The dialogue on the reuse of the Amorgos Windmills has started
The two-day Co-design Workshop for the reuse of the Amorgos windmills, held on April 18 and 19 in Chora, Amorgos, was successfully completed. The dynamic response from residents on both days demonstrated that the project has touched upon the sensitivities and desires of the local community regarding the issue of windmill reuse.
The first day’s co-design workshop was characterized by the wide participation of residents representing different social groups, ages, and professions. The open discussion that followed the presentations was particularly fruitful for the purposes of co-design, which is the core of the project. During the discussion, participants were given the opportunity to express their personal stories and opinions regarding the windmills’ place in social memory, and then to connect this relationship with modern community needs, concerns, and the issues that reuse is called upon to address.
On the second day of the workshop, a tour of the windmills took place, during which the operation of the windmill mechanisms, their structural and architectural characteristics, and the technical issues related to their reuse and restoration were explained. Simultaneously, members of the local community narrated stories from both the collective memory and the recent history of the windmills.
The project team will return to the island in October to continue collaborating with the community and local authorities to jointly design integrated proposals for the reuse of the Chora windmills. In the meantime, computational experiments and dimensioning studies will have been prepared. These proposals will incorporate observations and ideas expressed by the residents during the first co-design workshop, and will also include answers to the issues that were highlighted during its duration.
Warm thanks are due to the Amorgos Municipal Library and its staff for their hospitality, as well as to every member of the local community who participated with such great interest in this first step for the adaptive reuse of the Amorgos windmills.
The workshop was organized by the Arcadia Center for Sustainability Transitions AMKE, in collaboration with Boulouki, the National Technical University of Athens, and the Municipality of Amorgos, as part of the project “Energy transition and community participation: Co-creating a vision for the restoration and reuse of the Amorgos windmills”, which is funded by the Green Fund’s “Innovative Actions with Citizens” Programme.
