Narratives Reshaped: Cities in Conflict and Recovery

In the heart of every city enduring a crisis, there are untold spatial narratives yearning to be shared. Conflicts can alter the fundamental aspects of cities, leaving visible and invisible scars that both demonstrate and challenge the ability of inhabitants to adapt and persist. Cities, as witnesses to both challenging times and the capacity for recovery, play a crucial role in understanding how architecture reflects and negotiate, displacement, destruction, and atrocities. Within this complex and unprecedented scenario, we propose unprecedented methods

to observe, experience, narrate, and unfold the reciprocal relationship between cities and their inhabitants. We use tools from art, cinema, theatre, co-mapping, and sculptoristic imagination to narrate our calamity. These tools, intertwined with architectural tools, became central to communicate, moan, and reflect.

Mapping Variations

Written Work

  • (workshop - Transitional housing)

  • (Future housing Workshop)

  • On Thursday The 20th Of October 2022 And On The Course Of Two Hours, IWlab Has Launched The Premiere Of Its Architectural Film “Informality.”

  • The book is a result of a workshop in Damascus that focused on contexts of scarcities and informalities. In this particular context, scarcity is not about materials and resources but about social representation

  • Architect Iyas Shahine depicts architectural changes taking place in Damascus. These changes are reflected in their true form by showing their effects. The project covers several existing and future real estate projects that supposedly aim at developing the city. However, we do not know whether this aim will be achieved.