“How to become modern and return to source; how to revive an old dormant civilisation and take part in universal civilization”

(Ricoeur, P.1961: 277)

Dualisms are common in western societies, in fact as Clark describes they have been with us from the very beginning, setting “spirit against matter, soul against body, humanity against nature, subjectivity against objectivity and reason against feeling” (Clark,1990:8). These `conflicts` seep into almost every part of our culture, from art to economics, religion to politics all struggle to resolve ubiquitous dualisms.  While arguably never fully resolvable, these conflicts can be appeased by compromise and mitigation, imperfect but feasible solutions to what could otherwise be destructive swings back and forth. Architecture has often tackled Dualisms head on, non-more so than in the conflict between Globalism (Connection) and Regionalism (Identity) or Modernism and Traditionalism, the resulting middle ground, and focus of this thesis is Critical Regionalism. A theory, that rejects the often universally homogeneous architecture of modernism, in favour of an architecture adapted to its immediate local environment, at the same time retaining the `progressive` aspects of modernism that have improved life immeasurable over the last century.

Today the conflict between Connection (globalism) and Identity (regionalism) is ever-present particularly in our politics, however, Critical regionalism may offer a way to mitigate these two issues while re-instilling a sense of Belonging within our community’s.

This thesis will be focused on the Scottish Highlands, a region intimately familiar to the author and a area that will face huge changes in the coming years, the area already has a thriving group of critical regionalist, as described in New Highland regionalism: an architectural resistance. While the Highlands & Islands has many of the same issues as Scotland as a whole, there is also differences that if accommodated for could lead to a more sustainable and possibly successful ‘place’. The opportunity for a critically regional architects to help create a solution for what will be a large issue is therefore quite significant.

The architectural solution proposed by this thesis is, a new form of settlement that could help encourage a moderate re-densification of the Highlands & Islands and stabilisation of the region’s population demographics. The specific cultural, demographic and economic ambitions of the proposed settlement have been outlined in 5a.