URBAN HUBWHERE EVERTHING CONNECTS

Comprehensive Building Design. George Simpson

“Eventually everything connects – people, ideas, objects. The quality of the connections is the key to quality per se.” -Charles Eames

URBAN HUB HUB /həb/: The effective center of an activity, region, or network. The central and most active part or place.1

An urban hub, is designed to link distinct types of elements with each other forming a network2. An example of these elements that can constitute a hub are: Natural, Human activity, and Buildings. Examples of natural elements can include: a greenway, a group of trees, a large boulder, or a patch of grass. Human activities can include elements such as a workplace, a residence, a storefront, or a spot to sit and drink a cup of coffee. And Buildings which includes everything that man builds to connect natural elements and reinforce his activity nodes.3

As humans we need a connection to nature, to sense that we belong to the rest of the natural world. And we can make that sense of connection strong by experiencing nature often, through all the senses: such as going for a walk, gardening, feeding your fish, adventuring in the bush, swimming in lakes or the ocean, beach combing, making nature themed art, and smelling the rain; these can be experience in the city. Returning to a place or experience repeatedly, builds a stronger relationship as we collect stories of experience over time.4

We also need to connect with other persons and our communities, in order to create a sense of place, it helps us understand who we are and feel part of something larger than ourselves, and this can only can happen through interactions with others and by having an appropriate space for these interactions to occur. It is also important in order to have good connections, with the natural world and our communities, to have a healthy lifestyle. We need to benefit from these connections, and in order to achieve this, we need to take care of our body, with healthier food habits, exercise, and a healthier environment.5

This project situated in Wicker Park in city of Chicago, has a privileged site, because within the program requirements and its surrounding elements, it hold the necessary elements and characteristics to be a place in which everything connects, to be a center of activity, the place to be, to become an urban hub. A place in which we can connect with nature given its proximity to a greenway, a place in to connect ourselves with a healthier lifestyle in the health club propose, a place to connect with the community, providing

spaces for human interaction to take place, and a place that connects to our families, a place to call home. A place in which everything connects.

“We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever iaffects one directly, affects all indirectly.”6 Martin Luther King Jr. We are undeniably connected to everything around us, not only with other people, but with our community, and the nature around us, we are all elements of a complex network, and we can benefits from a place that helps us connect with different elements, a hub.

i. Merriam-Webster. Accessed September 10, 2015.2. A network can be simply defined as connections between entities. We have computer networks, power grids, and social networks and they all function on the simple principle that people, groups, systems, nodes, entities can be connected to create an integrated whole. 3. "Connections in architecture and urban design." connections in architecture and urban design. Accessed September 10, 2015.4. "Connecting to Nature - What Does This Mean and How Do You Do It?" HumaNature Connect. September 9, 2013.5 . Mouzon, Stephen A., and Robert Francis Kennedy. The Original Green: Unlocking the Mystery of True Sustainability. Miami: Guild Foundation Press, 2010.6. "Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.]." Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.]. Accessed September 10, 2015.