Pig City MVRDV
The Netherlands is the European Union’s largest exporter of pig meat. But how can this pork production line be streamlined and modernized? MVRDV, a firm known for their emphasis on intensive research and presentation, created Pig City as a means of demonstrating the high rise’s potential as a tool for solving problems of density, simultaneously calling into question the very same issues of quality of life that have dogged the residential tower since its inception. This porcine utopia proposed 76 towers of over 610 metres (2,000 feet), with a 90 meter x 90 meter (300 x 300 foot) floor plan, giving each inhabitant plenty of space to wallow. Pig City is naturally, only a concept. But, more importantly, it is a concept steeped in architecture critical thinking, a stern warning about what might lie ahead should Modernist principles be applied on purely economic grounds and not ethical ones.
Pig City MVRDV
The parallels with humankind’s ongoing flirtation with high-rise utopias are explicit.
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