Interconnected in Culture for a Stronger Ecosystem

An Experiment in Collective Urban Imaginary

Implemented by: Nadine et Nouran Sameh

City: Cairo, Egypt

An Experiment in Collective Urban Imaginary

Nadine and Nouran are two sisters who have degrees in architecture and urban design, particularly interested in how architecture plays an important role in the perception of reality.

Nadine and Nouran want to do an experiment in collective urban imaginary on an old national building in Cairo. Mogammaa Al-tahrir is a former bureaucratic and official building, which holds a certain significance in the collective memory and shared history of the citizens, and is left on hold for future redevelopment as most governmental sectors hosted in old official buildings are slowly moved to the new capital. The project aims to invite citizens to engage and reverse the power dynamics between the designer and the user of space and explore the urban imagination to enrich the community by co-questioning alternative scenarios of what this building could be to the local community. The research will take the form of piloting the co-imaginary through a micro-sidewalk, round tables, workshops and an online platform to collect ideas and imaginations from as much various and diverse participants as possible such as artists, architects, town planners, researchers to feed the project.

They will organise an exhibition that will bring together and present the data collected and the different imaginaries offered. In addition, an online platform that would serve as an archive for these imaginaries, notably highlighting the involvement of the people who participated. They also want to explore a possible publication/archival magazine for the collective imaginaries.

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