Ewout Dorman; Michelle Provoost; Cassandra Wilkins; Wouter Vanstiphout; Simone Rots; Annuska Pronkhorst
Crimson Architectural Historians are a collective working between historical research, critique and architectural practice, with the contemporary city as their subject. They view history not as a closed event in the past, but as something that can imbue the city with meaning across time, and their projects try to set this latent historical potential to work in the present. As part of our manifesto, FREESPACE encourages reviewing ways of thinking, new ways of seeing the world, of inventing solutions where architecture provides for the well-being and dignity of each citizen of this fragile planet. Crimson’s title resonates with our manifesto. A City of Comings and Goings captures a new feeling, a new sense of possibilities. They have questions that might get under our skin: What do we think about change? What new policies could accommodate inclusion? How can society become enriched by otherness? How can we see the dynamics of migration as beneficial and enriching both culturally and economically? How can cities respond, absorb and facilitate change and opportunity? At a practical and physical level, how can architecture, urbanism, spatial and economic policies combine to make a better world?