Mission : Conception, fabrication

Commanditaire : 2021 Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism, Corée du Sud

Localisation : Exposition temporaire

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Dans sa version minimale, la Superpausée devient Off-ground Shelter et se monte dans l'urgence sur les sites victimes de catastophes naturelles. Cette évolution de la macro tente est imaginée pour la 서울도시건축비엔날레 Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism dirigée par l'architecte Dominique Perrault ayant pour thématique "CROSSROADS, building the resilient city". L'exposition sest tenue du 16 septembre au 31 octobre 2021.

 

Old Fangak / 2035 / Two weeks after the hurricane. The humanitarian support is still active. Yesterday, local authorities started to deliver light shelters that allow a small living space above the water, operational within minutes. The operations need no more a few people, simple hand tools, and an plain simple instruction manual. With the help of NGO, isolated locals began to erect these off-ground shelters.

Structurally speaking, these tents are made of tension. Two frames made out of galvanised steel pipes, are brought closer together with a ratchet crank. This action allows the rise of a high platform, free from natural hazards, water rising, strong winds or ground shaking vibrations.

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Precious living space
In a world that is more and more subject to climatic variations and natural hazards, soil is becoming a precious surface, especially with the world population increasing exponentially. Its administration and its relation to architecture is one of the major issues of the 21st century.  Wether it is Architects, urban planners or politicians, they can no longer consider the cities’ suface as infinite, and they must envision a new relationship with it, as building higher and higher has its limits. The accelleration of time in cities, linked with these phenomenons, push us to emergency solutions and forces us to innovate : living off-ground, safe from predators and elements, but still together.

High shelter
The Off-ground Shelter defines itself as detached from our ground, flirting with the building heights, a height where the living is still easy. We postulate a basic principle : to offer a covered, watertight level, perched at 2.5m, leaving far under the hostile floor surface - as a caveman would do to escape a bear. This principle is a temporary solution, that can be set up in a wide range of situations : a rise of waterlevels, as the one that occurs in Jakarta where the capital is not relocated fast enough, an earthquake that leaves the floor unusable, muddy and strewn with debris, or even a dwelling density so high – like in Lagos – that even slums do not know where to spread. And we don’t even know what will happen in the future.

Flexible as a reed stick
Structurally speaking, the project is made of tension. Two frames, made of galvanised bended steel pipe, are progressively brought closer via a ratchet crank, at floor height.These frames hold above a covered level. The architecture that results, close to a tent, has therefore no foundations, and feature a reduced footprint on the ground. Due to its tensile structural principle, the tent withstand amenably wind gusts, ground shaking and vibration without breaking. Its structural cinematics based on a ratchet hoist means that no surhuman effort is needed to make it rise, nor any lifting equipment. The tent is carriable by hand and can be set up by a few people, following a plain simple instruction manual. Even if it doesn’t look like it, its constructive simplicity is a key advantage in order to set it up in various environements - even hardly reachable by road vehicle.

Capable space
The surface underneath the top floor is not left empty. Depending on its location, if it’s walkable, this space can be covered with an extra transluscent tarp and become a living space and an airlock, at ground level. If it’s muddy, watery, or polluted, a suspended floor can be set up, isolated and sanitary safer. Hanging stuff can also be considered, such as hammocks, drying food or clothes. Maybe, this empty volume can even be built in hard materials, if the temporary stretches in time.

Just an idea
Far, far from providing a new solution, the Off-ground Shelter is just another transitional possibility that, behind its apparent sophistication, only will to offer a relative comfort in difficult contexts.

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