The 3.1 Place in the City
Abstract
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The purpose of the city is drawing people and communities together, rather than setting boundaries to separate districts, streets and pavements. The challenge of urban planning in the 21st century is taking the balance between personal mobility and city reformation. Humankind can enjoy convenience and flexibility while walking in the city. This critical portfolio aims to explore the human lives in the city, examine how people shape the form of the city and redefine the meanings of places by inter-activities, communication and venues. According to Augé (1995), ‘Space, for him, is a frequented place, an intersection of moving bodies’. Nowadays, people reforming and remaking the frequented places for different activities and purpose based on particular demands and behaviours. This critical portfolio highlights the relationship between human activities and spatial possibilities, exploring the urban development possibilities and humanity in the city. Build the city for human rather than for cars, and make the city more friendly for human.
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Theme 1 | The in-between of workplace and home
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Nowadays, there are many employees chose to work or have meetings outside the office, giving the ‘identity of a place and memory interact’ (Karamanea, P. 2015). If space is related to specify ‘relational, historical and concerned with identity’ (Augé, M. 1995), that area may re-identify as a place. Space, places and non-places are interchanged in-between the identity by human behaviours and inter-activities. The character of third places is an informal area for people have typically gathering to relax and have leisure without any concern about social identity and social class, the ‘neutral ground’ (Oldenburg, R. 1989), everyone is equal and sharing the same status. Not only neutral ground in social but also accessibility and playfulness are the critical elements to constitute the place as a third-place (Oldenburg, R. 1989).
Because of the high-technology and internet well developed, humankind is easy to connect and have conversation nowadays. Thus, long-distance working can achieve. Moreover, the market tends to develop an innovation industry which is full of potential to start-up the business. These are the reasons to induce people to start their business and work at home.
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Figure 1. Holliss, F. (2005) House and Atelier Bow-Wow. Available at:
http://www.theworkhome.com/precedents/house-and-atelier-bow-wow/
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Historically in the UK, most smiths hired ‘their sons or apprentices to help out’ (Tarbatt, J. 2015) and worked in their home basement and garage, for example. That is a remarkable example to examine the home-working, morphologically as a work-live, to explain how smiths work in an ambiguous place in their daily life. The method of distinguishing in-between of dwelling and workplace zone in the home office is through the behaviours, needs, habit in the habitat and the identities of the inhabitants. For example, the start-up businessmen, self-employed, smiths may convert their home into dual-use nature purposed.
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Before exploring the dual-use of the home office, identifying the difference between work-live and live-work is essential. People may ‘living over the shop’ (Tarbatt, J. 2015), live-work, who work in, next to or lower deck of their house. That habitats provide convenience, accessibility and flexibility in-between the workplaces and dwellings. The opposite of pole is work-live. The inhabitants mainly focus on the working experiences, always make compromises to the environment or needs to sacrifice the living experiences. These inhabitants made their workplace or home squeezed into each other, have not lived and worked in purpose-designed premises.
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The home-based workers may owe to a different vocation and needs of the equipment. They may require distinct spatial and environmental requirements to desire the central issue between the dwelling and workplace aspect. Some vocation needs a vast space to work and make process such as an architect. In Japan, there is a building for architect used as an office with employees and generally transformed as a home in the evening, the House and Atelier Bow-Wow (Fig.1. left). In the regular days, this building always ‘progress from more public to more private’ (Holliss, F. 2015) When the schedule and process are tight, that building will be used as an office mainly. The ‘irregular stair … provide model storage’ (Holliss, F. 2015). The House and Atelier Bow-Wow is a great example to explain that the inhabitants make a compromise to sacrifice the living spaces and experiences.
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Intelligibly to identify and understand the needs and habitation hobby of the customer is the first and most crucial step to design a work-home, especially in this category. The psychological wealth of inhabitants may be influenced by work and live in a not well-designed space. Refer to the three typical typologies, ‘dominant function, spatial design strategies and patterns of use’ (Holliss, F. 2015), which are the useful keys to identifying the quality of home office, design and build more reasonable and valuable work-homes in the cities.
The dominant function can subdivide as home-dominant, equal status and work-dominant (Holliss, F. 2015), which are identified by the inhabitants’ needs, vocation, and which part they mainly focused in. By clarifying the relationship between the needs and vocation, mixing the spatial requirements will be the next index to modify and improve the spatial potential and possibilities. Ensure the inhabitants have wealth psychology between work and live, and produce the required standard of work-home. The needs, expectations and requirements need to take a balance in-between with the spatial design, ensure the pattern of use of the areas or zonings are well-developed and all are suitable for the inhabitants have sustainability to use the spaces in the future.
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It is widespread and easy to find out the traditional dual-use buildings in Hong Kong (Fig.02. below) with a unique architectural language which is ‘front store with back living’. The stores or working areas mainly located in front of the whole building on the ground level. The inhabitants choose to take an ‘equal status’ (Holliss, F. 2015) from the dominant function concept.
The living area and working area is nearby each other with a staircase at the back of the store to connect the upper living room. Typically, there is a cashier counter located in front of the staircase at the back of the store. The spatial design is well-developed with ‘live-nearby’ (Holliss, F. 2015) concept and appeared by the staircase without any intra-areas in-between two main zones, all spaces are dedicated clearly with either working or living identity. This architecture style display that the inhabitants have not compromised with the works and sacrificed the living spaces. It is an excellent example to explore live-work.
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Fig. 2. Barth, L. (2015) Hip Hong Kong. Available at:
https://www.departful.com/2015/05/hip-hong-kong-exploring-hk-islands-trendy-neighbourhoods/
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Theme 2 | Place-Making on the street through hawking and communication practice
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People build relationship and community in the workplace easily nowadays. Jackson and Suomi (2002) noted ‘a workplace is a central concept for several entities … and society as a whole’. The workplace does not simply connect with the office and industry mainly. Nowadays, people may do business by occupying exterior area such as on the street. Streets have meanings, and interactivities happened by people to do business and suddenly transformed as a commercial place for the society such as hawker market and street food market. Although this behaviour may against governance acts, it is still a strong phenomenon to explain how people build identities and provide meanings of place.
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Figure 3. Fung, K. (2018) Second-hand wares on sale at an unregulated market. Available at:https://coconuts.co/hongkong/features/hks-bazaar-battle-second-hand-sellers-push-greater-freedom-trade-streets/
Chan’s review article (2018) explored the hawker establish a strong appearance of place-making on the road to do business at night in Hong Kong, who transformed the purposes of the road into economies from transportation. The road became an illegal market and claim as heterotopias of deviation, which is the first of six principles of heterotopias defined by Foucault. The illegal market as an ambiguous business area because of ‘individuals whose behaviours are deviant in relation’ (Foucault, 1986). Chan examined the illegal night labour market in Sham Shui Po, which is one of the districts sharing the low-income label in Hong Kong. There are two groups of hawker self-identified as a poor hawker and non-poor South Asian hawker and place-making on the main road after seven o’clock at night. They develop different class identities and meanings of the place by different spatial practice. However, they still share some social identities and precarity.
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The hawkers who self-identify as a poor or low-income class are mainly migrated from mainland China. By Chan’s observation and conversation with them, he found out that the Chinese hawkers build the community and class identities by backgrounds, income and purposes. ‘The poor hawkers expect the market to be a place of care … for helping other poor urban dwellers’ (Chan, 2018). The poor hawkers occupy a business area by placing a huge carpet on the road (Fig.3.), which is made by certain materials such as fabric and nylon, surrounding by some short plastic stools for hawker and customers to sit. They supposed the illegal night market is a good ‘place to sell goods to the poor, instead of a place to maximise the profit’ (Chan, 2018). The hawkers may remind the precarity to each other such as the operation took by government actors, even they may do not know the name of each other. In their sight, the illegal market is full of ‘diversity … and more walkable neighbourhoods’ (Tarbatt, 2015).
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The non-poor South Asian hawkers seek business opportunities in this illegal market and always try to maximise their profit. They engrossed competition in this market. Their class identities built on their skills, knowledge and proud of their ability for choosing high-quality products and selling at a better price. Unlike the poor hawkers, they occupy the business area by trucks. Those trucks became a flexible shop and storage room. Moreover, they capture the sight of customers attribute to truck capacity and lighting from the driving area. They give thanks to the trucks as a convenience tool to occupy the place whenever they want, providing the flexibility of doing business.
However, all hawkers from the illegal night market are sharing the same social identities by communication practice while they are place-making. All of them are need to follow three unspoken rules which were discussed before. The first rule is that they cannot start to do business until seven o’clock at night, which is the official closing hour of the nearby fixed shops.
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The second rule is ‘giving face’ to the government actors, tidy up the business area and pack all of the goods. The meaning of ‘giving face’ is the hawkers cannot obstruct the policy and the government actors’ action. The third rule is self-governance the night market, ensure less argument. The class identities and differences may produce and reproduce in the place with specific human behaviours and social activities.
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At night, the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront in Hong Kong has become a performance area for the public by the buskers who occupy the waterfront by their musical instruments and guitar bag case (Fig.4. below). The buskers are place-making at the waterfront area with their class identities and communities. They act as entertainers playing music make performance in a public area. By my observation and conversation while I was living in Hong Kong, busking is not the method for making money. Unlike the buskers from London tube stations, all of them are self-employed licensed buskers and mainly to make money by playing music in public. They are only allowed to entertain at a specific hour and perform on a sticker which is marked as a performance stage and stuck on the floor (Fig.5. below).
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Figure 4. Leung, R. (2018) Alva Leung and friends from the group 3jammers play at the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront. Available at:
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Figure 5. Getty Images (2017) Buskers perform to 3.5million people on the Tube every day. Available at:
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4730762/busking-license-uk-london-underground-scheme/
The class identities of the buskers from Tsim Sha Tsui is their spilt, sharing the pleasures with the public. Sometimes, there is some marketing promotion which is asked for voting during the intra-college busking competition. However, the behaviours of the buskers are illegal politically because the Hong Kong policy is banded anyone to receive charity in public and placed any goods in the public. In the beginning, there were some policemen and Hawker Control Team (HCT) expel the buskers and confiscate their properties. After the conversation with the government, the buskers consented tacitly to perform in the waterfront area under specific requirements such as control the sounds and do not receive money.
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Thus the literature and findings, occupying a public area is not the only method to place-making, but also building social or class identities, enhance the spatial possibilities with communication practice. Providing the meanings for the place which is the most critical requirement to transform a public space into a functional place.
Theme 3 | Walking on Streets-in-the-sky, The Sky Deck
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Nowadays, the city and urban development are concomitant with human mobility and population growth. Buildings and human mobility tend to develop vertically. In mid 20th century, the concept of streets-in-the-sky had been elaborated to the public by Smithsons in a competition for the Golden Lane (Fig.6. below), which is a debate about urban development to solve the future housing storage and mobility after the Second World War (Borges, J. and Mendes, T. 2019). Smithsons developed the concept of streets-in-the-sky is concentrated on human association and identity with some integrates concerns, for example, social growth, scale and mobility (Smithson and Smithson 1967). In the later future, the Brutalism developed as an architectural style and coined by Smithsons (Designing Buildings Wiki 2019).​
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The radical concept of the streets-in-the-sky poetically called sky deck, which is a new urban structure detached from the infrastructure or pavement from the ground floor, massive terraces as the deck in the sky and provided horizontal access to apartments. Smithsons aim to examine the concept in Golden Lane and develop it as a democratic city. They imagined the Golden Lane could develop a new structural society language in a vertical building with lots of horizontal access (the sky deck) which for residents to depend for access (Smithson and Smithson 2001). Smithsons suggested an intensification urban consequence, which is formed and developed the apartments and sky decks depend on particular needs, aim to make the Golden Lane as like as articulation to connect the public spaces and semipublic places by ‘multi-level continuous complex’ (Smithson and Smithson 1967).
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Fig. 6. Peter Smithson, Golden Lane. Photomontage of street deck with a supposed Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio in foreground, 1953. Smithson Family Archive.
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The Golden Lane defined a new urban architecture concept for the future facing the economic and population growth, also identified a new social practice and community practice for the residents in the same building. The overlapping urban geographies transformed into a multi-level city inside the building by different occupation patterns, the scale of terraces, the density of population and human mobility by social activities. The streets-in-the-sky concept connects each individual with particular groups of inhabitants inside the building. Inhabitants can enjoy autonomous and social lives within the building by occupying the public space such as the stairs and huge terraces. Moreover, incorporate with raw materials such as concrete with large blocks of partition and curtain wall. Those elements, materials and structural language defined as Brutalism.
However, Coleman against the sky deck, because of the impression of sky deck associated with crime and thief (Coleman 1985). The Brutalism and high-rise buildings objected culturally because the sky deck accompanies those. Coleman’s argument fails because she neglected that the population tends to increase with high human mobility under economic development. In the later future, Park Hill designed by the concept of streets-in-the-sky as the theme to build the council housings and solve the population issue.
The high-rise building reappraised with the high-tech architecture since the influence of modernist movement with the Brutalism redeveloped in late 20th century, which is an excellent result influenced by a successful built project in mid 20th century - The Park Hill. The Park Hill, refurbished in mid 21st century, designed with the modified concept of the streets-in-the-sky. Based on the unsuccessful in the Golden Lane Estate, Smithsons improved the concept. The Park Hill had applied regular grid which is used as motorways and detached from infrastructure but also connecting the ‘buildings of different densities and functions’ (Borges, J. and Mendes, T. 2019). By the conventional grid system, The Park Hill provided a new form of human circulation in the sky, created a new urban landscape on the ground
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and the accessibility and flexibility for individual movement. The grid formed some huge slabs which are used for inhabitants to relax and connected by staircases. The stairs functionally connecting each slab and terraces, ‘but above all are representative spaces where public life can be performed’ (Avermaete, T. and Massey, A. 2013).
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It is not only to detach some pavements from infrastructure to shape streets-in-the-sky but also mixing with the lifestyles, enjoyment and social identities for inhabitants through the spatial design. The Oi Man Estate is one of the most significant public housing examples from Hong Kong, which is explained the concept clearly.
The Oi Man Estate is a vast, comprehensive public estate providing convenience for the inhabitants from ‘banks, markets to barbershops’ with an ‘air-conditioned commercial complex, a market, and cooked food stalls’ (‘Public housing estates in Ho Man Tin#Oi Man Estate’, 2019). The estate became a community because of the complex living experiences. Also provided an identity for all inhabitants, Oi Man Estate Resident, which was a model estate for Queen Elizabeth II visited in 1975 (Fig.7. below). The terraces (Fig.8. below) located at the front door as detached motorways from infrastructure became a shared social space for people to gather. There is a vast square common area on the ground floor which is for inhabitants for leisure and social activities over there (Fig.9. below), not only playing the role of pavement connect with the entrance. Moreover, the whole estate separates the public and semi-public spaces lovely, provides a high privacy standard for inhabitants even there are a lot of regular grids streets-in-the-sky. The kitchen area in each flat is facing to the street, also as a part of the facade which is credited the Brutalism architecture structural style with huge concrete blocks. There are some parts of streets-in-the-sky visually connect to the street, which is claimed as a semi-private space (Fig.10. below).
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Fig. 7. David (2014) Queen Elizabeth II visited Oi Man Estate in 1975. Available at: https://randomwire.com/oi-man-estate/
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Fig. 9. David (2014) Kids playing football on the concrete courtyard at the base of the building.
Available at: https://randomwire.com/oi-man-estate/
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Fig. 8. Dorason (2015) Terraces regular grid system. Available at: https://www.hongkongfp.com/2015/04/04/hkfp-lens-dorasons-hong-kong-public-housing-photography/
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Fig. 10. David (2014) The government opened Oi Man Estate which was built on a concept of “a little town within a city”. Available at:
https://randomwire.com/oi-man-estate/
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Bibliography
Books
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Augé, M. (1995) Non Places - Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity. London: Verso.
Avermaete, T. and Massey, A. (2013) Hotel lobbies and lounges : the architecture of professional hospitality. London: Routledge.
Coleman, A. (1985) Utopia on trial : vision and reality in planned housing. London: Shipman.
Holliss, F. (2015) Beyond live/work : the architecture of home-based work. London: Routledge.
Jackson, P. and Suomi, R. (2002) eBusiness and Workplace Redesign. London: Routledge.
Oldenburg, R. (1989) The great good place : cafés, coffee shops, community centers, beauty parlors, general stores, bars, hangouts, and how they get you through the day. New York: Paragon House.
Smithson, A. and Smithson, P. (1967) Urban structuring : studies of Alison & Peter Smithson. London: Studio Vista.
Smithson, A and Smithson, P (2001) The charged void : architecture. New York: Monacelli Press.
Journals
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Chan, N. K. (2018) ‘Place-Making and Communication Practice: Everyday Precarity in a Night Market in Hong Kong’, Space and Culture. Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications, 21(4), pp. 439–454.
doi: 10.1177/1206331217741085.
Borges, J. and Mendes, T. (2019) ‘Walking on streets-in-the-sky: structures for democratic cities’, Journal of Aesthetics & Culture. Routledge, 11(1).
doi: 10.1080/20004214.2019.1596520.
Foucault, M. (1986) ‘Of Other Spaces: Utopias and Heterotopias’, Diacritics, translated by Miskowiec (Spring), pp. 22-27.
Karamanea, P. (2015) ‘Landscape, memory and contemporary design’, Craft + Design Enquiry. Canberra: Australian National University, School of Art, 7, pp. 113–134. Available at: http://search.proquest.com/docview/1736669904/.
Tarbatt, J. (2015) ‘Live-Work: Understanding the Typology’, Urban Design, Issue 136, pp.32-35.
Online Resources
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‘Brutalism’ (2019) Designing Buildings Wiki. Available at:
https://www.designingbuildings.co.uk/wiki/Brutalism
(Accessed: 30 July 2019)
‘Public housing estates in Ho Man Tin#Oi Man Estate’ (2019) Wikipedia. Available at:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_housing_estates_in_Ho_Man_Tin#Oi_Man_Estate
(Accessed: 25 September 2019)
Illustrations
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Figure 1. Holliss, F. (2005) House and Atelier Bow-Wow. Available at:
http://www.theworkhome.com/precedents/house-and-atelier-bow-wow/
(Accessed: 2005)
Fig. 2. Barth, L. (2015) Hip Hong Kong. Available at:
https://www.departful.com/2015/05/hip-hong-kong-exploring-hk-islands-trendy-neighbourhoods/
(Accessed: 01 January 2020)
Figure 3. Fung, K. (2018) Second-hand wares on sale at an unregulated market. Available at:
https://coconuts.co/hongkong/features/hks-bazaar-battle-second-hand-sellers-push-greater-freedom-trade-streets/
(Accessed 04 September 2018)
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Figure 4. Leung, R. (2018) Alva Leung and friends from the group 3jammers play at the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront. Available at:
(Accessed 12 May 2018)
Figure 5. Getty Images (2017) Buskers perform to 3.5million people on the Tube every day. Available at:
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4730762/busking-license-uk-london-underground-scheme/
(Accessed 20 October 2017)
Figure 6. Peter Smithson, Golden Lane. Photomontage of street deck with a supposed Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio in foreground, 1953. Smithson Family Archive.
Figure 7. David (2014) Queen Elizabeth II visited Oi Man Estate in 1975. Available at:
https://randomwire.com/oi-man-estate/
(Accessed: 13th October 2014)
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Figure. 8. Dorason (2015) Terraces regular grid system. Available at:
https://www.hongkongfp.com/2015/04/04/hkfp-lens-dorasons-hong-kong-public-housing-photography/
(Accessed: 04 April 2015)
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Figure 9. David (2014) Kids playing football on the concrete courtyard at the base of the building. Available at:
https://randomwire.com/oi-man-estate/
(Accessed: 13th October 2014)
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Figure 10. David (2014) The government opened Oi Man Estate which was built on a concept of “a little town within a city”. Available at:
https://randomwire.com/oi-man-estate/
(Accessed: 13th October 2014)