Wrath of The Three Mighty Babas

The architecture of the city yearns to dialogue to dwellers the character of its era, mirroring societies’ cultural, political and social status. London’s urban landscape is structured on this notion but, with the political prelude ravaging the kingdom, the unthinkable arose. Citizens no longer identify with the British Patrimony.

The core idea explored through the Romanian Citizenship Centre (RCC) project challenges idiotic politics enforced by megalomaniac bigots and exposes how, through adequate architecture, a nation responds to unprecedented cultural changes, particularly adherence to a new identity. The project demonstrates the proficiency of an instant infrastructure, ambulant through its modularity, to colonise London with a picturesque territorial glimpse of Romanian culture. This is embedded in a simple program formed of the core tower, living units and a goat barn. Nonetheless, the effectiveness of vernacular design and building methods known of that culture, are present within the RCC as a whole. The strategy consisted of dissecting ornamental motifs and elements of the archetypal Romanian house (e.g: windows, doors, porticos, stairs, roofs, colours, materiality), to be further enlarged and transformed into the architecture itself, disclosing its functionality and decorative mastery. As a result, the centre is an abstracted realism of the country's architecture on British land. Materiality is supplemented with engraved geometrical patterns, clothed in vivid colours that serve their purpose: to illustrate the Romanian spirit sauntering through the RCC. The morphology of the centre replicates the stance of a pumice monolith. All useable architecture is clustered together to form one body, luring inhabitants towards its edifice: the central tower. A binding force, acting as the point of cultural reference for one to learn crafts such as art, sculpture and weaving; a must if you wish to obtain your citizenship. The recreational space allows inhabitants, both humans and their pet goats, to no longer feel suffocated, an issue vehemently imposed by the surrounding dull environment. Essentially, the RCC is a threshold, an epitome of combating soulless architecture and instead, show regard towards the prosperity and identities of communities. Perhaps, our world should be modelled on this very notion and not vice versa.