Recontructing the western front of Rethymnon

Residing in a typical Cretan landscape with its historic palimpsest from the Venetian and Ottoman era, the western  waterfront of Rethymnon (island of Crete, Greece) exemplifies a de-industrialized zone on a urban seafront, on the outskirts of a Mediterranean city. Main project's objective is the reconfiguration and the revitalitzation if this coastal zone, which is now a degraded area, characterized by a disrupted relationship with the sea, an intense residential development and discontinuity with the city's center urban actions. 

The projects consits of the overwall organization of the area, through a network of interventions, aiming the creation of spatial systems of outbreaks, cavities, extremities and connections along its entire lenght. These systems are aticulated  with each other by littoral route,  and internal coastal road and and sutures with the south and east districts. The design integrates the sorrounding landscape, attempting to signify the concealed streams of the region of the intervention and the diffusion of natural elements into the city. In the eastern part of the design, the approach nominates the reinterpretation and the accetuation of the trace of the Venetian wall, the use of water as a bioclimatic element and the rendition of a fractured and more natural coastline. 

Overwall, the proposal envisions the re-formation of the coastline and the redefinition of the interralation with the sea, as well as the creation of an open, active and cohesive landscape of urban leisure activity with a broad variety of interactions.