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Reconstructing Conservation

Part 1 Project 2020
Sonia Syed
Architectural Association London | UK
How can the dismantling of St Paul’s dome provide more value? As mentioned by Lewis Mumford, the very value of social history lies in the act of detachment. The cycling of heritage and value through architecture is questioned. The proposal sits as a new way of understanding conservation; one that takes into account the design of a building’s death along with its birth. By designing an expiry date of the physical object, a narrative is written into the gradual erasure of materiality.

The proposal rests as a 600 year construction process of St. Paul’s Cathedral and rewrites the existing conservation codes so that a point towards its delisting and material devaluation exists. A new outlook on conservation areas in the City of London is questioned. These new codes have a clear, over-arching framework of what conservation means at the beginning of this millennium; it takes 12 generations for a narrative to be forgotten, 300 years for value to lose value and another 300 years for it to be revealed.

This act will be in accordance with the existing Protected View from Richmond Park so that an enhanced view is framed. Moment of delisting: 2320.

Sonia Syed

Tutor(s)

2020
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