Final Major Project: The Crouch end Revival Project

23/02/2011

For my FMP I've decided to focus on my area and ways to bring more energy and excitement into it. Crouch End, in north London, is different from alot of surrounding areas- its always refered to as having a 'villagey feel' because its quite tucked away and surrounded by hills. Recently, lots of shops along the broadway have closed down and those that aren't replaced by bigger chain stores are just left as empty shop fronts. I've heard quite alot of people saying how Crouch End has gone 'down hill' so I want to stage several small interventions (some temporary and I'll make plans for other permanent proposals) which will become talking points among the residents.

We started our projects on Monday and from now on I'm going to record my experiments and experiences for this 6 week project.

these first 3 pics show a stretch of the broadway which always seems hardest hit by the recession. It has the most bare shopfronts.

This is the crouch end clocktower which is the focal point to the area (still cant stop this pics rotating themselves).

At first I thought i would just focus on the clocktower and ways in which I could draw interest to the monument and the island it stands on. At the moment the tower is practically a traffic bollard, sitting at a busy junction of two very busy roads. I still definately want to look at the tower, but i also want to work on other sites in and around the main broadway.

For these first few days I've been researching the area, drawing little details, sketching buildings and looking into the history of hornsey and crouch end. 've found it quite weird researching and studying a place i've lived in all my life- its almost more of a challenge than approaching a site and researching it for the first time. Today I walked around and did some sketches in the centre of crouch. I focused on the contours, lines and silhouettes of the surrounding buildings. It was really useful, because i began to notice lots of small details that i wouldnt usually pick out.

I've also been doing a string of research on plaques- this stemmed from when English Heritage sewed this small art gallery in the area a couple of years ago for putting a blue plaque on the clocktower reading " The man that sleeps with your wife lives here".

source: http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4005/4493666311_220c0a5b2c.jpg

 I remember it being something all crouch end residents were aware of and it became quite a talking point. I like that idea of crouch enders being bought together by little messages and funny occurances. It would be great to construct this temporary space in the centre of crouch end where people could slip little messages and communicate with each other - it would be a bit like a physical social networking space.

I've got a few other ideas of ways to extend my revival project- one being replacing the clocktower with another time keeping device, maybe an hourglass. But I'm finding the idea of getting a 6 week project on the way quite daunting. I've got used to 1 or 2 week long projects and at the moment I feel like I'm hovering on the periphery of my ideas, when i just want to go for it and get on with them. Tomorrow I'm going to do a bit more research into drop boxes and ways of sending messages.