Alastair Sinclair

The project explores the liminal space between water and earth, the tension between natural systems and man-made structures. Mont-Saint-Michel and its bay have been in the constant entanglement between land and sea. Due to the opposing processes of sedimentation and erosion, the terrain of those areas has changed over time. Constantly re-shaping of the material space by constructing, reclaiming, destroying and restoring. The bay of Mont-Saint-Michel can be seen as a palimpsest, each narrative erasing the previous, but still preserving the traces of the old. Once again, the landscape of the area is about to change. To protect the salt marshes and to avoid the process of costal squeeze caused by sea level rise, a historic sea wall is reconstructed deeper inland, leaving behind the ghosted lines of the former polders and dyke.

By weaving the natural and artificial, the managed and the unmanaged, and the micro and the macro, we create strange and active architectures. Many nonhuman actors contribute to ecosystem function. To tackle the threat of biodiversity loss in the bay, the project introduces a network of walled gardens that act as a nursery habitat for different species within the salt marshes. Granite canals separate the gardens and regulate their access to the water of the bay. Upon these canals, thin screens of university buildings enable the study and maintenance of the gardens.

Entwined with the transitional zone of the ecotone, proposed walled gardens become landscape interventions that nurture an active form of environment.

University of the Littoral is a collaborative project between Jagoda Borkowska, Lucrezia Hu and Alastair Sinclair.