the many issues that today’s youth face and aims to rethink the youth centre as a place that combines youth culture and architecture to create a space that not only provides adequate recreational and vocational opportunities but which is also representative of youth.
Theoretically, I focus on notions around finding identity within the city, whilst questioning the stigmatisms around various youth subcultures. I look in more depth at how certain youth appropriate space within the city and by analyzing their process of appropriation, whilst noting the significance the stages of appropriation have in the pursuit for one’s identity, parallels are drawn from various theorists. Particular reference to theories by Iain Borden, Jeffrey Hou, Andy Bennett, Dick Hebdige and others, explore the notions around the insurgent use of public space, youth culture, street culture, and the meaning of style and expression among youth.
Through research into various subcultures of youth and activities that youth are actively involved in in and around the city, it aims to explore the youth centre as a programmatic model for reaching young people in South Africa. By appropriating the language and influences of youth as key design ingredients, it aims to create an architectural intervention, called The 3rd Place Youth Centre, in Newtown North, through which youth can reconnect to their surroundings thus giving youngsters a much-needed sense of place and identity within their ever-changing city.
There are several youth centres in and around Johannesburg, however these are primarily focused on providing youth with reproductive health (RH) services, and although this is important I do not feel it should be the focus of a youth centre nor what defines it.
There are obviously many issues that face todays youth such as: safe sex, substance abuse, gang involvement, crime, and possible the most detramental to our future is unemployment and lack of skills.
In 2011 just under half a million students wrote the matric exit exam. Of these students only 175 000 were admitted entry into university. This means that 321 000 students left school that year with few or no options.
This recurring pattern each year has resulted in over 3 million youth in south africa between the ages of 18 and 24 being what is considered a 'NEET' which means they are not in any form of education employment or training.
This can and obviously does have a huge effect, often resulting in discouragement, drug abuse, gang involvement, riots and crime. One can even see a direct correlation between the age of these NEETs and the average age of a house robber in South Africa being between the ages of 18 - 24 years.
Therefore and architectural response to youth is not easy. Youth have a very different set of values, understandings and needs and so they need to be spoken to on a level with which they understand. It is for this reason that I focused my research on activities that youth are actively involved in, in and around the city, in order to draw inspiration from in designing a youth centre that engages youth. These activities often have an insurgent nature where youngsters are appropriating spaces within the city in order to express themselves and find a sense of place and it is for this reason that I refer to them as the Space Invaders.
More specifically these individuals are the Streetartist, the Breakdancers, The Skateboarders, and the Parkour groups.
Through my research into these individuals I established a process of appropriating a space that they follow and I adopted this process as my own design methodology. This process being: DEVIATE, LOCATE, NEGOTIATE, CREATE, and ASSOCIATE.
DEVIATE:
Deviate is to rethink the youth centre as a place that combines youth culture and architecture to create a space that not only provides youth with recreational and vocational opportunities but which is also representative of them.
LOCATE:
Through my study of these activities I observed 7 primary spatial types that the Space Invader appropriates.
Through my study of these activities I observed 7 primary spatial types that the Space Invader appropriates.
These being: The spaces BETWEEN, AROUND, BELOW, ROOFTOPS, WEDGE, VOID, and REDUNDANT and OVERSIZED spaces.
These spatial types not only gave me a good indication of the type of space the site for the youth centre could be but they also suggested types of spaces that could be incorporated into the design.
After much deliberations I chose a wedge space located in Newtown North, Johannesburg, South Africa.
The site is situated at the foot of the Queen Elizabeth Bridge just as one passed over from Braamfontein.
Currently the site is a park of sorts, it houses William Kentridge's Fire Walker which I am proposing to be relocated.
The site is highly accessible, being located next to the Metro Mall Market and Taxi Rank. Also in close proximity is Brickfields housing projects, the new Newtown Junction Mall going up, as well as other similar large portions of land which have been proposed for future mixed use development.
There is loads of pedestrian movement on and around the site. Especially people travelling up and down Queen Elizabeth and Diagonal Street.
People then actually diagonally cross the site along their daily commutes.
This has even formed a dirt path across the site and so it is these existing paths of movement that I felt important to incorporate into the design of the Youth Centre.
The program structure was negotiated around that of a typical youth centre with a commons area and facilities organised around this.
So I took this notion and adapted it to whereby an Urban Park would form a commons and the building is organised around this.
This program structure is divided into 4 main sections, these being: SOCIAL, PHYSICAL, CULTURAL, and VOCATIONAL.
I also looked at physical elements throughout the city that these individuals physically negotiate as to develop a catalogue of elements that the spaces in the program could comprise of.
CREATE:
It was in the design charrette that through a series of explorations into the site and these activities using photographs, sketches and models I developed a concept for the site.
This being: CARVEL-FOLD-FLOW
From here I started looking at possible moves that could be made on the site.
Paths of movement that could be created
and spatial arrangements that could be made
This led to a volumetric exploration into the program on the site.
In developing a form and aesthetic I felt it crucial that the youth centre express itself almost in the same way that the youth of today choose to express themself.
The concept of style is extremely important in youth culture as youth largely choose to express themself through a visual style. Therefore it is the aesthetic of the building that affords the greatest opportunity to communicate with youngsters. It is for this reason that I chose to analyse aspects of these activities in greater detail in order to inform the language of the youth centre.
I started by looking at street art pieces in the area surrounding the site as to inform a colour pallette for the youth centre that could create a vibrancy and excitement for youngsters.
For the form I started by analysing graffiti tags in the area and I tried deconstructing these into a series of interesting primary geometries that make them up.
A big inspiration for the form also came from the poses of breakdancers. I found these poses to be quite expressinve and somewhat structural and so I tried translating these into a series of geometrical forms and spatial arrangements:
These then lead to a series of concept models that informed the building.
I also felt it crucial that the building adopt a distinctive aspect of these activities as a distinguishing feature of the youth centre.
The feature I chose was that of the arrow. The arrow is an eminent symbol in graffiti tags with each graffiti writer having their own unique style of arrow that they use to distinguish their works.
So I chose the arrow as a defining feature to run throughout the building
The symbol of the arrow could further be used to make connections to the youth centre throughout the city. As a graffiti writer tries to get their name up all throughout the city by tagging as many buildings as they can, so too can the arrow be used to mark and establish other youth focused typologies throughout the city. These could become extensions of the youth centre, 'tags' across the city that offer additional services to youth.
The 3rd Place Youth Centre aims to be a space within the city that youngsters can associate with and express themselves through.
This is the Ground Floor Plan. The ground floor has a natural fall of 4m from the top North point down towards the South West corner and it is this natural fall that I wished to utilize to facilitate various forms of movement across the site. The ground floor is largely made up of the urban park which allows for spaces for various activities, however some areas are more specifically aimeed at certain activities.
For instance there are good areas for parkour, dance performance areas, skateboarding, and street art.
The steps in these areas form a larger amphitheatre for the viewer
The park is framed by a retail arm which comprises of a bar, skate shop, media store, cafe, clothing store, street art gallery, print shop, and tattoo parlour. There is also a 'modding' workshop, this opens directly onto the park and is where individuals can build their own ramps or elements they wish to insert into the park in order to modify it how they see fit.
Various voids, stairs and ramps were used to create several paths of movement across the park. The most important being the existing diagonal movement which now happens along the face of the retail arm. Other cuts through the retail arm allow movement across the park and then there are various paths of movement along the periphery of the site.
Vertical circulation to the upper floors happens via the core
On the 1st floor the core opens onto the 'Chill Zone', this comprises of bar, pool tables, arcade games, ramps and sitting areas.
Next to the Chill Zone is a dance studio which can become a dance floor for the chill zone after hours
On the Eastern face of the chill zone and dance studio is a walkable and climbable steel facade.
I chose to take the image of a parkour jump and translated this into varying sized perforations for the steel facade as to create a solar shading device that depicts the image to the park.
The main entrance into the main building is actually via a ramp which ramps up from the upper part of the ground floor and forms the roof of the retail arm.
Across the park from the main building is the media centre. This comprises of a business enterprise room, study area, book bar, internet surf zone, tech hub, and cinema.
Circulation up to the top floor of the main building happens either via the core or a main staircase.
On the 2nd floor is the gym with changing rooms
The gym overlooks the dance studio below and is directly connected as to allow both use of the changing facilities.
Next to the gym is a clinic which has, Doctor's rooms, one-on-one room and first response room for any injuries that may occur in the park
On the other side of the 2nd floor is the reception with security office.
Print and textile workshop
and lastly the administration offices
For my technology study I looked at developing a piece of public furniture that can be appropriated for different uses thus allowing the user to further associate with their space.
The piece of furniture i developed is a steel bench that can be adjusted to for a light where needed.
These lights are located all around the park and by using them in conjunction with Pavegen tiles which convert kinetic energy into electricity, they can take advantage of the large amounts of movement that would occur accross the park and use this resource to not only operate the building but to also illuminate it at night thus making it accessible at all hours.
Final Thesis Presentation Slideshow
