Revitalization of Old Havana, Cuba

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Discussion
Analysis
Conclusion
Reference

The architecture of the city of Havana in Cuba is etched with unique historical forces and signature buildings. The architecture of Havana embodies local reproductions of Western and European architecture. The superpositioning of Western and European styles led to the formation of a “strange baroquism” that defined the “lasting features of the overall idiosyncrasy of the city”. Since the change of government in the 1950s, Architecture has progressed very little. In 1982, La Habana Vieja was inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List. A safeguarding campaign was launch a year later to restore the authentic character of the buildings.

While it is important to keep Havana’s old charm, it is also imminent to revitalize and meet the needs and functions of a modern society. The difficulty faced by architectural design during a revitalization of the city will lie in the necessity of encapsulating modern design,

regionalism, and the marketing image of the culture. These characteristics serve as unique propositions that underlie the continuous globalization of Havana. The dilemma faced by architectural designers is best stated by Paul Ricoeur as he says that the challenge lies in ‘‘how to become modern and to return to sources (while) reviving an old, dormant civilization (in order for it to) take part in a universal civilization’’.

The study will focus on the integration of current needs and functions with the city’s old architecture. The desirable site will be located on a public destination in Old Havana. It will focus on how the old and the new architecture will physically connect while meeting the characteristics of new uses and adaptive re-uses of existing buildings. This research will be conducted by

analyzing the sites existing conditions,
choosing contemporary uses that are missing within the city’s structure and
by analyzing other projects with similar conditions. And by doing an overall research on existing architectural, economic, and social issues that are related to Old Havana’s development This revitalization could create a new Havana that will preserve its value while meeting the modern standards and architectural functionality.

Introduction

As globalization has dictated on trends and forces that have to be imminently addressed by localities to maintain competitive growth as well as survival, commerce and tourism has crawled on almost all sectors and lifestyles to include how historical places or built environments must be treated, revived or re-constructed.

This paper will go through the existing conditions of the old Havana of Cuba, present contemporary uses and needs that might be missing within the city’s structure, and analyze other similar projects with close relations and regards to Havana’s condition and development. This revitalization analysis could lead to possible creation of a new Havana that will preserve its value while meeting the modern standards and architectural functionality.

Discussion

Brief Historical Background

Europeans first visited the area during Sebastián de Ocampo’s circumnavigation of the island in 1509 of which the following year, the first Spanish colonists arrived from Hispaniola and began the conquest of Cuba (IPIN, 2008). Conquistador Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar was said to have founded Havana on August 25, 1515. Its original site was on the southern coast of the island near the present town of Surgidero de Batabanó and adjacent to the harbor at the entrance to the Gulf of Mexico with an easy access to the Gulf Stream, the main route that navigators followed from the Americas to Europe.

The location led to Havana’s early development as the principal port of Spain’s New World colonies. Its name is considered to be derived from Habaguanex, an Indian chief who controlled that area, as mentioned by Diego Velasquez in his report to the king of Spain (IPIN, 2008).

More Spanish fortification projects occurred after transfer of controls among other European colonists. This transformed Havana into the most heavily fortified city in the Americas with the Fortress of San Carlos de la Cabaña considered the biggest Spanish fortification in the New World. Cannons forged in Barcelona while the castle of Atarés and El Príncipe were also established (Santana, 2000). Havana flourished and became a fashionable city with theaters that featured distinguished actors of the age. Its prosperity and the burgeoning middle-class led to the erection of classical mansions and Havana became known as the Paris of the Antilles.Additional cultural facilities include the luxurious Tacon Teatre, the Artistic and Literary Liceo (Lyceum) and the theater Coliseo continued (Santana, 2000).

Existing Condition

The Ciudad de La Habana or Havana, is the capital city of Cuba serving as its major port and leading commercial center with about 2.6 million inhabitants. With its high population density, it is considered the largest city of the Caribbean region (Butler, 2003).

Eusebio Leal was considered the head behind the rebuilding of the Old Havana which was an ambitious and Machiavellian project of Fidel Castro aimed at propping up his revolution as well as the social needs of the old city’s residents (Adams, 2001). An utopian undertaking of the Cuban Revolution, restoration and reconstruction took place in the “crumbling colonial heart if the city, known as La Habana Vieja,” Adams (2001) wrote. It aimed to attract foreign investment and revenue as well as harmonize tourist development of which Leal was quoted saying, “This is a unique effort. We are creating a system that deals not only with bricks and mortar, but also with social and educational programs,” (Adams, 2001).

Actual restoration project started in 1979 after Leal was awarded a five-year budget of $11 million while he was head of the Office of the Historian of the City where he was able to recruit a team of four architects. The first restoration plan identified a 1.3-square-mile area consisting of 242 city blocks, with some 4,000 buildings in dire need of repair and inhabited by 74,000 residents. The area has about 90 percent structures deemed to have historical or architectural value (Adams, 2001).

By 1982, the United Nations declared the Old Havana as a World Heritage site and by 1993, it has won full political recognition and Adams noted that, “Leal was handed extraordinary land-use powers to rescue the Old City through creating hotel and real estate joint ventures with foreign investors,” equivalent to controlling the Old City. His office became overall responsible for the zoning, planning, housing, parks commissioning, tax collecting, comptroller and final arbiter of nearly every public investment decision. Within a few years, a web of companies already run a network of hotels, restaurants, bars, shops and museums.

Nearly 4,000 architects, construction workers and hotel and restaurant employees with salaries of about $10 a month made up the work force. Its top architects made some 400 pesos, or $20 a month. In addition, the office also runs its own school that trained carpenters, masons, painters and metalworkers needed to carry out the work.

The restoration project had profits returned directly to local investment with a small percentage going to the state while businesses boomed to generate 10,000 jobs as well as earning $60-million in 2000. While it was considered a capitalistic venture, a third of the profits were directed to social education projects and restorations that helped local residents which include renovation of public schools, a new public library with 100,000 books, an infant-maternity clinic and a children’s park (Adams, 2001). A system is exemplified by the conversion of the Convent of Belen, built in 1718, into a day care center for the elderly financed by an adjoining hotel and museum.

Buildings were returned to their previous splendor that has attracted praise, interest and offers of support from Europe and the United States including its exiles, specifically in Miami. The Plaza Vieja, the Saratoga Hotel and the Central Park, San Francisco de Asís Plaza, the San Ambrocio School and the Lonja de Comercio were all part of the restoration efforts (Digital Granma, 2007).

Already, efforts and assessments were documented in books that include the UNESCO-backed A Singular Experience: Appraisal of the Integral management Model of Old Havana, World Heritage Site in detail and depth. It was also recommended that certain concepts in the restoration could serve as a model for the rest of Latin America (Havana Journal, 2006).

Unique buildings such as the Cathedral and the Castillo de la Real Fuerza were the first to be preserved but a wider scope all over Old Havana and even along the Malecon have been included. Building restored includes the Hotel Florida, Iglesia de Paula, Plaza de Armas and the Ministry for Culture. Already, it was found that Havana’s urban environment still has vast areas of crumbling buildings, and that it could not afford much needed care and support. Already, the Cuban National Heritage based in Miami, Florida was set up to help stop the disintegration of Havana’s Built environment of which Hunt (2008) suggested would have, “a long way to go to help preserve a city of so many diverse styles and influences.”

Analysis

As already deemed necessary, tourism and foreign investments are much needed to sustain the development that was started in 1979 on the restoration of Havana’s old grandeur. Historical relevance of a city always had the biggest impact in tourism and foreign interest as aside from cultural, I will try to compare and analyze the restoration of Old Havana to that of another World Heritage site Vigan. Although not the capital city and far from it of its country Philippines, Vigan was also a Spanish colony who has maintained its centuries-old Spanish architecture throughout the world wars.

Vigan’s town design was and established in the 18th century that conformed to the Ley de las Indias or the Law of the Indies. It regulated the lay-out, street patterns and open spaces of all new settlements during the Spanish era with a regular urban design of grid street pattern radiating from a central plaza (Heritage City of Vigan, 2008).

As Segre, Coyula and Scarpaci (1997) suggested, “Time and neglect are etched onto both faces. The utopian ideal of restoring Havana will not only depend on life-saving foreign investment, real-estate developers, multinational corporations, or joint ventures. It will take more than skyscrapers, shiny hotels, and luxurious condominiums to revive a lackluster Havana and to restore its original radiance,” (p 390) commenting on the “Antillean Pearl” goal of the socialist government.

Currently, while the Old Havana has not totally been open to the world despite its globalization aims, Vigan City shows a bustling and diversified lifestyles as well as its built environment of old, the pre-Spanish, post-Spanish as well as the preserved Spanish buildings and landmarks it now boasts (Heritage City of Vigan, 2008).

Nevertheless, it is to be noted that Philippines (Vigan) is a democratic country although flailing with its political leadership, has maintained a transparent governance as well as healthy foreign affairs relations thereby attracting investors and tourists alike. Henthorne and Miller (2003) have opined that there should exist a partnership among the Caribbean countries to progress regional approaches to tourism planning, development, and marketing. Hunt (2008) suggested that there is also much need to integrate global and even individual tourist prospects’ expectations as well as the ongoing progress within the Old Havana.

The self-financing scheme of the restoration, however, is a feat that Old Havana could boast to the world despite previously conceived negative views about the Cuba governance.

Conclusion

There is a very positive change already noted with the restoration of Old Havana for the last decades. The efforts of Leal have borne quantifiable fruits that the people of Old Havana are experiencing ever since. The maintenance and the continuity of the project as well have caught the attention and support of many and will have a domino effect on major stakeholders and prospective investors.

Nevertheless, the observations of Adams, Henthorne, Segre et al and Hunt could not be easily dismissed. Decades of neglect and abuse on the part of the socialist government and its leadership led to a decay that has inflicted even to its populace. There is a much need for rehabilitation of its people from the ravages of failed governance that will supplement a changed built environment. A deeper social and cultural decay could not be camouflaged with a fast restored built environment, in Cuba or elsewhere. Education and provision for livelihood means could always be a major development.

After the mindset and attitude of the people is repaired, the progress on built environment restoration may be resumed with the full force of a reinvigorated populace. Already, the Old Havana provides a very rich heritage and a site that the region and the world could revel. A restored Old Havana is best matched with a fresh mindset of its people ready to face the surge of tourism, open cross-cultures and globalization.

Reference

Adams, David (2001). “Reviving Havana.” St. Petersburg Times. Web.

Butler, Rhett (2003). The World Gazetteer. Web.

Carpentier, Alejo. El Recurso Del Metodo. Barcelona: Bruguera, 1974.

Fornias, Carlos, Narciso Menocal, and Edward Shaw. (1996) “Havana between Two Centuries.” Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts, 22.

Ricoeur, Paul. History and Truth. Trans. Charles Kelbley. Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 1965.

Henthorne, Tony and Mark M. Miller (2003). “Cuban Tourism in the Caribbean Context: A Regional Impact Assessment.” Tony L. Henthorne Journal of Travel Research; vol. 42: pp. 84 – 93.

Dopico, Ana Maria. (2002). “Picturing Havana: History, Vision, and the Scramble for Cuba.”Nepantla: Views from South 3 (3), pp. 451-493.

IPIN (2008). “HISTORIA DE LA CONSTRUCCIÓN NAVAL EN CUBA.”. Web.

Santana, Alicia Garcia (2000). Havana: History and Architecture of a Romantic City.. Monacelli.

Digital Granma International. (2007). “The Lonja de Comercio.”. Web.

Heritage City of Vigan (2008). “Town planning”. Web.

Segre, R. Coyula, M. and Scarpaci, J.L. (1997). World cities: Havana: two faces of the Antillean metropolis. Wiley.

Hunt, Nigel (2008). Havana Architecture. Web.

Havana Journal (2006). “The restoration of Habana Vieja or Old Havana Cuba.” Cuba Culture. Web.

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