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La Cité Miroir: Reflections on the experience of disabled persons
Abstract
La Cité Miroir, a public multi-use cultural space is situated in the former public swimming pool and thermal baths of La Sauvenière (Bains et thermes de la Sauvenière), a modernist architecture registered as monument in the Walloon heritage since 2005. This building located in Liège city centre in Belgium has been considered as one of the most important constructions of the interbellum modernist style and referred to as the “cathedral” of sports architecture in Wallonia. Following the success of architect Georges Dedoyard (1897-1988) in the building design competition in 1937, the construction of La Sauvenière began. The building was inaugurated during the German occupation in 1942 and has been described as a symbol of resistance as it was designed in the Bauhaus style which was considered degenerated by the Nazi regime. For more than half a century, this unique high-rise building served as a public sports centre until it was abandoned in 2000 due to non-compliance with safety standards. In 2014, after an extensive project consisting of asbestos removal, demolition and rehabilitation, La Cité Miroir was opened to public as a “cultural and citizen space”. In resonance with the social values of the site, the Cité Miroir Foundation aims to advocate and promote humans’ rights principles and contribute to creating a just and unified society.
In an in-depth study of disabled people’s interaction with built heritage and its values, shifting from the classic relation in which the standardized human body was the source of proportion and measures for architecture, the human experience of space is in focus. This consists of how the space feels and works and what it means for the user and takes into account both the spatial and temporal aspects of built heritage, reflecting on its values. In the framework of this study, this paper investigates the disabled people’s experience in the context of this modern heritage site and the new use the space affords. Building upon the unique expertise-by-experience of disabled people as user/experts, the analysis is conducted through in situ field studies with multiple persons with an impairment in which their bodily experience is attended to. This paper reports on the preliminary results of these field studies which offer insights for improving the inclusivity of heritage spaces and its values.
The relation between accessibility and conservation is often contested, resulting in tensions between accessibility and heritage advocates. While the importance and necessity of accessibility and gradually the broader notion of inclusivity for diverse users (e.g. people with different abilities) is becoming more evident, existing discussions mainly focus on the problems and constraints of accessibility in the heritage context. Instead, in this article, we present disability as a generative resource.
People with disability experience, referred to as ‘the other’ and ‘strangers in their own land’, similar to people with different ethnicities, cultures and genders, have been subject to discrimination. In the heritage field, the notion of self and other is mainly focused on colonial and occupied heritage. Additionally, it can be seen in the division between heritage experts and the others. Nowadays, the conservation practice is gradually moving towards collaborative approaches involving diverse others. Our research on inclusive built heritage acknowledges the existing challenges at the crossroad of accessibility and conservation. Following the example of research that rethinks disability’s meaning and its impact on architecture, we build upon methods used in the context of inclusive design and adapt them for the heritage context. In order to gain insight into how different bodies and minds experience built heritage, we collaborate with user/experts on multiple case studies in diverse heritage sites. We observe the potential of the theoretical and methodological output of the research for the broader conservation practice. The approach put forward by our research provides an opportunity to rethink normative approaches in heritage conservation, questioning assumptions and habits (in e.g. heritage evaluation) and challenging prevailing preconceptions.
This thesis analyzes the principle of minimal intervention in built heritage
conservation in order to determine its relevance for today’s heritage field. The origins and
evolution o f minimal intervention are analyzed in early conservation projects and
heritage doctrines, in 20th century charters and legislation, and in the present context of
values-based conservation and sustainability. This research shows that while the principle
was developed in close connection to material authenticity and the historic value of
monuments, more than one type of minimal intervention can be identified today. Further,
the thesis proposes a new definition to minimal intervention, one that takes into account
the impact of conservation decisions on all the values of a place and on all the
stakeholders involved. It asks to consider minimizing the impact of conservation
measures not only on the material fabric of places, but also on their associated values,
users, broader community and even the planet.
Europe’s built heritage is the world’s most diverse and rich patrimony, and an important component of individual and collective identity. Its societal relevance is inextricably linked to sustainability: by opening up built heritage and using it appropriately, its upkeep is best secured and its protection from decline guaranteed. Integrated conservation therefore strives to give built heritage a contemporary role in society. At the same time, inclusion policy strives for all people’s participation in society, which requires that environments can be reached, entered, interpreted and used by people with diverse and evolving abilities.
When built heritage plays a contemporary role in society, and different people participate in society, both meet. Making built heritage inclusive—i.e. reachable, accessible, understandable and usable for as many people as possible—is a highly complex matter, however. Proposals to make historic buildings more inclusive, tend to raise objections from conservation authorities, which guard the historic values of built heritage. Current approaches to accessibility do not seem to deal with these concerns well. Built heritage thus remains beyond reach, both practically—from the perspective of disabled people—and legally—in terms of building regulation.
Is making built heritage (more) inclusive really beyond reach, the proverbial exception to the rule? Or can we address it from a different angle? This paper reports a field experiment that addresses inclusivity of built heritage in a different way, by allowing a group of people to become concerned with this issue. The context of the field experiment is a European university, whose campus features a considerable number of protected buildings. After introducing the origins and set-up of the experiment, we report what insights it yielded so far, how these are received by different people and how they impact the real-world situation on campus.
The relationship between the built environment and the human body is rarely considered explicitly in contemporary architecture. In case architects do take the body into account, they tend to derive mathematical proportions or functional dimensions from it, without explicit attention for the bodily experience of a building. In this article, we analyse the built environment in a way less common in architecture, by attending to how a particular person experiences it. Instead of relating the human body to architecture in a mathematical way, we establish a new relationship between architecture and the body—or a body—by demonstrating that our bodies are more involved in the experience of the built environment than we presume. The article focuses on persons with a sensory or physical impairment as they are able to detect building qualities architects may not be attuned to. By accompanying them during a visit to a museum building, we examine how their experiences relate to the architect’s intentions. In attending to the bodily experiences of these disabled persons, we provide evidence that architecture is not only seen, but experienced by all senses, and that aesthetics may acquire a broader meaning. Senses can be disconnected or reinforced by nature. Sensory experiences can be consciously or unconsciously eliminated or emphasized by the museum design and use. Architects can have specific intentions in mind, but users (with an impairment) may not experience them. Attending to the experiences of disabled persons, and combining these with the architect’s objectives, provides an interesting view of a building. Our analysis does not intend to criticize the one using the other; rather the combination of both views, each present in the building, makes for a richer understanding of what architecture is.
Over the past few decades, the architectural heritage of the Modern Movement has appeared more at risk than that of any other period. This built inheritance, which glorifies the dynamic spirit of the Machine Age, employed advanced technology that has not always endured long-term stresses; and the functions which the buildings originally met have changed substantially. Docomomo aims at acting as watchdog whenever important Modern Movement buildings anywhere are under threat in various ways, including by exchanging ideas relating to conservation technology, history and education; fostering interest in the ideas and heritage of the Modern Movement beyond their own circle; and reminding those in power of their responsibilities towards this recent architectural inheritance.
- Susan Macdonald
Susan Macdonald, "Materiality, Monumentality and Modernism", (Un)Loved Modern: Conservation of 20th Century Heritage Conference, Sydney, 2009, 5.
The preservation of nineteenth-and twentieth-century heritage
- Fabio Grementieri
Fabio Grementieri, "The preservation of nineteenth-and twentieth-century heritage", World Heritage Papers 5, Paris, UNESCO, 2003, 88.
Liège: Les bains de la Sauvenière
- Flavio Di
Flavio Di Campli, "Liège: Les bains de la Sauvenière", Le patrimoine moderne et
contemporain de Wallonie de 1792 à 1958, Namur, Division du patrimoine DGATLP,
1999.
Centre d'archives et de documentation de la CRMSF, Fonds de la CRMSF
- Liège
Liège, Centre d'archives et de documentation de la CRMSF, Fonds de la CRMSF,
Liège 2.770.