LIMA_Alvaro_Puertas-1_Designing_Cities

Design Concepts That Have Shaped Your City

LIMA - PERÚ

As shown in the maps, the following presentation is about three types of city designs in Lima, Perú. It is remarkable that both PREVI (System

City Design) and the San Felipe Complex (Modernist City Design) were designed and built almost around the same time (1960’s). Also, it is

remarkable that the Traditional City Design in Lima Downtown is by no means traditional in the peruvian sense but instead, carries european

(spanish and french in particular) influences everywhere.

System City Design

PREVI

Traditional City Design

Lima Downtown

Modernist City Design

San Felipe Complex

LIMA_Alvaro_Puertas-1_Designing_Cities

SYSTEM CITY DESIGN

PREVI (EXPERIMENTAL HOUSING PROJECT)

Peter Land design the base plan for PREVI and 26 architects took part of the

design of housing following a distinct and experimental criteria. The principal

focus of this project was the growing house concept. Indeed, PREVI was

designed as a platform for expansion, flexible growing, and idea also shared

by Metabolists.

As a matter of fact, Kisho Kurokawa and Fumihiko Maki, members of the

Metabolist movement, participated in the design and construction of PREVI,

using a genetic strategy. You can also see the application of the growing house

concept in the Quinta Monroy, a project by recent Pritzker winner, Alejandro

Aravena. Ideally, people is meant to extend their living space according to their

needs.

What also makes PREVI part of the systems city is that 26 architects –among

them Aldo Van Eyck, Christopher Alexander and James Stirling– took part of

the design. Multiple visions were combined and interacted, the way nature

does.

PREVI emerged in 1965, when the Peruvian Government and the United Nations invited

British architect Peter Land to design a strategy for mass housing as an alternative to

the massive informal settlements that were dramatically taking place in Lima during that

period.

Sources:

http://www.architecturalpapers.ch/index.php?ID=91

http://www.scielo.cl/pdf/arq/n59/art16.pdf

KAHATT, Sharif. Utopias Construidas. Las Unidades Vecinales de

Lima.Lima. Perú. 2015

LIMA_Alvaro_Puertas-1_Designing_Cities

TRADITIONAL CITY DESIGN

LIMA HISTORIC DOWNTOWN

(Source: http://www.diversionenlima.com/plaza-de-armas-de-lima-plaza-mayor-de-lima/)

If you could image the City Beautiful Design by Daniel Burnham, you could also imagine a place like shown in this

picture. Plaza de Armas is a place that ilustrates and captures such paradigm. This kind of design and spatial

organization can be found in Lima Downtown. Of course, there are other places that could be compared to Plaza de

Armas, but if you ever go to Lima Downtown, you will definitely be transported to the Daniel Burnham dimension. In

Perú, there are other places influenced by such model, and most of them can be found in the capitals of every region.

The weather nor the topography matters, you will always find a square with european, traditional influences.

Lima Downtown is full of architecture extracted from european tradition. After the

conquest of Perú, tradition has not extisted besides the own spanish architecture. Two

of the places that prove that spanish and european tradition is the key to Lima Downtown

are Plaza San Martín and Plaza de Armas.

LIMA_Alvaro_Puertas-1_Designing_Cities

MODERNIST CITY DESIGN

SAN FELIPE HOUSING COMPLEX

The San Felipe housing complex proves to be

everything that Le Corbusier and all Modernist

giants wanted. The tall buildings where people

live, separated to maximize sunlight, the green

spaces in between, everything in this design by

peruvian architect Enrique Ciriani, is evidence

of the influence of the Modernist paradigm in

peruvian lands.

Large public spaces are also part of the

Modernist scheme. Even if the height of the

buildings is different from time to time, there

are always spaces for people to live in

community. However, this design, in my

opinion, commits the very same crime that Le

Corbusier committed: taking to much space for

parking and cars. Nevertheless, and exemplary

design, and of the best housing complex in

Lima, Perú.

Sources:

http://arquitecturacontemporanealima.blogspot.pe/2012/01/122.html

http://www.tvperu.gob.pe/novedades/sucedio-en-el-peru/la-residencial-san-felipe-cumple-50-os

https://habitar-arq.blogspot.pe/2009/05/residencial-san-felipe-i.html

San Felipe Housing Complex was designed and built around the same time as PREVI.

Since then, nothing like these two proyects have emerged. It seems as if we are stuck

in time, living in the past, remembering ancient glories. Now, we face the growing Lima

without soul only with high rises that offer no social life to the citizens.