H₂Otel : a new model for integrating water systems and coastal architecture

Abstract

During the Industrial Era, "dams, water towers, sewage systems, and the like were celebrated as glorious icons, carefully designed, ornamented, and prominently located in the city, testifying to the modern promise of progress." When technology failed to meet society's expectations, "these icons lost their mobilizing powers and began to disappear from the cityscape." These systems became material embodiments of disillusionment and emphasis shifted from the process of production to the product of production. As technological systems were visually severed from society and natural processes, water became re-conceptualized as a commodity that miraculously enters the "domestic sphere, coming from nowhere in particular." This separation between process and product has transformed consumers' perception of water into a limitless and inexhaustible resource. This misconception has placed the world's freshwater supply is in a state of crisis. Dieter Grau explains that "water is wasted all over the world, in countries with rapidly growing cities that are in the early stages of industrialization, in industrialized countries growing at a moderate rate, in regions that have little water and regions that have a lot of water." The thesis addresses these issues by re-evaluating the organizational strategy of a typical hotel design to emphasize the connection between the consumer and both active and passive water processes. The H₂Otel is a new model for coastal architecture that not only mitigates the effects of industrialization on water but also takes water out of its current status as a limitless commodity and, once again, transforms it into a valuable resource.