The City as a Laboratory of Processes: A Decade of Urban Experimentation with Concentrico

"As cities continue to develop, we are seeing ever more well-planned, thoroughly executed, and tightly regulated approaches to shaping urban centres and their surrounding spaces-for better and for worse. As codes, restrictions, and guidelines improve and tighten, urban environments become safer, more balanced, and less prone to surprise. Yet the flip side is that highly managed districts can drift toward over-order and sanitisation, shedding the messy, accretive character that once produced alleyways, residual spaces, and unexpected sequences of movement-conditions"

"In response, a growing number of initiatives around the world are proposing short-term urban installations that test alternate futures for the city. These works aim to provoke dialogue between what the city is and what it could offer its communities through thoughtful, context-specific spatial practices. One notable example is Concéntrico, the international festival in Logroño, Spain, conceived as an urban innovation laboratory."

Cities are becoming increasingly well-planned, thoroughly executed, and tightly regulated, making urban environments safer, more balanced, and less prone to surprise. Highly managed districts can drift toward over-order and sanitisation, shedding messy, accretive character that produced alleyways, residual spaces, and unexpected sequences of movement. Community improvisation in grey regulatory zones historically generated informal spatial conditions and spontaneous interactions. Short-term urban installations are emerging worldwide to test alternate urban futures and provoke dialogue about potential community-oriented spatial practices. Concéntrico in Logroño, Spain, functions as an urban innovation laboratory marking its tenth edition with a book and an international tour sharing a decade of collective transformation and design insights.

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