Project Loops, “Edgelands” and the Permanent Reimagining of Landscape

This article proposes that Boris Groys’s claim that contemporary life is mediated via an ongoing loop of speculative, unfinished “projects” can be used to explore the production of particular kinds of interfaciality and “Edgelands”, as defined by Marion Shoard. I examine the Granton Waterfront area, a region of Edinburgh, Scotland, that has witnessed redevelopment projects initiated and abandoned over the last three decades, and where construction materials, half-finished roads, derelict gates and rezoned “development” areas are constantly revalued and reinhabited by humans and non-humans in looped cycles. Utilizing photographic images produced at various points over a decade to construct a visual narrative of the site, as well as drawing on the work of cultural geographer Hamish Kallin, I demonstrate how Shoard’s and Groys’s concepts, most often applied in art, cultural geography and planning contexts, can be useful tools for contemporary archaeologists in examining and reflecting upon the production and ongoing lives of ‘waste’ landscapes.