Hotel Concordia

“Inevitably, every act of memory carries with it a dimension of betrayal, forgetting, and

absence.”

—Andreas Huyssen

“The ship is the heterotopia par excellence. In civilizations without boats, dreams dry up,

espionage takes the place of adventure, and the police take the place of pirates.” —Michel Foucault

The "Hotel Concordia" is a proposal with the aim of stimulating new future vision for the Giglio Island and the shipwreck. With a Tripsmarter1 campaing our task is to collect 329,999,999 US dollars to refloat the cruise and keep it there to create a new economical force in the island: a Hotel. The "Hotel Concordia" thus, will become a significant project to reinvigorate the local economy, while becoming a part of the same landscape and with the same identity of the island.

"The focal point of The "Hotel Concordia" is to refloat the boat and keep it there, in the same place that the shipwreck happened to create a project that will use tourism as the main econimical force in the island of Giglio. Considering that the population of Giglio Island is 1,458 (30 April 2009) and that the Costa Concordia Cruise has a capacity to host 3,780 passengers plus a crew of 1,100 persons, the project can be helpful to create a new source of work for it’s inhabitants, that has suffered an ecological and enviromental disaster and transform the capsized vessel into a powerful economical engine.

While reusing the cruise, we aim to focus the project with an "ecological" approach as it will be done with the existing infrastructure: rooms, kitchen, dinner room, etc. This approach transforms The "Hotel Concordia" into a significant project about social architecture and how a community works together over a period of time to construct a space to reinvigorate the local economy.

The firing of this unique hotel will solidify it as a testimony to human creativity sealed by high fire which will last for generations to come."

With this ironical statement, we want to reinforce the deep crisis we're living in terms of economy, but also in terms of ethics and values under the capitalist market and the political decicions that surrounds our daily life. Andreas Huyssen2 talks about “the nostalgia markets” and this concept links with the idea of tourist taking their souvenir from the Costa Concordia, as a vivid example of what Susan Stewart3 calls “cultural disease”. Our main goal is to remark how architecture could be a site of radical political activism and the importance thet the sociopolitical and economic context has in our architectural responses. To evidence this “cultural disease”, we're being ironic about how even the new economical and collective effort to raise money, such as Crowdfunding campaings can be absorbed by our perverse behaviours.

On the web-site of Micoperi [the company that had been awarded the contract by Costa Crociere to refloat and tow away the Costa Concordia], we can read:

"The plan also includes measures to safeguard the island of Giglio’s tourism and wider economy. Salvage workers’ presence will not have any significant impact on the availability of hotel accommodation on the islandduring the summer season. The main operating base will be located on the mainland at nearby Civitavecchia, where equipment and materials will be stored, thereby avoiding any impact on Giglio’s port activities."

The architectural proposal of refloating the cruise is based on the salvage works that have been done. Instead of removing the wreck, we propose to refloat it using cranes and cables, which is difficult but part of the already approved process.