The Role of Sustainability in the Design of Memorials Commemo ...

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  • Title: The Role of Sustainability in the Design of Memorials Commemorating Warfare in the Twentieth Century and Onward
  • Author(s): Cayo Gamber
  • Publisher: Common Ground Research Networks
  • Collection: Common Ground Research Networks
  • Series: Design Principles & Practices
  • Journal Title: The International Journal of Design in Society
  • Keywords: War Memorials, D.C. World War I Memorial, Lieu de Mémoire, Monument against Fascism, Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red, The Gateways of the Germans, Memorial Design, Nation-making
  • Volume: 13
  • Issue: 1
  • Date: March 15, 2019
  • ISSN: 2325-1328 (Print)
  • ISSN: 2325-1360 (Online)
  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.18848/2325-1328/CGP/v13i01/53-66
  • Citation: Gamber, Cayo . 2019. "The Role of Sustainability in the Design of Memorials Commemorating Warfare in the Twentieth Century and Onward." The International Journal of Design in Society 13 (1): 53-66. doi:10.18848/2325-1328/CGP/v13i01/53-66.
  • Extent: 14 pages

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Abstract

When designing commemorative memorial sites to a nation’s war dead, there is a pronounced desire to ensure permanence. Given that these memorial sites often were seen as the sole grave markers many of the victims were denied, the desire for permanence is understandable. I would like to argue, however, that we could/should learn from rethinking permanence as a design imperative. Monuments should embrace their own mutability. To that end, I consider how impermanence, ephemera, redesign, and/or memory itself could (should) become part of the original design effort.