Every year, we reach Earth Overshoot Day earlier: the moment when we have consumed all the resources the Earth can provide in a year. From then on, we live on credit, depleting still further natural reserves that take thousands of years to replenish. It is only natural that the effects are now being felt. Summers are growing longer and ever more scorching, heatwaves are breaking records, while winters, which our ancestors described as harsh and snowy, are being stripped of their precious white mantle. The seasons seem to merge into one another, disrupting balances we have long taken for granted.We inhabit, cross and alter territories, yet all too often we ignore their nature and how they are formed. Our stories of today and tomorrow must nonetheless be built in harmony with the environments that shelter us, despite the upheavals we have inflicted on them for decades now. The urgency we face compels us to act. We must learn anew to know the ecosystems and geographies we inhabit, through a new lens, striving to shed the perceptions of the modern world that we have internalised and that distort our vision. This quest to transform and question our practices has a profound impact on the work of students in schools of architecture, such as the projects presented here, which seek to offer innovative theoretical and conceptual tools for adaptation through work on the transition of territories in the face of climate change, from the Camargue to the Vosges.
Speakers:
- Liam Mc CORLEY, State-certified architect (DE), ENSA Marseille 2023, intern at Concorde architectes-urbanismes
- Mathieu BURGER, State-certified architect (DE), ENSA Marseille 2023, research track (TPER) under the supervision of René Borruey, INAMA laboratory, ENSA Marseille
From the Grand Rhône to its mouth at Port-Saint-Louis: humankind’s conquest of a wild territory
We chose to work on the municipality of Port-Saint-Louis-du-Rhône and the geography of the Plan-du-Bourg because of its pivotal position between rich and complex ecological and human systems. This low-lying territory, barely above the waterline, is the last inhabited mainland site where the Rhône meets the sea. How can we inhabit an unstable and unpredictable territory without constraining it? The approach can only respond to this uncertainty by redefining the conventional modes of thinking, acting and representing the architectural project. The master plan projecting a finished vision at a set date is obsolete; it must be superseded by a phased construction that remains very open to change and able to evolve according to needs and contingencies. Our project therefore lays the foundations for a paradigm shift and is intended to be passed on, appropriated and amended by local stakeholders over the long term, since it cannot claim to solve all the challenges ahead. Here we seek to deconstruct the Anthropocene and move towards a new form of diplomacy with nature, rather than fighting or ignoring it.
- Camille OPPE, State-certified architect (DE), ENSA Nancy 2023, Theisen architectes – Luxembourg
- Marie DZIECHCIARZ, State-certified architect (DE), ENSA Nancy 2023, permanent position at an architecture practice in Haute-Marne
Post-ski landscapes: the future of a ski resort in the Vosges mountains
+ = -. This equation may look wrong, yet it echoes a reality increasingly affecting France’s mountain ranges: + 1°C = – 1 month of snow cover. While we all have in mind the IPCC report with its scenario of +1.5°C by 2030, the small Vosges resorts find themselves at a loss in the face of the shortage of the “white gold” they had been able to rely on for more than a century. Since 1956, 18 ski areas in the Vosges have already seen their slopes empty of skiers. Yet now that the resorts have their backs to the wall, opinions differ. Should they invest in snow cannons? Try to attract a wealthier clientele? Or simply accept the loss of skiing and find a more virtuous model? Two opposing visions seem to emerge: that of locals who would like to see tourism become more restrained, and that of tourists driven by the desire for discovery. Yet far more than a simple debate about development, it is in fact tourism itself that is being called into question in mountain territories, and particularly in Ventron, the case study for this project.
Respondent:
Carmen De JONG, hydrologist, professor at the University of Strasbourg
Registration:
Free online lecture, register here.
