The diploma thesis of the student Loukia Peklari-Mei base on the term ‘repurposing’ (Metachrisis). The main goal of the study is the adjustment of an object to serve a different use while maintaining its characteristics. Τhis is proposed through the creation of a range typologies of spaces among the Kallirois and Sygrou Avenue at the Syggrou Fix subway station.

-text by the author

The project Sygrou Fixed: Forms of Metachrisis is a result of extensive experimenting and design research, around the sectors of computational design, simulation and fabrication process.

The goal of the project is the invention, description and analysis of a design, construction and mostly morphological system, whose application is investigated indicatively in the city of Athens, in an urban scale.

Stimulus for the start of this research is Peklari-Mei Loukia’s research thesis ‘Metachrisis and multiplication in architectural structures’, and especially the term ‘Metachrisis’, which is defined by the writer –as a translation of the English term ‘repurposing’– as the adjustment of an object, to serve a different use than the one that it has been designed for, but maintaining at least some of its original characteristics. In this thesis, metachrisis is being investigated literary, through physical model making, but also figuratively, as morphological trigger through digital simulation of the repurposed objects.

Particularly, in the present project the experimentation initiate from sections of paper and plastic bottles, whose behavior and distortion limits are being recorded, analyzed and clustered. Specifically, we studied the effect of forces applying pressure locally on the system and as a whole, the location and the direction of these forces, the different durability and flexibility of the system’s composition materials, as well as the conjunction elasticity. In the next stage, the system is being transferred into e digital environment, in order for his behavior to be parameterized, and it’s complexity, more extensively discovered.

The final form of the system is a hybrid with the characteristics of both physical and digital investigation, while its curves are being studied spatially, and in relationship with the human body anatomy.

The result is a range of typologies, operating as functional centers and transitional spaces, that enclose fluctuations from “closed’’ to ‘’open’’, and from ‘dense’ to ‘sparse’ with the rotation force being the most dominant one, which brings to system to formations that resolves the need of a horizontal terrain for ground or sheltering and a vertical one for separation requirements, without any additional composition tool.

The typology is being adjusted in the distinctive area of the site and resolved in constructive matters. In more detail, the typology comprises an open-air versatile park that is located in a central traffic junction of the tram station and subway exit of Sygrou Fix, among the Kallirois and Sygrou Avenue, abutting the Museum of Modern Art. The site’s shape has a specific nature as it is long and narrow, with absence of usage different from circulation and is situated in between to considerably different areas, in a matter of traffic, financial and maintenance level, the areas of Koukaki and Neos Kosmos. It is a spot in Athens being crossed by thousands of pedestrians every day, however, it does not invite them for further staying.

The design proposal suggests a series of consecutive open-air and semi-open-air spaces that have a range of privacy degrees and spatial qualities that can host athletic, kids recreation, music and exhibition events, composing an urban lounge.

The existing traffic flows are maintained and the most significant of them, between the metro and the tram station, is amplified through their mutual sheltering connection. Lastly, the synthesis is being faced as a light structure with individual 3d-printed particles, assembled on site in every occasion.

Facts & Credits

Project title  Sygrou Fixed: Forms of Metachrisis
Project type  Diploma thesis project
Student  Loukia Peklari-Mei 
Supervisor  Vasilis Stroumpakos
Year  2022
University  Patra’s School of Architecture


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