From Cycles and Systems to the Creixomil Interstices

Gonçalo Fernandes

From Cycles and Systems to Interstices from Creixomil: between their knowledge and potential transformation is a research about the Parish of Creixomil, through their interstitial spaces between the National Road 206 and the Creixomil Variant. In this research, we intend to find design tools that incite their inherent and relational potential. This study is motivated by the constant changes taking place in the Parish of Creixomil, as a result of the urban expansion of the city of Guimarães that in turn overlapped their specific vocations of the water and the soil. This overlap, fragmented the territory modifying the land division, ways of life, creating unplanned spaces between agricultural lands and the urban sprawl of the city of Guimarães. The gaps are the object of study in which is grounded the specific look to acknowledge the interwilingness between their fragility and potential. By observing the apparent weaknesses of their abandonment, non-occupation and disuse it is possible to recognize vocations and opportunities, not only for agriculture, flora and fauna, but also for collective uses. In them, are traces of past uses, as well as present appropriations and future possibilities; they are a product of/in time and of/in space. It is through these questions that their potential becomes an essential subject of study for a deeper understanding of these spaces and constituent territory. The research project is divided in four chapters: (1) looks at the inherent Creixomil vocations (Vocations); (2) intends to understand the motions that transformed this specific territory of study (Cycles and Systems); (3) deepens the spaces that resulted from these motions, studying their uniqueness, bridging the study (Interstices); (4) to explore a strategy which reinforces their specific and relation potential (Strengthening and Preparing). This strategy is an active response to the special inquietudes that these spaces reveal, through punctual and incisive actions, the aim is to re-integrate the Interstices in the larger territorial dynamics, strengthening their vocations and preparing them for indeterminate appropriations. From Cycles and Systems to Interstices is a study between scales, between times, and between territorial relations, that aims to find ways to articulate seemingly unconnected areas of their surroundings. This relationship is made through an intervention that brings closer the potential of Creixomil territory to the needs of the collective, being the Interstices the device for their articulation.