The parade of temporary interventions on our streets injects them with joy, colour and life – and has lessons for architects, argues Eleanor Young
Carnivals for me are young farmers prancing around in fancy dress on the back of a trailer. The big band plays and crowds jostle in close. There was something of this to the February farm protest filling London’s Whitehall, and all roads to it, with a bright herd of tractors, trumpeting their way through the city streets revelling in their remarkably tuneful, and loud, horns.
Life on the street is often temporary and transitory – and at its best celebratory and communal. We have learned a lot from meanwhile uses, from the joyful sheds of Jan Kattein and from the outdoor eating revolution. But it feels like there is more juice to be squeezed from temporary interventions that work to signal that spaces are for people.
A recent cycle in and around Belfast Harbour was a reminder of the value of small-scale injections of life into streets and spaces that are not quite as much fun as they could be. Next to a flyover a kiosk built of steels, plus good coffee and space to gather, puts that place onto the map; in a miserable commercial square the enclosure of that space with colonnade and bike fixing will bring life too.
Outward-facing energy
I remember my first food-van food-revelation, more than two decades ago on an equally dismal parking lot on the MIT campus, just across the cold Charles River in Boston, US. Amazing pieces of architecture – by Frank Gehry, Fumihiko Maki and others – were opening around it. But it was the deliciousness from the van that drew the student crowds.
Kiosks and vans bring an energy all of their own, despite a lack of plumbing, the discomfort of working them and the complexities of power and hygiene
This odd relationship between the temporary and permanent is visible walking into the city in Bristol, where office blocks with apparently empty ground floors line the street. No life in there. But there is a coffee van perched on a corner, with a barista blowing on his hands in a futile attempt to warm them. No retreating behind glass doors and insulated walls here.
Planners might exhort architects to animate their ground floors with commercial or public uses. But kiosks and vans bring a life and energy all of their own, despite a lack of plumbing, the discomfort of working them and the complexities of ensuring power and hygiene.
The economics of entrepreneurship drive these moveable, temporary-ish outlets. But it is the very fact that they are camping out, along with passers-by, that makes them accessible and convenient. They are in your face, asking to be used, in a way that often our buildings – with their focus on warmth, security and internally driven programmes – neglect.
In doing so, they miss out on the energy of interactions with their location and the people in it. There is something to learn from the parade of temporary buildings in our cities.