(1997, Evry-Courcouronnes) is an architect and researcher with a degree in architecture from the Ecole Nationale Supérieure d'Architecture de Paris-Belleville (Ensapb) and a master's degree in architecture from the University of Porto (MIARQ/FAUP) with the dissertation "Inhabiting water, the public washhouses of Porto: an experience of women in the modern city". She has been a member of the pedagogical innovation community Porto: territories and networks of invisibility (PTRI/CIP - UP) since 2018. Since 2020, she has been co-founder and co-editor of the journal Lina: Feminist perspectives on architecture and urbanism. In 2021, she collaborated in the editorship of the international journal Sophia Journal, indexed by the AAI group at CEAU/FAUP, and Scopio Editions. She combines the professional practice of architecture and research, particularly with independent projects: Inhabiting water. Documenting women's urban practices, she took part in the project Des/oriente, funded by Plaka-Criatório, in which she co-created the activation/performance Rito das águas : cortejo pelos lavadouros de Campanhã, and took part in the exhibition Vozes da Paisagem at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto. On 25 November 2021, she was awarded 1st prize by the public and an honourable mention in the "Pioneers" category in the international photography competition Nuestras Arquitectas, with a photograph of the Miradouro Tower by architect Maria José Marques da Silva.
This article is an overview of the historical and architectural study, as well as the practice of archiving Porto's public washhouses using sensitive cartography. The historical context of the study is presented, as well as the justification for studying the washhouses from the point of view of aesthetics, typologies and cultural heritage. In Porto, these fragments of women's work in various urban environments are abandoned and in ruins, despite the fact that they are still present in the memories of the inhabitants.
This archive work is gradually being transformed into an artistic, self-ethnographic work of interpretation, mixing the personal and the public, but also serving as a basis for research into architecture and urban planning: how can we preserve the memory of washhouses? This work is part of the feminist historiography of recent years, which aims to recover the presence of working-class women and their history in the public space.
References
Choay, Françoise. L'allégorie du patrimoine. Paris: Seuil, 1999.
Col·lectiu Punt 6. Urbanismo feminista: por una transformación radical de los espacios de vida. Barcelona: Virus, 2019.
Darmon, Chloé. “Habitar a Água, os Lavadouros Públicos do Porto : uma experiência das mulheres na cidade moderna”. Master Thesis. Universidade do Porto, 2020. https://repositorio-aberto.up.pt/handle/10216/133165.
Darmon, Chloé. “Abandoned wash-houses. Archiving wash-women practices in Oporto modern urban space”, Sophia Journal Vol. 6, nº 1 (2021): 154-169.
Darmon, Chloé, and Gabriela Manfredini. “Rite of the Waters: procession through the Campanhã Washhouses”, Scopio Magazine AAI Utopia vol. 1, nº 1 (2023) : 84-98.
Fjeld, Anders. “Chapitre 3. L’égalité sensible du régime esthétique de l’art.” In Pratiquer l'égalité, edited by Jacques Rancière, 75-108. Paris: Michalon, 2018.
Hanisch, Carol. “The Personal Is Political.” Notes from the Second Year: Women's Liberation (1970) : 76-78.
Lefébure, Christophe and Marie Rouanet. La France des Lavoirs. Tolouse: Editions Privat, 1995.
Lima, Dr Oliveira. “Boletim de Higiene e Sanidade Municipais: Os Lavadouros Públicos do Porto”, 1936.
Moreira, Inês. “Após a fábrica, novas abordagens à ruína e aos fragmentos pós-industriais.” Revista Arqa, Arte e Arquitectura (2014): 118-119.
Paleo Mosquera, Sofía e María Novas Ferradás, “Lavandeiras, género y arquitectura. Una crítica periférica sobre los espacios de la colada”. Ábaco 95-96 (2018): 192-196.
Pardo Marín, Rosa and Carlos Barberá Pastor, “El lavadero donde la mujer lava. Un espacio contradictorio y difuso en las políticas urbanas”, Feminismo/s 32 (2018): 23-47.
Perrot, Michelle. “Le genre et la ville.” Communications 65 (1997) : 149-163.
Perrot, Michelle. Les Femmes ou les silences de l’Histoire, 57-58. Paris: Flammarion, 1998.
Tsing, Anna L. Proliférations. Paris: Wildproject, 2022.
Velho da Costa, Maria. O Cravo. Lisbon: Moraes Editores, 1975.
Weizman, Ines. “Performing the Counter-Archive.” In Critical Neighbourhoods: The Architecture of Contested Communities, edited by Paulo Moreira, 165-167. Zurich: Park Books, 2022.