During her Architecture Honours studies, Christine designed an extreme sports centre in Gugulethu. In this speculative project, Red Bull has proposed to develop the project as part of a social response scheme, which targets the participation of teenagers and young adults in particular. In response to the problem facing the youth living in areas like Guguletu, where they are often initiated into gangs because it gives them a sense of belonging and to be a part of something that is thrill – seeking and adrenaline inducing; which are often dangerous and illegal activities. The proposed site for Red Bull X: Gugulethu, at the time of the project was being used as a dumping site by the temporary housing location behind it. People living in this location have nowhere to dispose of their rubbish as the municipality rarely organizes garage collection in these locations. Red Bull as a company is very aware of its environmental responsibly and is constantly going to great lengths to ensure its carbon footprint stays as small as possible across the entire lifecycle of their energy drink can - from how it’s made, it’s design, material choice, how it’s transported and how is cooled and finally how’s it recycled. Quite similarly to the lifecycle of a building; so when designing an extreme sports centre, they would undoubtedly have the same approach. Starting from their choice of site and how they can design a building from the ground up, which not only responds to the social factors of the area, but environmental factors as well.
