Cristina Palicari
(Ro)
I'm Cristina, interior architect, amateur poet and nomad at heart, and I have two big passions: cities and people. Most of the time I am either observing them or writing about them. Through my work, I want to awaken feelings of love, community and most of all, belonging. We are all in desperate need of it.
House of Comings and Goings is a project that wishes to shed new light on the travelling industry and our relationship with the city. It is a place whose aim is to transform long-term travel into a beneficial and fruitful pursuit for both the people doing it, the nomads, as well as those partaking in it, the locals.
Situated in the heart of Berlin, it acts as the neighbourhood living room and has only one goal: to be the connection point between locals and travelers, blurring the boundaries and limitations between them.
House of Comings and Goings is a place of exchange, discussion and creation, curated and maintained by the nomads, for the locals. A place in which the roles of guest and host have been exchanged.
We are currently living in what some might call ‘dark times’. Since the ‘50s, we have been experiencing an uninterrupted development of a society of consumers. In our society of affluence, through stages of modified capitalism, we have seen the transition from a state of incommensurate production to one of lavish and excessive consumption. Being nomadic is the oldest and somehow ironically, the youngest form of existence. We used to call them hunter-gatherers or pastoral nomads; nowadays we classify them in different ways: expats, backpackers, digital nomads. More of us move around for work, for pleasure, for love or to explore. But how is all this mobility influencing our societies? In a state of perpetual flexibility, what changes are cities going through?
This paper’s aim is not just to be an analysis of nomads, but a larger examination on our society; a reflection on how we see and consume the world. Tourism, migration and mobilities are no longer marginal aspects of our world; they have moved to the centre of contemporary societies and are important elements constituting our individualities. While offering a perspective on the economic, political and social settings that helped shape a new generation of nomads, I wish for this thesis to start a conversation on the promise of a new urban civilization, its vitality, immediacy and doubts, as well as what it means in relation to our notions of identity and belonging.