● Detection

Memorium

ID09

TypeArchitecture

Date2023-09-01

CoordsSpeculative · a waterless future

Posx -0.90 y -2.40 z -1.70

Slug09-memorium

A proto-cemetery — from life to death.

Set in a waterless future reshaped by extreme climate change, Memorium emerges in canyons, reimagining death as the celebration of one's life. The studio challenged preconceived cultural conditions and crafted a narrative for funerary rituals that transcend socio-economic constraints — exploring new configurations for digital-analogue coexistence, where truth unfolds from fiction.

Designed as a proto-cemetery carved into the canyon walls, it sequences a procession of emotional states — from fear, anxiety, and somber heaviness toward calm, serenity, and the sensorily sublime. Spaces range from hospice accommodation and reflective halls to sensory-deprivation chambers, a Reunion Hall, and a Final Act Hall, each tuned to evoke rich sensorial experience and emotional transcendence at this momentous point of a life.

Amidst a world reshaped by climate change, civilization finds solace in the embrace of nature's grandeur.

Media & materials

Dusk render of a canyon with a moon and lit dwellings carved into the rock walls — Memorium at moonrise — the canyon city glowing within the rock.

Detailed cutaway section of Memorium carved into the canyon with numbered spaces — Sectional cutaway — the procession from canyon-top lobby down to the Cemetery Lobby and Reunion Hall.

Render of a luminous corridor within the Memorium canyon — A glowing canyon corridor between the carved volumes.

Aerial render of a red canyon with a winding watercourse — Aerial over the canyon — the river that once was, traced through ochre rock.

Atmospheric render of a misty sensory forest hall — The sensory forest — mist, light, and a suspended mass within the hall.

Render of a purple-lit domed hall with an oculus — The Final Act Hall — an oculus of light over the gathered mourners.

Bubble program diagram linking hospice and cemetery spaces — Program diagram — the hospice and cemetery sequences and their emotional arc.