847355 EP Design Studio 1

winter semester 2021/2022 | Last update: 01.09.2021 Place course on memo list
847355
EP Design Studio 1
EP 5
10
weekly
annually
English

M1_WS21/22

Intro

The studio will investigate how various foreign cultures can be blended within an architectural project. This creates hybrid articulations, patterns, and shapes with new multifaceted identities - an architecture that is both looking back and ahead, one that will fuse divisions, encourage exchange and offer new paths for integration. The task will be to design a cultural research and community center in Austria - a think thank for cultures.

Background

Today, a record number of the world’s population is displaced. More people than ever before are finding themselves in a country and a  culture which is different from their own. We argue that an architecture that reflects various cultures can facilitate an improved dialogue and help establish a new shared identity of space in which everyone can see fragments of their own traditions.

Architecture can shape human behaviour, and therefore societies need architecture to be sensitive to their inhabitants’ respective cultures. We believe it is important to investigate how foreign cultures can blend, mix or clash, and how this can be reflected through architecture and space. Architecture and culture are two sides of the same coin. By integrating one into the other, we can avoid the progression of architectural uniformity, and create spaces that express and reflect the cultural diversity in which they operate.

Methods and Tools

The studio aims to learn from existing architecture and cultures, and bring the findings into a present and future context. The project will start with a set of tasks and exercises that both introduce a series of precedents and readings while building a “toolkit” to design with. 

We are not looking to replicate existing architecture, nor copy a style or methodology. The goal is to create an abstract machine that, together with our current context, knowledge, and digital tools will inform, and help to develop a new, exciting typology.

The focus of the studio will be on architecture and space-making, and should be in the service of forming new types and reinforcing old types of interaction between people in the design process.

There are no specific tools we expect, but advanced digital design skills will be required in order to achieve the studio’s goals. Workshops and individual support can be offered if groups decide to further advance specific toolsets in their projects. Such workshops would include ML and/or AR.

The studio will take place in a hybrid format every Wednesday and presence is mandatory(either physical or digital). You will form groups of 2, max. 3 people.

Course examination according to § 7, statute section on "study-law regulations".

Will be discussed in the first lesson.

See the detailed brief in the link below. A short video presentation will follow within the next week here.

06.10.2021