Is the city a Buffet, A’ la Carte or Table d’hôte?
Updated: Jun 20, 2020
[ Metabolism, Agency and Choice ]
I’ll get to the dining analogy at the conclusion of this train of thought. Instead, I’d start with writing about the metabolic movement of the 60’s. Possibly the final wave of manifesto driven urbanism that originated in Japan as an alternative version of the avantgarde utopia. A group of young enthusiastic architects and planners challenging the status quo by introducing concepts of modularity, pre-fabrication and reconfiguration to a discourse dominated by a “build it and they will come” thinking. The movement asked, “why not let them build it themselves?”.
In the wake of post-modernism and the western acceptance that modernism was a conflict between technology and humanity, the Metabolists argued otherwise
“We believe design and technology should denote human vitality. We do not believe that metabolism indicates only the acceptance of natural, historic processes – “
“- Technology Is an extension of humanity”
- Metabolism 1960: A proposal for a New Urbanism
The city was seen as one continuous cycle of living. Technology and humanity were envisioned to harmoniously ebb and flow to the tune of spontaneous urbanity. Kisho Kurokawa (1977) highlights why the movement was an alternative form of modernism. It had all the ingredients of doctrinal utopian vision as its western counterpart, but the doctrine itself was inspired by a very differing context – The East. He wrote about the ‘Architecture of the Street’, and how the streets of Kyoto were spaces of living and interaction, challenging their hitherto assumed role of only facilitating transportation. The movements principles were deep rooted in the socio-cultural structure of the east.
I find this interesting because metabolism provides an alternative lens of looking at globalization through the eyes of modernism, as a utopia that is possibly more realistic to the developing world. The city was viewed as a process, instead of a result. Growing and changing in a spontaneous fashion, similar to that of an organism. The world wars plunged cities across the world into an infrastructural crisis, and opportunity. This was the case with Japan, with a majority of its cities obliterated from aerial bombing. Kurokawa (1977) points out that the blank canvas was more apparent in Japan, with the collapsed structures being predominantly wooden, hence razed to the ground in entirety. The Metabolists put forth many proposals, some that turned to reality, and some that remained conceptual. I’ll discuss a few of these proposals, and how they contributed to a larger argument of what cities are meant to represent.
The Marine City by Kikutake was envisioned as the ‘movable city’, it stressed on movable components from the scale of daily equipment to entire urban blocks. Kurokawa’s Nitto Food Company Canary (1964) used prefabricated structural columns with external insertion plates designed to facilitate future expansion. They formed a single unit “cell” that would eventually be repeated to form a larger “organism”. Let it be Otaka’s light gauge steel units or Kurokawa’s box-type concrete blocks in the Nagakin Capsule tower, both approaches were meant to create modular, customizable housing. All these projects and ideas were about growth, customization and spontaneous reconfiguration.
What makes this interesting today? The world wars instigated a global housing crisis, and paved the way for innovation. Today, with a pandemic we are living through, the advocacy for open source platforms and the increased digitization of our cities, how will we now innovate? I’m reminded of a conversation I had with a roommate in my undergrad in India. He was excitedly online shopping for individual components to assemble his own Personal Computer. He had done a ton of research on different parts of the system, the best CPU, Hard Drive, RAM, Display screen and so on. He was configuring his system, with the hope to optimize it, financially and performance wise. I asked him why he didn’t just buy a PC from a reputed brand, and avoid the hassle and risks of assembling it himself. “It’s a rip off, end-to-end encryption is overrated. They charge you extra for the brand, not the performance, just the assurance. I know what I’m doing, so why not do it myself?”. This stuck with me.
Doesn’t this thinking apply to every facet of the great Indian hustle? That chaiwallah prefers to push his cart to and fro everyday than set up in a rented-out shop. He likes the freedom the mobility gives him. He can go where the business is, clear out at will, tune up his business strategy on the go. The Metabolist movement fizzled out for many reasons, one being that the way of living envisioned was so bizarre for the period it belonged to. The technology wasn’t in place, the world wasn’t ready. The Nagakin capsule tower faded out of purpose, and is on its way to be demolished. It had never been reconfigured since it was built. Why? Was the technology not good enough back then? Were the options not enough? Was the process of reconfiguration not fast enough?
I think in this age of digital democracies, we like controlling the outcome. We customize and personalize our smart phones, laptops, cubicle walls etc. We like online shopping, applying filters, comparing brands and reviews, and picking exactly what we want. ‘Tailor Made’ is considered a luxury, and we will pay more for it. It’s also interestingly the most frugal form of living, except it isn’t made for us, we make it ourselves. The Quinta Monroy housing project in Chile proved the same. Let people build and participate, don’t just hand them a finished project. Let them shape their home, just like they shape their lives.
"People will gradually lose their desire for property such as land and big houses and will begin to value having the opportunity and the means for free movement. The capsule means emancipation of a building from land and signals the advent of an age of moving architecture."
- Metabolism in Architecture (1977) - Kisho Kurokawa
The “capsule” was described as a way out, a way of growing. A glimmer of agency in a dystopian setting of replicating cells that stoop the world into monotony. If we could take anything from the Metabolists, It’s the idea of Agency, Choice and Spontaneous Growth.
Informality in Indian cities resounds these qualities, subverting the ordered structure of cities to carve out niches within the system. The bargaining at the vegetable market, the plastic tarps tied to the side of auto-rickshaws as protection from the monsoon, the pop-up cell phone case markets that line the footpaths. They all point towards individuals taking control, and having options. I may never buy a phone case from the pop-up stall, but it’s nice to know that I have an option that is far cheaper than a store bought one. And this is the point I’m trying to make; our cities need to be more open and flexible. With todays technology being considerably more accessible, with open source platforms becoming so popular that LINUX was the operating platform for the recent SPACE X launch, we could head towards a future where built reconfiguration is made so easy that this time, unlike Nagakin Capsule Tower, it may actually be used to its full potential. Qualities of participatory design and responsive building put forth by the Metabolists, or Cedric Price’s Generator Project (1976-79) could today change the status quo, not just challenge it.
Modernism was like a Table D’hôte, listing out the items on the menu and giving little or no choice for the diner to select what they wanted. They had to trust the chef’s better judgement. Our cities today are like an A’ la Carte, you’re given options through zone wise development and smart technology, but the dish style, quantity and presentation are still controlled by the chef, owing to “better judgement”. Maybe it’s time the city became a buffet instead? You could choose to overload on the deep-fried starters and ease up on the salad, and choose your own sauce topping. Maybe dip the fries in the chocolate pudding, why not?! Your choices could bewilder the chef, but you’re the one finally eating it, so it shouldn’t matter.
1) Metabolism in Architecture (1977) - Kisho Kurokawa
2) The Generator Project (1976-79) - UCL Interactive Architecture Lab