ABSTRACT
It is more than clear that we must begin designing cities together with the natural landscape rather than against it. The micro/world communities/microcosm of plants, fungi, bacteria, animal and insect life can teach us something if only we are prepared to listen. Our conceptual boundaries between ‘us and them’ need to be seen not as dividing walls, but as spaces of negotiation and development. The environment is not a ‘machine to be fixed’, but a whole in which we humans are embedded.
This chapter describes a case study of a small farming community on a Greek island facing the ominous forces of mass tourism. The study was an attempt to become intimate with the lived reality of this place. Its history, topography, built tradition, social customs, animal life all came into the foreground through the use of narratives. These stories revealed the spatial and conceptual nature of boundaries, which are in many ways the community’s deep structure. The interpretation of these stories revealed the social and ethical function of architecture and suggested ways in which one can live with nature and its seasonal changes. If we can be clear about what we have and love, we may be more able to defend it.
