The project's main concern is to investigate the postindustrial shrinking cities, or what happens in an urban and social context when the main industry reduces either ceases its activity. In this sense, the research has led to global matters such as urban shrinkage and the degrowth culture, which have become an urgent topic in the contemporary architectural scene. Thus, it intends to show how these cities face a critical duplicity, between the promoted image of a city that moves forward from the obsolete industry - the artifice-, and on the other hand a perceptible decadent side, which is rarely assimilated by administrative agencies or by their own inhabitants - the heterotopia-.
Despite affecting a local level, urban shrinkage is a global issue which needs to get exposure as this problematic is not only related with deindustrialization, but degrowth is also a consequence of global warming and socio-political instability.