Urbanism versus Branding
for Montréal’s Quartier des Spectacles

The group located and mapped a series of neighbourhood organizations involved with similar social issues, and proposed, by means of maps and drawings, a series of prototypical suggestions that would be useful both to visitors attracted to the venues to the area and local inhabitants: for example, distinctive public toilets that could be installed year round, or playgrounds that would make parks more multi-faceted, for example, occupied for longer periods by visitors accompanied by children. The group also considered more ephemeral projects, such as the Bookcrossing project, a practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise. The Collective noted that new university facilities in the area had already demonstrated some insensitivity to existing social programmes In one case, a major new building entrance faced the main door of a church-organized meal programme for street people that had been operating for some time.

Le spectacle est le capital á un tel degré d'accumulation qu'il devient image.
Guy Debord, La Société du spectacle, 1967 Chapitre 1, 34
above left: Urban Playground Park proposal by Cecilia Chen, incorporating a sculptural image by Guiseppe Gabellone.
right: Urban Washroom Prototype by Cecilia Chen.