18 Oct

History is only activated when the artifact of the past age is transformed from an object back into a story by the willing participant. This is how I learned history as a kid and how I best experience it today. When I’m plainly told what is relevant about the past I struggle to care, but when I can engage the artifacts of a story the events of the past become alive and meaningful. The same is true with architecture. The objects or stories of the past weakly stand alone but when it is possible to experience the artifact and learn the story,  history (activated) becomes relevant and relate-able. Buildings preserved as objects that can’t be used loose there importance and relevance to the present culture. In the same way, cultural artifacts are lost forever if not treated with respect and preserved in some manner for future generations. This fine balance must be negotiated respectively to activating history through adaptive reuse. Because buildings left to decay often loose their inhabitants and are robbed of their ability to be experienced. Therefore, buildings must be continually updated, modified or re-inhabited with different uses to keep people using them. This use helps the occupants to find the stories of history hidden in the fabric of buildings and write expansions of that story for the future. Activating buildings in this way doesn’t muddy the clear picture of history. It updates our links to that history and assures our understanding of it.

The picture below shows that event the smallest adaptations of spaces keep them living. My bedroom is a modification of what used to be a living room or breakfast nook. Now a 3/8″ wall composed of a shelving unit and a board allow more people to live in the apartment and the rent to seem more manageable. This minor change doesn’t ruin my understanding that I live in a spacious penthouse, it instead enhances it.