MSA Stage 5 School of Architecture

Felicity Pike

(she/her)
Contact
felicitypike99@gmail.com
F.Pike1@student.gsa.ac.uk
@Felicity.Pike
Final Design Thesis
A Patchwork of the Urban Fabric

A Patchwork of the Urban Fabric

‘Western civilisation has had a deep-rooted trouble in making connections between head and hand, in recognising and encouraging the impulse of craftmanship’ Richard Sennett, The Craftsman

Patchwork consists of repeating patterns built up with different fabric shapes. Marseille itself can be understood by thinking about the city as a layered patchwork; neighbourhoods, streets, and spaces interlock one another and overlap each other to form a culturally, socially, and architecturally diverse city. Le Panier, the backdrop to this thesis, is the oldest portion of this patchwork. It is a quaint neighbourhood, with classic apartments typical to those found in Southern France, stitched into narrow cobbled streets. This thesis aims to better understand this neighbourhood through a lens of textiles and apply the ideas from the craft of making and using fabrics to mend and create a new ‘patch’ within the city.

My thesis draws upon the writing of Richard Sennett in ‘Building and Dwelling: Ethics for the City’ in which he discusses extensively how a person can read a city whilst using language synonymous with textiles. The fabric of a city refers to how buildings, streets, and open spaces all knit together to form one place. The grain of the city considers the patterns within a place and the relationship between internal and external spaces. The texture refers to how a place is used and what informal and formal activities occur there. The ‘texture’ my thesis aims to bring is providing a space to celebrate and exchange understandings of the city’s lost craft.

Marseille has a rich history of textiles and was once a central point for fabric based crafts. Its trade links have historically brought techniques and methods of printing and handling fabrics from abroad. The city’s relationship with textiles has been turbulent and the place it once held in Marseille is not what it once was.

A Patchwork of Marseille

A Patchwork of Borough 2

A Programmatic Section

Conceptual Threads

Isometric

Sectional Perspective

Level -1 Plan

Level 0 Plan

Level 1 Plan

Level 2 Plan

Level 3 Plan