Transforming Historic Fabrics: Community-Driven Design in Marseille’s Bastide District

Thesis Abstract

The Bastide district of Marseille, with its layered historic fabric and diverse resident communities, faces pressures from gentrification, tourism-led transformation, and uneven participation in urban agenda setting, compelling a reconfiguration of design processes that center local knowledge and agency. The study addresses the problem of how community-driven design can transform historic urban fabrics without erasing cultural identity or compromising architectural integrity, while achieving social, economic, and environmental resilience. Its aim is to develop a robust framework for participatory design in historic districts, and its specific objectives are (1) to document residents’ lived experiences of space, memory, and identity within Marseille’s Bastide; (2) to map existing governance structures, stakeholder networks, and informal design practices that influence refurbishment and adaptive reuse; (3) to test the efficacy of participatory design interventions through pilot workshops and model buildings; (4) to formulate design guidelines and a decision-support toolkit that balance conservation imperatives with community aspirations; and (5) to contribute to theoretical discourse on community-driven urbanism, applying related theories to empirical data from the Bastide context. The research questions investigate how community narratives shape design priorities, what governance mechanisms enable or hinder co-creative processes, which design interventions most effectively reconcile preservation with contemporary needs, and how measurable outcomes in social cohesion, local economy, and environmental performance can be linked to participatory design actions. The study is underpinned by two theoretical framings Arnstein’s ladder of participation to assess citizen power and engagement levels, and Sherwood’s framework of place-keeping that emphasizes cultural continuity and adaptive reuse in historic urban settings. The methodology integrates a mixed-methods design, combining qualitative and quantitative strands to ensure depth and generalizability. The population comprises residents, local associations, and small-scale enterprises within the Bastide boundary, with a targeted sample of 160 residents across age groups and neighborhoods, 20 active community organizers, and 12 property owners involved in recent or ongoing refurbishments. Data collection instruments include semi-structured interviews (n=60), focus group discussions (n=6 with 8–12 participants each), participant observation, document analysis of planning records and conservation plans, and a survey (n=400) to gauge perceptions of heritage value, design preferences, and willingness to participate in future processes. Validity and reliability are addressed through triangulation, pilot testing of instruments, intercoder reliability checks for qualitative coding, and a test-retest approach for survey items. Data analysis employs thematic analysis for interview and focus group data, regression analysis to explore relationships between participation levels and perceived outcomes, and network analysis to elucidate governance and stakeholder linkages. A design intervention phase includes two co-creation workshops and the development of three pilot design proposals, followed by an evaluative framework using Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) to compare scenarios against conservation guidelines, social benefits, and economic viability. The anticipated findings indicate that high-quality participation correlates with stronger perceived heritage compatibility, increased local business activity, and modest improvements in environmental performance through optimized material choices and energy-efficient retrofits. The study expects to reveal barriers such as time constraints, power imbalances, and regulatory complexity, along with enablers including trusted mediators, transparent decision processes, and culturally resonant design vocabularies. The contribution to knowledge lies in a transferable participatory design framework tailored to historic districts, a context-sensitive set of guidelines for Bastide-style interventions, and empirical evidence linking co-creation processes to measurable social and economic benefits in a Mediterranean urban setting. The main conclusion posits that community-driven design can recalibrate the relationship between preservation and modernization, provided participation is genuine, inclusive, and structurally embedded within planning timelines. Recommendations include codifying participatory procedures within Marseille’s conservation district plan, establishing a permanent community design lab linked to municipal agencies, prioritizing retrofit strategies that preserve iconographic landscape features, and expanding training programs for residents to participate effectively in design discourse and decision-making. Suggestions for further research include longitudinal tracking of pilot outcomes, comparative studies across Marseille’s historic quarters, and exploration of digital participatory tools to broaden inclusivity and scale.