CONTEXT

The Infonavit Independencia neighborhood is located in the north of the city of Guadalajara. It is estimated that around 66 people live in its 2.500 towers, among which the feeling of abandonment and low appropriation towards the neighborhood predominates. During the first months of 2017, work was done through the Department of Culture of Guadalajara in the activation of the area. Our first contact with the neighbors was through surveys that allowed us to study the context of the colony to develop two design proposals that were later socialized so that the neighbors could vote. The execution was carried out in November 2017 also in a collaborative way, with unemployed neighbors, students from the UDG and citizens of the city. “Nierika” served as a spark to extend the pictorial intervention to the 66 blocks that make up the Infonavit Independencia colony.

South facade

West facade

North facade

East Facade

DESIGN

Neighborhood dynamics put us on the trail of the universe WixárikaThe Wixárika are a majority ethnic group from central western Mexico, mainly the state of Nayarit and the mountains of Jalisco. Like Nierika, we feel the work and its development as a transgenerational mirror.
El Nierika It is the transgenerational mirror of the Wixàricas. A place where different times meet. An amalgam of energy that prolongs the wisdom of the ancestors in the following generations, guiding them to build the future.
In the Wixárika universe, everything is related, everything and everyone is in constant communication. People, plants, animals, the Sun, the air, the water, the earth… we all form part of the same universe, full of links that unite us with each other. Because of the importance of community ties to understand the world, we chose the worldview of the Wixárika people, as well as some of their most identifying elements as inspiration for the project.

"FUI, SOY, SERÉ" represents the strength of the identity of the Mexican people. The richness of their past, the determination to keep it alive in the present and the knowledge that it is in the hands of the people of today to keep their identity beating in the future.
A place built on bridges between different social realities working together. This way of building cities should be a model today, to develop the society of the future.

Tzicurri or God's eye

Adaptation of proposals to support

Participación

The process has been developed jointly with the Department of Culture of Guadalajara, which took on the challenge of activating the area through the activities “Cultura Itinerante”, “Arte sin Paredes” and “Festival Sucede”. The objective was to establish a more open social fabric, capable of welcoming external incentives, and to prepare the community for the upcoming project. Our first contact with the neighbors was through one of the surveys that allowed us to study the context of the area and create two design options. Both options were then presented to the neighbors for them to vote on. They finally chose Nierika. The last stage was the execution, and it was also conceived in a collaborative way. Six unemployed neighbors were trained to work at height, and then hired to work with us. 40 students from the CUAAD of the University of Guadalajara – UDG.

Voting process for design selection