There is a certain soul to Rotterdammers that you can’t find anywhere else. As a result of the city’s industry, a Rotterdammer is tough, cold, but honest. In recent years however, this working class nature of the Rotterdammer is being replaced for the more intellectual yup. Nowhere is this more evident than in Delfshaven, shared by workers, immigrants, and students. In this melting pot of cultures, one place holds ground as the living archive of a city’s soul: the nursing home. What follows are short stories, representative of that soul, loosely inspired by real interactions I had from the 5 years I worked there. Names have been changed for anonymity.

Collapse is not only an end-of-world stage but marks beginnings and opens possibilities for familiar objects. It is a state where old values crumble, and only some things endure. This article explores these ideas by weaving a film review into lived experiences. What can architecture learn from film and art about what we preserve? What lives through mundane acts of preservation?