City of Memory

(RIBA article, March 2011)

Aldo Rossi's Analogous City is represented as a collage of significant memories and places

Walking through the city, we are able to navigate, to understand our surroundings through a series of tacit clues in the environment. We have an almost subconscious understanding (picked up though years of experience) of the roles and relationships of various elements which are present in almost every city in the world. Elements such as high street, town hall, market square and cathedral are readily identifiable as belonging to specific types. We can read, in the language of their architecture the essence of their function. They are the basic building blocks of urbanism around which everything else pivots. The city can be understood as an ever changing mass of housing, workplaces, roads and districts anchored by a network of these fixed elements. 

Over time the elements become monuments of a sort. As they adapt and change with the development of the city their function may change, they may be extended or altered but still these built artefacts retain some aspect of their history and of their original role. An old factory, now repurposed as offices or apartments becomes more than simply factory or housing. It tells us something about the character of our city, about its existence and development over time.  These monuments are stronger than their function. They are a repository for the collective memory of the city, physically embodying the trials and changes, progress and setbacks that together make up the unique character of a town. 


It is important to understand this when considering the city because even if a monument is removed completely, its influence may still be felt in the surrounding district. The traditional location of a market will still invoke a sense of gathering, of bustle and of trade in the hearts and memory of locals long after the stalls have disappeared. Franz Kafka observed this phenomenon in his native Prague while walking through the site of an old Jewish ghetto. 


“Today we walk through the broad streets of the rebuilt city, but our feet and eyes are unsure. Still we tremble inwardly as if we were in the wretched old streets. Our hearts have not yet registered any improvements. The old unhealthy Jewish district within us is more real than the new hygienic city around us.”


Our urban fabric tells a story about us as a society and that story will always have both positive and negative aspects, but new developments which attempt to ignore the pre-existing character of an area, or try to rewrite the history embedded in monuments will ultimately ring false. They will suffer from a sense that they are not really a part of the urban fabric, merely a facade concealing the underlying texture and thus disrupting the legibility of the city. 


An architecture which is reflective of its status as one piece in an ever changing tapestry, can contribute positively to the development of the city. By understanding the existing fabric in terms of its function but also its meaning we can hope to produce work which has a legitimacy within the context of the city and of society.