HoteLess. Testing a new type

“I’m inside, you know? It’s working out all right
Charles Gayle*

In Barcelona, there are some 3,000 homeless people, 300 sleeping on the streets. There are many different initiatives working to tackle this problem, ranging from pensions to street flats, shelters, shared flats and all their variants.

At the same time, one of the main sources of income in the city is tourism. But it must be noted that, over the past decade, Barcelona has been controlled by this sector, creating a serious imbalance between private and public interests. Amidst this debate, which we believe is essential, this workshop stands with people who have been left without a home (a right, not an investment) and proposes a combined operation involving tourism and homelessness.

HoteLess. Testing a new type is an Innovation Workshop that aims to explore a new residential format for the homeless within a normalisation process. A new context where the issue isn’t addressed solely from the standpoint of helping but also shows what is being given back to society as a result of the success of the Barcelona model and gets all of society involved, first hand, in this new realityt.

The workshop, proposed at the eme3 architectural festival and geared towards students and professionals in the various disciplines of design, architecture, social sciences, anthropology and urban geography, proposes an introduction to casuistry through different ways of sleeping and co-existing, from Ferran Busquets, and the evolution of hotels, from Txatxo Sabater.

It starts by defining the need, explaining the appropriateness of an urban location, taking advantage of normal hotel structures, conceived as a business that substitutes eco-taxes for social taxes, describing the need to predict arguments.

The work focused on drafting two documents: a diagram, or sketch summing up a new outline of how hotels work, showing what is shared, what type of spaces could be proposed, and how they would work; and a collage, or imagined section, in the style of Rue del Percebe, representing communal life and scenes of co-existence.

 

*This is what jazz musician Charles Gayle said when, after living on the streets of New York for many years, he overcame his time being homeless and was asked how he felt in the tiny new flat.

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Start Date 23/10/2015
End Date 24/10/2015
Title HoteLess. Testing a new type
Mission Workshop
Typology Teaching
Location IED Barcelona
Developer eme3 International Architecture Festival
Teachers Daniel Cid, Francesc Pla
Collaborators Ferran Busquets, Txatxo Sabater, Óscar Guayabero

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