newitalianblood

Once, a Spanish settlement in the Caribbean sea, Cartagena de Indias is a chaotic and contradictory metropolis. The coexistence of the remarkable historical heritage, slums, pre-colonial tradition, and joyful lifestyle is not limited to the city center, but it marks the whole lagoon. The current lagoon harbor is mainly touristic. It consists of a gated dock inaccessible from the city. Potentially it could be a key point for the mobility for the territory. The proposal considers the lagoon as the natural connection of a fragmented territory. The possibility of bringing the inhabitants’ daily lives back to the water could recover the relationship between the historic city and the informal settlements of the archipelago. The movements from the islands to the mainland, and backward, represent a heritage that the most aggressive transformations has not erased.