Alexander Hemming

TEMPORAL UNITY CENTRE

This proposal is a community space supporting the fishing village of Haiyan, China, with the project responding to the cultural and social issues prevalent in the area. Forging the narrative of the design, the writing of my own legend/myth from which my design is explained, helped to create a rounded idea. The story centres around two fish spirits respectively representing the future and the past, which beach themselves due to the pollution in the nearby lake and create the buildings. The two structures and the space around it, therefore, meander the villagers through functions routed in tradition such as cafes and gathering spaces as well as into more forward-thinking areas such as water treatment facilities which allow the community to evolve. The linking of materiality to shape and the balance between resolution and narrative drives the building to an aesthetic yet practical finish.