Dott 07

Urban Camping
Exploring the concept of urban camping and ‘camp&ride’ schemes as a model for sustainable urban tourism, the first group worked on an urban camping brief. Their aim was to transform a disused space in NewcastleGateshead into sustainable accommodation for visitors the to the Dott 07 Festival in October. The team envisaged a huge tent space based in an archway beneath Byker Bridge, which would protect the visitor from North’s October weather. Tents would sit on platforms of varied heights within the cocoon.

The area would be electricity-free and would have a communal cooking and eating area to encourage sharing and conversation, as well as a more relaxed beanbag seating area.

The group looked beyond the physical to design with the entire experience in mind: a local man and his dog – ‘Bob and the Dog’– were to welcome people to the campsite and act as security, Quaylink buses were to bring people from Central Station to Ouseburn and the local business Recyke Y’ Bike was to provide recycled red Dott 07 bikes for visitors to explore the city.

See more pictures of the Urban Campsite and find out what the campers thought in the Dott Blog.

Allendale Industrial Heritage
The second design camp group worked with the rural community and industrial heritage of the North Pennines on a project entitled ‘Revealing the Invisible’. The concept involved staging night-time outdoor light installations, highlighting industrial structures that have become ruined or have disappeared completely. The

centrepieces of the light installations were all features of Allendale’s lead mining heritage and community, including a long-demolished aqueduct, a spectacular water wheel on the old smelt mill, and the Blackett level, a long, straight, underground tunnel. Audiences were particularly taken with the team’s interpretation of two largely ruined round stone chimneys, which were ‘virtually’ recreated using strong beams of bright, blue light shone from inside the structures
to represent their original height.

Find out what happened when we visited Revealing the Invisible.

Landlines
Designing the agricultural landscape How could minor changes to farming procedures change the face of the landscape? This was the question the Landlines team asked themselves while working with farmers to explore how existing resources might be used to change the view from the windows of Mainline trains travelling through the North East. The aim of the project was also to underline the roles of farmers as producers and custodians of the landscape. The Landlines project will be ongoing over the next 18 months (see what next?).

See more images of the Landlines project at Beals Farm.

Wind Power in the Landscape
The final project explored the concept of power generation as visual spectacle and tourist attraction. It asked: can wind power have a positive effect on the landscape and tourism? Are wind farms examples of contemporary beauty or monstrosities obstructing the view?

The group developed an unusual way of communicating the power of these huge structures, thereby creating a reason for tourists and local residents alike to visit the site. The rotation of each turbine would turn a huge ‘skirt’ of material suspended around its trunk. Visitors could gather beneath the whirling installation – named Perpetua – and use the space to meet others, hold events or watch the world go by.

What next?
Everyone can become a more sustainable tourist. The key is to make use of local resources in ways that provide benefit to the community without damaging the local environment. In a sustainable region, we will make better use of the people and heritage that are already here.