Narrative Methods for Writing Urban Places

EDITORIAL

Authors

  • Klaske Havik
  • Lorin Niculae
  • Jorge Meija Hernandez
  • Mark Proosten

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.7480/writingplace.5.5865

Abstract

This fifth issue of the Writingplace Journal examines different narrative methods, understood as procedures, techniques or ways of relating or recounting events, and how they can be used to appraise and imagine the city. The editorial process of the issue has been developed within the context of the EU-funded COST Action ‘Writing Urban Places’,1 a multidisciplinary network of researchers who are interested in developing new narratives for the European city. By recognizing the value of urban narratives – stories rich in information regarding citizens’ sociospatial practices, perceptions, hopes and ambitions – the network seeks to foster and preserve the democratic, and therefore inclusive, nature of the modern European city. 

Author Biographies

Klaske Havik

Klaske Havik is Professor of Methods of Analysis and Imagination at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment, Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands. She studied architecture in Delft and Helsinki and literary writing in Amsterdam. Her book Urban Literacy. Reading and Writing Architecture (2014) proposes a literary approach to architecture and urbanism. Havik initiated the platform Writingplace and organised the conference Writingplace. Literary Methods in Architectural Research and Design (2013). The resulting book Writingplace. Investigations in Architecture and Literature appeared in 2016. Klaske Havik was editor of de Architect and OASE, and initiated the Writingplace Journal for Architecture and Literature in 2017. Her literary work appeared in Dutch poetry 141 collections and literary magazines. Havik is leading the EU COST Action Writing Urban Places.

Lorin Niculae

Lorin Niculae is associate professor at Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism, Bucharest, Romania, since 1998. Vice dean since 2020. PhD of the same institution in 2013 with the Arhipera_The Social participatory Architecture, doctoral thesis. He began working 140 in the area of social architecture in 2007, introducing the participatory design method for the communities living in extreme poverty, beneficiaries of housing projects. Currently, he is the president of the Arhipera Association, founded in 2011. Owner of Archos 2002 design studio. Architectural experience since 1994. Founding member of the Romanian Order of Architects (ROA). Currently member of the National Council of ROA. Humanitas Library founding shareholder.

Jorge Meija Hernandez

Jorge Mejía Hernández graduated as an architect in Colombia, and received a PhD from TU Delft, where he teaches design studios and researches with the section Methods and Matter as an assistant professor. He is a member of the Delft/Rotterdam-based research group Architecture Culture and Modernity, where he supervises PhD candidates from the program Architecture and Democracy. He also acts as science communications manager for the EU-funded COST action Writing Urban Places: New Narratives of the European City. Mejía participated in the design of the Balcony exhibition, part of the 2014 Venice Biennale, and designed the San José de Castilla high school in Bogotá.

Mark Proosten

Mark Proosten graduated as an architect in 2011 at the Technical University Eindhoven. Upon graduation he started working as an independent architect in the region of Maastricht, the Netherlands. Since October 2013 he is working as an Assistant for Prof. ir. Wim van den Bergh, within the chair of Wohnbau at the RWTH in Aachen. Mark is one of the contributors of Writingplace, laboratory for architecture and literature. He co-edited the book ‘Writingplace, Investigations in Architecture and Literature, (nai010, 2016). Mark’s research focusses on mid-century modernism in Scandinavia and North America, in which he is pursuing a PhD upon the topic of the so-called Utzonian houses of the Danish architect Jørn Utzon. His teaching and writing is devoted to narratives in general and the relationship between architecture and literature in particular.

References

writingurbanplaces.eu/.

writingurbanplaces.eu/about/team/wg-3-methodological-framework/.

https://writingurbanplaces.eu/library/links/.

These three topics – meaningfulness, appropriation and integration – as goals for the built environment, will be developed in the upcoming 6th issue of the Writingplace Journal, which will be published in the autumn of 2021.

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Published

2021-06-29

How to Cite

Havik, K., Niculae, L., Meija Hernandez, J., & Proosten, M. (2021). Narrative Methods for Writing Urban Places: EDITORIAL. Writingplace, (5), 3–7. https://doi.org/10.7480/writingplace.5.5865

Issue

No. 5 (2021): Narrative Methods for Writing Urban Places

Section

Articles

License

Copyright (c) 2021 Klaske Havik, Lorin Niculae, Jorge Meija Hernandez, Mark Proosten

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.