Programme

One way of dealing with large quantities of water, like the yearly melting water coming from the Alps or moments of intens and heavy rainfall, is to give the Rhine space. Literally space: the embankments are not made as hard borders for the water, but they are designed to adjust the waterflow in small or broad streams depending on the amount of water that is flowing through.

The area next to the river, where the embankments give space to high water levels and coach the riverflows into regulated streams, is where we will do the workshops. We will be working on a number of topics, for example with materials that are at hand (water and all kind of sands and clay to find out geotechnical properties of the riverbed) and we will also try to conceptualize how building and living in these ‘semi-wet/semi-dry’ areas could look like.

The location of the workshop will be near the centre of Nijmegen, the sister-city of Arnhem. Nijmegen is on the river Waal, which is the first branch of the Rhine after entering The Netherlands. Actually the Waal is broader than the Rhine and has more traffic of boats going from Rotterdam harbour to Germany.

A temporary program:
8 july Sunday, circa 17.00hrs: meet and greet, collective diner, getting installed;
9 july Monday: getting to know the area and the river by bike. Several lectures on the what and how of resilient embankments;
10 – 11 july Tuesday and Wednesday: workshop;
12 july Thursday: morning workshop, afternoon and evening presentations and party;
13 july Friday: travelling back home.

The summer school is a collaboration from ENSAS and INSA in Strasbourg, the Fachhochschule in Konstanz and ArtEZ Academy of Architecture.