During my Masters at UCL I participated in a project situated in Medellín, Columbia. The work was part of a learning alliance between MSc Building and Urban Design in Development from the DPU, the Moravia Cultural Centre, the Moravia Resiste Collective, and the Cooperative Coonvite.
Despite being in the midst of the pandemic, for more than a month, 62 participants - me, my course mates, professors, as well as people from different organisations in Medellín - worked from 13 different countries. We met in a digital space to tackle a common challenge: how to address research-based design to have an impact in the city decision-making process inspired by popular education. We worked along four analytical axes to create the Living Heritage Atlas: systems of care, memory, and migrations, landscapes of recycling and community connections, and communication.I worked on the axis of Landscapes of Recycling, chapter 4 of the Living Heritage Atlas, where we co-created a comprehensive analysis of the neighborhood's waste metabolism and strategies to create a more just circular economy. We focused on the work of recycling workers and showed the importance of their work in the neighborhood, Moravia, and the wider context of the city.

The main site of inquiry, Moravia, has been the laboratory of spatial interventions and has endured long-term eviction threats. During the engagement, we needed to grasp the complexities and contradictions of urban transformations to rethink different urban futures for Moravia through a living heritage approach as a way to respond to those threats. The notion of Living heritage was conceived as a tool to rethink urban futures and create strategies to tackle threats and grow opportunities. 

Although the co-creation occurred remotely, I am proud to say we generated new cartographies, shaped by the participants’ commitment, enthusiasm, and dedication in spite of their different personal situations and locations. The type of design based research cultivated in the co-creation process was based on the dialogue of knowledge(s), intergenerational learning, and storytelling to promote collective imagination to advance towards spatial justice.
Our presentations were attended by representatives from Medellin Local Government, the Global Platform of the Right to the City and UN Habitat. Particularly, UN habitat Director for Latin American and the Caribbean, Elkin Velasquez, praised our collective work to be inspiring for the region as reported by the LA network. The Atlas content will be used as part of the key inputs to the newly created city plan 'the Board to negotiate Moravia's future'.
Chapter 4 - Landscapes of Recycling
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