Hannah Wood

The Postcrisis Reconstruction Agency is an architectural response to the international aid money that poured into Japan to support rebuilding after the tsunami in 2011. As a political entity, the Agency intervenes in an institutional vacuum, or ‘state of exception’ prior to the remobilisation of political infrastructure in the aftermath of urban trauma. It acts upon physical matter to re-code the dominant economic mechanisms that proliferate in this condition to realign urban reconstruction with the needs of citizens.

 

The project was developed in response to a 6-week research period in Higashimatsushima, north-eastern Japan, during 2015. The aim of the Agency is to redirect 80% of the annual rebuilding budget which bounced back to Tokyo banks unspent while citizens remained in emergency accommodation long-term. The Agency combines the operations of credit union and developer to offer communities affected by catastrophe a greater stake in the rebuilding process, a concept which was developed into a business model in collaboration with Copenhagen Business School.

 

The presentation drawings explore the Agency in motion, acting and reacting with the Kotobuchicho neighbourhood as it becomes a laboratory for an alternate construction ecology. The central hub includes a community forum, where people living and working in the local area can present ideas for rebuilding so decisions can be taken collectively. The Agency has multiple entrances and sometimes covertly occupies space in existing businesses. The architectural expression of the building draws from the Metabolist movement which inspired post-War Japanese architecture.

 

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