Crowd culture: towards an integrated approach for cultural diversity

This document is submitted in partial fulfilment for the degree: Master of Architecture Professional at the School of Architecture and Planning, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa, 2017.This research report explores the spatial needs required to culturally experience public spaces through a brief study of the Mauritian context: historical, social, physical and cultural. The latter leads to theoretical research on how cultural behaviour in the Mauritian society informs an appropriate architectural design. A photographic analysis was implemented to identify the different aspects of ‘urban street culture’ as a tool to implement the ‘cultural street fair’, when creating cultural spaces in an urban environment. This has led to a better understanding of human scale and its economic and spatial limitations in a Mauritian urban context. More in-depth research on urban conditions and street functions, to fulfill required characteristics of street life was investigated to understand how to manipulate threshold features such as physical barriers, access, shelter, and opportunity for interaction. As a contextual point of view, the site, as a physical fragment of the present urban decay, was analysed through the urban theory: Finding lost spaces. This theory comprises of Figure-ground theory, Linkage theory and Place theory and multiple urban design principlesXL201