Investigating the presence and activity of millennial's in Stellawood cemetery, Durban : toward the design of a cemetery that reintegrates the living with the dead.

Abstract

Cemeteries have for centuries played a significant and influential role in society, most especially within the urban fabric. Today, however many urban cemeteries are becoming isolated and distant to life in cities; their real value lost to the society in which they rest. With the intention of starting a discussion around the future and potential of these lost city spaces, to explore deeper meaning and alternate uses, the research within this dissertation looks to another user of cemeteries, the Youth who seek a new but once accepted function in these incredible city landscapes. A young generation of millennial’s eager for change, for reformation, for a new world and structure of life, taking control over the terrain of the cemetery as their playground, their own unique space within the city. The understanding adopted here is that these spaces offer a freedom and unique set of features unlike any other public space. These youth give a life, albeit a forbidden one, to these cemetery landscapes, they add a new purpose and value in these spaces, engaging in Longboarding, Skateboarding, Running, Cycling and Exploring the depths and beauty of a landscape set apart from the normalities of society around them and it this potential for the youth to add new life to these spaces that has yet to be realised.