Making Culture - Continuous re-appropriation of a city piece

Abstract: I understand the site of the former Schilleroper as a piece of the city with an unsettled history of trying, failing and trying again. Despite its difficult history of ups and downs, the Schilleroper has been a meaningful and popular place within its neighbourhood. A place of affordable, low threshold culture for the former working class residents. Even long after its life as a venue for large cultural events in the grand hall, it has been a lively public place in the area.Decades of neglect and decay later, the building is facing an uncertain future and it remains unclear, what, if anything, will be done to preserve it. The proposal suggests a (more or less) temporary use of the place as a continuous construction site of cultural making. Instead of aiming for a finalized architectural proposal, it describes a process of change and adaptation that, started by the suggested architectural interventions, could eventually develop its own self-renewing dynamics. It aims to offer a place that allows to be inhabited, appropriated and altered by its users. A place that not only accepts these notions, but actively depends on them. A place that the people of Hamburg can call their own.