Open City of Ritoque

La Ciudad Abierta de Ritoque is a settlement of 270 hect. located 16 kms. north of Valparaiso. The land includes extensive dune fields, wetlands with an extraordinary diversity of flora and fauna, an edge of the beach, streams and fields. Founded in 1970 by poets, philosophers, sculptors, painters, architects and designers, is today inhabited by many of them. The students of the architecture faculty Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso co-participate actively in it's ongoing construction through workshops. Living in the Open City means to be a partner of Corporación Cultural Amereida and therefore have a degree of detachment, because nobody owns, and each input and construction that takes place is a gift. The original idea was to found something of a city, but not in relation to the number of people who live there, but its structure, which should contain the unusual, the des-order. The land chosen is as fluid as the dunes. It's not strong, it is at the mercy of the wind.