URBAN ACUPUNCTURE - Use of Small Scale Interventions to Transform the Larger Context

Project idea

In traditional Chinese medicine, acupuncture refers to the insertion of fine needles into specific parts of the human body with the aim of treating a range of symptoms. In a similar way, urban acupuncture refers to the theory of manipulating the urban fabric on a small scale to affect greater socio-environmental impacts. Urban acupuncture as a series of small-scale, highly focused interventions that have the capacity to regenerate or to begin a regeneration process in dead or damaged spaces and their surroundings. In this scheme, nodes are used as Urban Acupuncture tools to serve the community in the Dahampura region and thereby serving the neighboring communities as well.

Project description

Kolonnawa should embrace its exceptional urban setting in which the historic core of the region and the City’s industrial zone coexist in extremely close proximity. Connecting these two conditions into one functional and legible whole would reveal this dramatic juxtaposition and create the premises to articulate it into an attractive urban constellation. It would completely reinvent the region’s identity and move it towards the image of a vigorous urban condition with a bright future.

Technical information

From a fragmented region unaware of its treasures and focused around it’s poorly connected mini centers, Kolonnawa should turn into a coherent compact region with multiple meanings. It should become an open-air exhibition of all of its natural resources, offering exceptional quality of living and working conditions. As such it would become attractive for a variety of social groups, from young families to energetic entrepreneurs, by this way the Kolonnawa region can position itself in the network of centrality with Colombo City. Industry and the natural resources can make Kolonnawa truly competitive and complementary on the regional scale.