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Funding: Crowdfunding, Otto per Mille of the Waldensian Church of Italy
Collaborators: Beirut Municipality, Ahla Fawda, Roula Abdo, Fouad Chehab
As girls grow up their freedoms to use public spaces shrink while for boys it increases. Public spaces are vital for adolescent girls as they provide them with an important space outside the house for social interaction and self-expression. For this reason, public spaces must be welcoming for everyone, including girls! With public spaces that are welcoming for girls, these spaces can have the power to inspire and encourage both girls and women to take an active role in public life.
One year after our successful crowdfunding campaign, we concluded the pilot project in Beirut, Lebanon that aimed to empower adolescent girls to take control of their neighbourhood through co-designing and building public spaces.
The project was piloted in the neighbourhood of Karantina whereby gender inequalities are evident in its public spaces. We also prioritised working in this neighbourhood to build on their previous successful community engagement activities. In a country where adolescent girls are excluded from decision making processes that affect their lives, our established community trust facilitated us to work closely with adolescent girls empowering them to tackle this sensitive and crucial topic together.
A co-design programme set out to raise awareness on gender equality, promote girls’ rights to safety in public spaces, understand how girls experience public spaces, and co-create design ideas for safer and more inclusive public spaces.
Adolescent girls co-designed three built interventions in their neighbourhood: a mural and two street interventions.
Mural
A co-designed mural visible to the whole neighbourhood, represents adolescent girls’ aspirations for public spaces in their city. Working in small groups, the girls designed posters inspired by key themes that emerged throughout the participatory process, and with a local artist Roula Abdo (Ahla Fawda) a mural design was shaped. The mural was then implemented with the participation of adolescent girls alongside boys and children of all ages who came together to paint the mural.
Outdoor living room
The mural overlooks the first street intervention site, a space by a sidewalk, shaded by a tree and overlooking a green empty lot. In a co-design activity, the girls got to set up a temporary intervention using simple design elements such as bamboo, cardboards, and fabric, to design and test the use of the space. Following the design direction set by the girls, the design was developed as an outdoor living room. It incorporated a group seating layout protected by a low wall, which acts as a screen sheltering the space from the street to enhance privacy, while preserving the greenery and a religious shrine on site. The girls assembled the mosaics themselves with the support of local artist Fouad Chehab.
“I want to bring all my friends here to show them I was part of creating this space. We will have a great time creating new memories here."
L.O.V.E. wall
The second street intervention site is a sidewalk at the northern edge of the neighbourhood, in a quiet area shaded by trees. Adolescent girls appreciated the scenic qualities of the sidewalk, covered by trees, and saw the potential in creating a colourful intervention that could enhance the spatial quality, and give them a safer space to use. The design spells the word LOVE and provides multiple seating configurations protected by a canopy. The word “LOVE” was identified throughout the programme, expressed by the girls repeatedly: their love for their community, their friends, and their neighbourhood. A photobooth nestles between the letters using infinity mirrors, with a mural that was co-designed and implemented by the girls. The playful benches take only a small portion of the sidewalk, giving enough space for girls to walk, sit, and rest without disrupting the flow of pedestrians.
“My daughter and her friends are doing their social media videos in the spaces they created. They play their music, do their dance, and spend their time laughing. We sit nearby to watch because we enjoy seeing them happy"
We received your application and we will be in touch soon. In the meantime please consider subscribing to our newsletter: