‘But, what’s wrong with ruins?’ Traversing inevitable loss in industrial heritage

Abstract

An architect and a cultural geographer meet to visit a vast industrial complex in southern Spain that was gradually abandoned between 1962 and 2012. Despite being formally designated as protected heritage, the practical absence of material intervention, historical interpretation or control of access turns the act of walking through these ruins into a highly immersive, sensorial and reflective experience. Drawing from fieldnotes and photo-documentation, this contribution broadens the generative potential of preserving-by-not-preserving, a novel heritage approach recently tackled in cultural geography literature.