From time immemorial, the farmer has reigned over the lands of Oldambt. Devoted to agriculture, villages developed like fine linear carvings in the vast productive landscape. For millennia the Oldambtster farm defined the territory in large numbers.
Due to agricultural reform and upscaling the original characteristics of the landscape started to disappear, resulting in fallowed lands and natural in-between spaces. Many were either driven into bankruptcy or exchanged their traditional farms for generic industrial sheds in isolation. Oldambtster farms and villages got deprived of their raison d’être. In an attempt to revitalise the region, part of the polders was re-flooded. With a focus on leisure, Oldambtmeer and Blauwestad can be seen as the first step towards the summoning of today’s leisure class. Yet, as a rather invasive and exclusive gesture it failed to meet expectations and to involve its surroundings.
This project aims to complete the gesture initiated with the Blauwe-stad and Oldambtmeer while commemorating Oldambt’s history and heritage, and enabling the area to attain true picturesque status. A series of interventions is introduced to the tamed yet seemingly wild and impermeable natural conditions surrounding the lake.