Prof. Dr. Md Shahidul Ameen, Patrick D. Rozario, Syed Abu Sufian Kushol
Year:
2018
University:
BUET
[ From the student ]
The present is a time, where no fixed guideline remains as to from what point of view a project should be understood or observed. Whether it be an engineer or an architect, we are to find that grey area in between, which maximizes the output of the objectives to be achieved.
This project is based on the concept, ‘Assemblage’ which is an ontological framework developed by Giles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, originally presented in their book “A thousand plateaus(1980)”. Assemblage theory provides a bottom-up framework for analyzing social complexity by emphasizing fluidity, exchangeability, and multiple functionalities through entities and their connectivity.
The concept of assemblage is being observed in a wide variety of fields in today’s time. Now the question arises whether the same concept can be applied to address the rapid growing disruptions in an urban context.
The tannery industry is one of the thousand industries which faces this form of disruption at a massive scale. And of the many proposals to tackle this disruption, the middle ground of assemblage seems to be one of the most reasonable ones in terms of solving this crisis from the basic core.
For the last 50 years, the tannery industry has grown with all its chain of networks in Hazaribag, which has eventually lead to manifold disruptions and adverse effect upon the environment, especially the Buriganga river. In recent years, the industry has been shifted to Savar with the aim of regenerating the tannery estate in a technologically advanced and environmentally sustainable way. But unfortunately most of the objectives are not achieved and with the exclusion of the social fabric of Hazaribag, the disruptions are forming with newer dimensions. The alarming part is that Dhaleswari is soon turning into the next Buriganga.
Now the main challenge was to design a new tannery estate at Savar, regaining the lost social fabric of Hazaribag and including the upcoming technologies for upgradation. The spatial design was generated following the five points of Rhizome from the assemblage theory, connection, heterogeneity, multiplicity, asignifying rupture, cartography, and decalcomania.
Starting from the building mass to the clusters and finally the entire master plan – these factors could actively decrease the predictable disruptions and generate opportunities for future adaptability from a single unit industry to the urban scale.