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A panel discussion presented by Svensk Standard, with Rory Hyde (UK), Tor Lindstrand (SWE) and Karin Matz (SWE)
Part of the lecture series Den Rättvisa Staden, hosted by ABF Stockholm in collaboration with the School of Architecture, KTH, coordinated by Catharina Gabrielsson.
6.30pm-8.30pm, Tuesday the 3rd of May, 2016
Language: English
ABF-huset, Sveavägen 41, Stockholm
Stockholm is awash with advertising promising visions of a happy, mindful, sustainable, and successful life… If you buy into the real-estate dream. Rather than sound plans, precise detailing, formal eloquence, or long-term affordability, architecture is increasingly sold to clients, governments and inhabitants on the basis of glossy visualizations and lifestyle branding. What are the implications of architecture’s obsession with its own image? What kind of life are we really being promised, and at what cost? Finally, can practices of image production in architecture (rendered, montaged, or other) be retooled to produce progressive, emancipatory, and even radical change?
Svensk Standard, with the support of the Swedish Schools of Architectural Research (ResArc) and Critical Studies in Architecture at the KTH School of Architecture, presents a panel of architects and critics who will, over the course of 120 minutes, attempt to get to the bottom of “how lifestyle replaced architecture” and what must be done.
Guests:
Rory Hyde (UK) is Curator of Contemporary Architecture and Urbanism at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, where he is currently curating a major exhibition on the future of design to open in 2017. He studied architecture at RMIT University in Melbourne, where he also completed a PhD on emerging models of practice enabled by new technologies. He is currently Adjunct Senior Fellow with the University of Melbourne. His first book Future Practice: Conversations from the Edge of Architecture (Routledge, 2012) was awarded the AIA prize for architecture in the media.
Tor Lindstrand (SWE) is an architect and Assistant Professor at the KTH School of Architecture. His practice oscillate between architecture, art and performance and has been presented in numerous cultural contexts. Tor Lindstrand is an architecture critic for FORM magazine and involved in the collaborative research project Power, Space and Ideology at Södertörn University.
Karin Matz (SWE) is an architect and teacher, whose work has been published in Arkitektur, FRAME Magazine, Casa Vogue, domus, Baumeister, Corriere della Sera, and Abitare. Through Karin Matz Arkitekt, she has designed to completion a series of smaller residential projects and interiors. Karin also teaches within the Masters of Architecture at the KTH School of Architecture (2013 – present) and works at the office Vera Arkitekter (2012 – present), where she is currently Project Architect for Kv. Cellen in Hagastaden, a mixed-use development over a total of 33,000 square meters.
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In the Spring of 2015, Svensk Standard’s entry Bygglovsboken was selected as one of ten proposals which were subsequently funded and developed in order to form part of the exhibition EVA, an open public art and architecture competition run by Eva Bonniers donationsnämnd.
In response to the competition brief, Svensk Standard proposed to produce an almanac of building permit applications (bygglov), cataloguing plans and sections for all proposed multi-residential developments granted a permit within the City of Stockholm in 2014. Through the book, we wish to raise the value of existing regulatory structures as a space of democratic negotiation, and the planning process form of public space in their own right. We also see the book as providing a “neutral” evidence base for a discussion of contemporary architecture. Specifically, we ask: What can be said about the housing we are designing, regulating and building at the present moment? What forms of publicness and of society is Swedish architecture (re)producing through its design labor in the housing sector?
What are the possibilities for architectural critique within a climate of neoliberal deregulation?
Bygglovsboken is an un-curated catalogue of un-doctored floor plans and sections, from the 51 multi-residential developments that were granted a building permit within the City of Stockholm last year (2014). Unfiltered raw data, cross-sectional exposé, and neutral evidence base, this book provides a comprehensive glimpse into the residential architecture of the very near future, inviting the question: what do we think about that future?
The content of the book reflects the hard work of many architects, planners, administration staff, financiers and venture capitalists, marketing kids, project managers, engineers, curators, citizens, and politicians, whose collective desire to produce (or prevent) architecture’s materialization in the real. These actors are all brought together in the publicspace of the building permit application process.
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The images, diagrams and texts that were produced by Svensk Standard for the preproduction of upcoming movie “the Unliving”, and displayed as part of the 2013 Staff Exhibition at the KTH School of Architecture, ‘Human Resources – Zombies, Architects, and the Politics of Unwaged Labour’, can now be read in their entirety at www.futurepostcards.tumblr.org !
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This thursday (14th of march), as part of the Human Resources exhibition at the School of Architecture, KTH, Stockholm, we will talk about some of the projects that we have produced and participated in, what they cost, who payed (and did not pay) for them, what was expected and what they resulted in. Why, how, how much and then what?
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Full video of the first episode in the Human Resources talk show series; “For the Sake of Architecture”, held at the School of Architecture, KTH, Stockholm.
Guests are; Teres Selberg, Erik Wingquist, Lena Viterstedt, Tor Lindstrand.
The show is hosted by; Helen Runting.
For additional information about the talk show and exhibition; see previous posts,
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Urban planning practice comes close to an exercise in therapy. Last night, the Swedish Association of Architects (Sveriges Arkitekter www.arkitekt.se) organised a rather large collective therapy event for the damaged souls of Stockholm’s architecture community. A spot of last-minute consultation for the draft policy for architecture, ‘Arkitektur Stockholm’ (an addition to the översikstplan, Promenadstaden), provided the perfect opportunity for Stockholm’s architects to air their grievances, expose and explore their hopes and dreams, jostle for position, make themselves heard, and ultimately do what architects do best: talk about architecture in the company of other architects.
With Bjarke Ingels distracting all the kids down at the School of Architecture at KTH – the title of his lecture, ‘Hedonistic Sustainability’, gave a taste of the show that would surely follow – we were by far the youngest people in the lush and sombre space of the main hall of Liljevalchs Konsthall. Being young (experienced as a disconcerting ‘cuteness’ in these kind of friendly get-togethers) gave us an excuse to get stuck into the champagne and to push some infantile ideas like ‘politics’ and ‘production’, however the speed-dating format of the round-table discussion tended to emphasize trite one-liners (ours included) and exclude a careful consideration of the structure, mechanics and ambitions of the Arkitektur Stockholm policy document. All in all, our general impression of the night constituted a choppy collage of soundbytes, which the concluding summary by the moderators largely failed to narrativize, critique or clarify.
So, whilst impressed by the palpable concentration of power in the room, we left feeling somewhat unfulfilled – it was hard to say whether the therapy had worked, whether old neuroses had indeed been quashed or whether rather on the contrary a sense of paranoia had simply spread. What was the problem with architecture in Stockholm? Was there a problem, and if so what could be done about it? By who? Was, in fact, architecture itself the problem? Or, worse, was Stockholm? We retreated to a bar to try to reformulate our position in what had become murky water, speculating briefly about why recovering alcoholics might possibly find comfort in meeting in “groups” composed of others with the same problem. When it comes to group therapy for Stockholm’s architects, it seems to us that the therapist (the City) might have to be more proscriptive in elucidating workable strategies for behavioural change, and – first and foremost – clarify the diagnosis upon which the treatment is based…
The event was attended by Helen Runting and Rutger Sjögrim of Svensk Standard.
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On Wednesday 19:th of October we will lecture at the School of Architecture in Stockholm. We will speak about some of the themes that has surfaced through our production (and as all good things, they come at the power of three): Talk, Show, Transmit. Myth, Performance, Broadcast. Light, Camera, Action!
We will start at 18:00, in hall A4 (we will speak in swedish).
You should come, it will be fun!
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Our thoughts concerning the guidelines for architectural quality, Arkitektur Stockholm, put forward by the City of Stockholm, has been summed up and sent to the city planning office as a part of the public consultation process. A discussion was held, as well (last tuesday) with representatives from the planning office and the groups participating in the exhibition at Kulturhuset. Hopefully, the transcripts of the discussion will be available soon and we’ll make sure to post them on this site as we look forward to follow the ongoing efforts to shape the document. In the meantime, these are our thoughts, as sent to the City Planning Office on the 20th of September:
(More information about the guidelines for architectural quality can be accessed here (swedish))
“Angående: Arkitektur Stockholm: en strategi för stadens gestaltning
Diarenummer: 2010-11401-51
20 September 2011
Svensk standard was invited to participate in the ”Blinda Fläckan” section of the Våra drömmars Stockholm exhibition on the 13th and 14th of August. The invitation came to us through Sara Vall, a long-standing friend of ours, some time in June of this year. Thus began our involvement and interest in Arkitektur Stockholm: en strategi för stadens gestaltning. Upon the basis of our multiple and collective readings of the draft policy text (developed over 3 afternoon workshops), our position within and towards architecture in Stockholm, and the experience of working with Blinda Fläckan, we would like to offer our views on the draft document and our aspirations for what it might become…
First, we might explain the position from which we speak. Svensk standard is a group of friends who spend weekends, evenings, and holidays discussing, producing, arguing, and thinking about architecture. We all either live in, or have lived in, Stockholm, although at the moment some of us live abroad. We’re about 13 people, although less may work on a specific project, and this submission represents the work of Helen Runting, Rutger Sjögrim, Markus Wagner, Karin Matz, Caroline Ektander, Martin Losos, Ola Keijer, Daniel Johansson, Fredrik Andersson and Mattias Beckman. The group primarily constitutes architects, with the exceptions of an urban designer/planner and a chemical engineer. Three of us work at the School of Architecture at KTH as teachers. Four have recently started practices. A few of us work for larger commercial architecture firms. We have very different views about architecture, but share certain aspirations. The submission is English because it was prepared by a non-Swedish resident of Stockholm, and we’d be happy to provide a translation if required.
1. Trojan horses
We read Arkitektur Stockholm in three sittings. It was in the summer, and Stockholm was warm. The windows to the loungerooms in which we met were open. Despite this, we closed the blinds and read Arkitektur Stockholm together by projecting the text on a wall, and together we noted down the recurrent terms – Stockholms unika värden, hög arkitektoniskt kvalitet, välfungerande stadsliv – that run like threads through the text, knitting it together and forming the core of its message.
Slippery terms those, the meaning of which we debated at length. The meaning of which you probably debated at length. Terms which, in coming months, will be debated over and over again. Why? Because they are more or less “empty”, open to multiple meanings and reinterpretations. Their emptiness makes them interesting as a vehicle to push new agendas for architecture in Stockholm. It also makes them, as acknowledged by Per Wirtèn in the critique he performed at Färgfabriken, terrifying.
They are terrifying because they defer the critical attention of the public who might assume that they are inherently “good” (who can argue against a “välfungerande stadsliv”?); or that they are too “technical” to define (who dares claim the authority, in a normal situation, to define or even use the term “hög arkitektoniskt kvalitet”?); or that they are obvious truths (who doesn’t feel the timeless ring of a phrase like “Stockholms unika värden”?). In planning critique, these phrases are often referred to as “motherhood” statements (after all – how can you argue against motherhood?). But you already know this. All good planners do. Because planners need these words, to smuggle in concepts and terms, to simplify complex or challenging content, to affect and persuade audiences (the public and the politicians).
We’re happy for you to use these terms, but express the hope that you might use them to smuggle in a new agenda for architecture: to support the architectural profession in exploring new ways of doing; to permit uses and reuses of architecture which produce new types of space, or permit new ways of living; and we would like you to dare to tackle the big questions of architecture, like social justice, rather than simply aesthetics. Because whilst Stockholm is a great city to live and to practice in (most of the time), we believe (like you) that it could be better. Maintaining the status quo is relatively easy, and whilst it takes a lot of bureaucracy to do it, it doesn’t take a lot of bravery. We would therefore like you to use terms like “unika värden”, “hög arkitektoniskt kvalitet”, “välfungerande stadsliv” as Trojan horses, to smuggle in the bureaucratic tools required to produce new (more open) types of spaces, new (more open) ideas about how to live, and a new, more hopeful, context for architects to work in.
2. New spaces to explore
We therefore offer the following directions that we’d like to see explored in a development of the policy. Whilst we acknowledge Karolina Keyzer’s call (made in her speech to the audience at Färgfabriken) for architects to contribute solutions to the consultation process, as perhaps you can understand, developed and workable solutions take more than 4 weekends to produce, even when you are a group of 10. We therefore set out a series of questions, which we may continue to work with independently of Arkitektur Stockholm, but which we hope you may look into to too.
(i) Producing spaces through making.
We disagree with your definition of architecture (page 7), although (as evidenced in the never-ending battle between “Architecture” and “architecture”) disagreement should not be seen as unhealthy. Where you portray architecture as a product – a building, a park, a street (both object and environment), we see architecture as a process – a way of thinking (a field of research, a knowledge tradition), a way of doing (a practice, a profession), and a way of debating (in built, material, terms) who we are and how we want to live.
If architecture is to be enacted as a process, and if it is going to venture into new territory, it needs spaces to materially “think” and “make” with/in, where risks can be taken and failure is allowed.
We therefore wonder, can Arkitektur Stockholm aspire to open up new material and economic (rather than just discursive) spaces for a more open negotiation, experimentation, and “thinking by doing” in architecture, by architects?
We suggest that such spaces might constitute infrastructure for architects such as studios, education and competitions; but most importantly might constitute sites, commissions and real opportunities to build.
(ii) Producing spaces through use and reuse.
The city can be seen as a negotiation between conflicting interests, as well as a series of qualities/situations/conditions which “emerge”. It is the contingency of architecture – the unpredictability inherent in the way that a building is “lived”, in the way that it can be altered, and is therefore never entirely fixed – that makes architecture interesting. And often it is planning that works with that contingency, allowing and prohibiting the use and alterations of buildings, parks and streets, long after the architect’s job is “finished”. Stockholm is a city where permission can be difficult, where unforseen uses (a small café ore restaurant on a street corner? a non-traditional household trying to find a larger flat? retention of old, perhaps even ugly, buildings for studios?) may not find a place.
We therefore wonder, could Arkitektur Stockholm open up material and economic (rather than just discursive) spaces for ‘unforseen’ and essentially ‘unplanned’ use and re-use of architecture and the city, by architects, developers and – most importantly – citizens?
(iii) Spaces for production.
There is a lot of discussion of consumption within Arkitektur Stockholm – of slinking into a shop or café on your way from A to B, of the form of shopping malls, of the city as a “market place” and of the consumption of events and activities in public space. We think production is simply more interesting. Whether that production is large-scale (where are the factories in Arkitektur Stockholm?) or small (where are the kolonilotter?), the opportunity for citizens to produce, through architectural decisions about space, could provide a vital addition to the present discussion.
We therefore challenge Arkitektur Stockholm to use policy mechanisms to open up material and economic spaces for production (for instance, for urban agriculture, studio spaces, and small-scale shops, restaurants etc.,) instead of large-scale spaces for consumption.
Further, as a group composed (predominantly) of architects, it is rather natural that we think about the production of buildings. As eloquently described by Catharina Fored at Färgfabriken, and reinforced by our experience, the field of development is hopelessly dominated by the big four building companies in Stockholm, who are in turn supported by the big architecture companies. We question what is won (and who wins) through this arrangement.
We also question the current trends of applying different colour treatments to permimeter block buildings simply to aesthetically “fake” different owners, and urge you to instead direct your attention to the questions of power and economics that underlie comprehensive development.
More opportunities for more architects and for smaller actors in development could be a strong step forward, we pose, in supporting architecture (as product and process) and building in diversity into the built environment.
We therefore wonder whether Arkitektur Stockholm could open up an economic space for actors (other than the top 4 building companies) to develop property in Stockholm?
(iv) Wicked problems
The socio-economic (and dare we say cultural?) segregation in Stockholm exists at an unacceptable level today, well beyond what could be imagined of a city like Stockholm in a country like Sweden. The housing market, the rental rules, the development industry, the architectural discourse all need to be focused on consideration of workable solutions. What can we, as young architects, do in our daily practice to improve this situation? While we might be dazed by the scale of the problem, we should be able to look to our city for implementable solutions, which we feel ownership over.
We therefore ask, could Arkitektur Stockholm propose real measures for architects and developers to deploy in tackling segregation?
Poverty, housing, health, ageing, loneliness, unemployment, ecological damage: design is a tool in tackling the truly wicked problems faced by society. In the face of larger social problems, the retention of aesthetic character fades in importance. Stockholm has many young (and older) architects willing to work for change, and as per our comments regarding segregation, workable strategies are something the city could provide, and something which could make a document like Arkitektur Stockholm more than just aesthetic guidance.
Upon the basis of the above input, we wish you the best in the coming redrafting of the policy. Please keep us informed of progress and get in contact should you require clarification of our position.
Yours Sincerely
Svensk Standard
Stockholm, 20 September 2011. “
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Twelve years ago the last Stockholm Water Festival was held. The first Water Festival was held in ’91 and, although it was initially propelled by the best of intentions, it soon fell into an abyss of generic content and fast-food stands.
This weekend, the Floating Lawn will perform as the base and platform for a water-festival-as-it-should-be: Spontaneous, low-key, and fun!
Join us next to the water at, Reimersholme, Horsntull and Tanto in Stockholm, this sunday. We start at 15:00.
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TV! is an open workshop about architecture-TV. It will be the starting point for the production of a pitch for a TV show about architecture aimed at swedish television.
It is our contribution to the upcoming (next week, 8-13 feb) event/workshop/forum “48 timmar” (48 hours) at the Museum of Architecture in Stockholm. In response to the exhibitions question “what and how can a museum about architecture be and act?” we ask; could it be television?
On the 11th and 12th of february TV! will be a platform for encounters, discussion and the search for themes and a format that produces rich and entertaining television about architecture. The intent is to produce a show that discusses architecture as phenomena rather than showing visual form as object and that makes architecture accessible, understandable and unpretentious.
There will be interviews and features, backdrops will be made and puns will be wrought. There might be sketches and maybe some clever graphics, honest photography and peppy editing . Short test sequences will be made and showed on-site as well as on-line.
Between the 8th of february and the 13th “48 timmar” will also feature the talents of:
Otto von Busch, Byggstudio, Expeditionen för arkitektur och grafisk form, Konst & Teknik, Staffan Lundgren, The New Beauty Council, Tidningen STAD, Apolonija Šušteršič & Meike Schalk, Testbedstudio, Tor Lindstrand, Christina Zetterlund & Pontus Lindvall and more…
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On a sunny Wednesday evening, the people of Stockholm had the pleasure of witnessing The Field performing live on The Lawn, as it floated gently passed their balconies, windows, parks and bars.
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Some more images of Åke on the waters of Stockholm.
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After two days of construction the floating lawn (now properly named Åke) is complete and floats with pride.
Manymanymany thanks and hugs to all of you that helped us put it together.
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In the summer, it’s always nice to go somewhere.
In Stockholm, many of the people leaving the city go out to the archipelago at the edge of the baltic sea.
It is nice there.
Some people go boating (or sailing) and a lot just stay at their summer houses doing (usually not a lot) things like reading and having barbecues at a lawn close to their house. If they are lucky the lawn is also close to the water.
This is very popular. So popular that the prices of these summer houses limit most people from actually experience this local eden. Thus many swedes of middle to lower income travel to places like Tailand with cheep charter flights and hotels.
We wanted to hang out on a lawn, reading and doing barbecues.
But we also wanted to hang out in the city, and we thought that it would be a little bit boring to be in the same place the entire summer.
Lucky for us there is a lot of water in Stockholm. It is, after all, often referred to as “The Venice of the North”.
So we decided to build a floating lawn with a small engine so we could move it around.
Construction starts tomorrow, friday 18:th underneath “Nya Årstabron” at the “Södermalm”-side. Drop by and say hallo if you like. We are nice people and will probably play some music, do some barbecueing and have som beer.
You can download the construction drawings (with cost and weight calculations) if you want to build one yourself. The total cost is around 15000 SEK excluding the engine.
Project by: Markus Wagner, Sara Liberg, Karin Matz, Ludvig Netré, Joel Joannet, Fredrik Andersson, Daniel Johansson, Ola Keijer, Caroline Carlsson, Rutger Sjögrim, Mattias Beckman, Anders Berensson
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A small sign produced during the summer of 2009 (as a part of the work “en annan paviljong” by Anna Koch, Weld) for a pavilion in the park Tantolunden, in Stockholm. Telling the story of the pavilions spectacular past.
Project by: Fredrik Andersson, Anders Berensson, Daniel Johansson, Joel Jouannet, Sara Liberg, Ola Keijer, Helen Runting, Rutger Sjögrim och Markus Wagner.
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Due to the migratory nature of Svensk Standard members, this winter has seen the upstart of a small Svensk Standard branch located in Melbourne, Australia, accompanied by an entry in the Laneway Competition 2010, a public art competition in Melbourne.
While researched and conceptualized by the Melbourne team, the production would be split between Sweden and Australia, creating an intentional glitch, a lost-in-translation-factor where one team was perfectly in tune with the sites, with their physical and cultural context, and the other would be completely clueless.
On January 5th, the following letter was received in Stockholm:
“Dear Ola, Markus, Sara and Rutger,
Tristan and I have been wandering the lanes for weeks now.
At first we were attracted to the dirtiest and the ugliest of them: the lanes that felt like vertical sewers. Tiring of wading through the rubbish, however, we soon turned our attention to the sleaziest lanes which thread through the business district, behind the strip clubs and seedy bars and corporate headquarters and law courts. Eventually, we became dissatisfied with our own journeys and elected to follow others, who – more often than not – never went into the lanes, and when they did, disappeared into the rear doors of what we can only imagine might be workplaces, but which might have been something entirely different.
The mystery, it seems, was always on the other sides of those doors and walls: in the private spaces behind and alongside the lanes. In the buildings. The lanes themselves seemed to hold little mystery of their own: everything seemed so familiar, just a repetition of elements. A basic geometry. The familiar, the recognisable, that which makes the laneways what they are, and in turn Melbourne what it is, had reached a point of saturation.
Perhaps we can only value that which is unknown, foreign, strange. We feel this must be the case.
In order to advance our project further, we therefore send you the unappreciated, banal and everyday artefacts which we collected in our journeys, objects (and, indeed signs) which make up the graphic and material language of the lanes – a language which we (like perhaps millions of other Melbournians) are presently unable to read, in our current state of distracted overexposure. We hope that you might take them and through your own work make them foreign to us again. We would like you to estrange us from them, just as you are estranged from us.
Take one or many, and do what you can. If you need any further information (dimensions, materials, or anything else that may be useful in this task), please do not hesitate to contact us.
Thrilled by the sudden removal of contextual restraint, the Stockholm team grabbed their pens and laptops and set out create something thoroughly unnatural.
Four days later the following three concepts, along with a short letter and some rather strange sketches, were sent back to Melbourne:
“Dear Helen and Tristan,
We have worked with the material you sent us and tried to respond to our assignment in an interesting way. We quickly realized that there was no way that we could fully understand these objects whithout their context, what parts they play in the economic and social structures of Melbourne. The objects that we were given all derive from a need and are connected to the local and global programmatic system in the area. Like many European architecture offices working out of context, for example in China, we perform an architectural colonialism by ignoring the objects’ context and functions. Instead we invent a new programmatic system for the objects to work within. Three ideas have been produced for this, concepts that can be used individually or somehow combined:
The Laneway Back Alley Band
The object move mechanically and correspond to the different sounds in the “Laneway Back Alley Funk” which is played through a hidden speaker system. The objects get a new relation to each other, and become parts of a new system that replaces their former programmes.
The Talking Totem Pole
The totems whisper to each other continuously, amuses itself by telling funny stories etc, but whenever someone approaches the alley they hush each other to silence. However, the totem can be aggravated and stressed out by the presence of a crowd, yelling out curses to anyone present. The pole is constructed from the given objects in the catalogue.
The Inanimate Objects Animal Masquerade Parade
Disguising the objects as creatures with costumes, creating a sence of unnaturalness by adding the image of nature. For added estrangement it is also possible to apply this concept to the preceding programmes.
Back in Melbourne the sweded objects were recontextualized and injected back into their original environment as agents of estrangement.
At the 22nd of January the final proposal was handed over to the City of Melbourne.
“Estrangement
Through an international collaboration firmly grounded in Melbourne but with roots in Stockholm, Sweden, we wish to reframe an experience of Melbourne’s laneway spaces through the performance of an architecture of estrangement…
Weary of both the dominant modes of working as “foreign architects”and of the dominant elements of architectural discourse addressing “place-making”, we would dearly like to consciously side-step both the ignorant imposition of foreign forms on unfamiliar contexts, andstrategies of “gentrification through glorification” whereby elements of historic urban fabric are scrubbed clean of their present (undesirable) uses in order to introduce foreign programs. Whilst the former mightbe termed the “Bilbao effect” and has been idolised by those interestedin placemarketing via architecture (or simply besotted with Frank O.), the latter presents a more covert way of sanitizing the messy, gritty, difficult areas in cities by creating “buzz”. Through all of work, and this submission, we wish to propose an alternative to this way of working as architects, and a conscious critique of the above.
Perhaps there is a hint of irony in reacting against processes of architectural santization when talking about Melbourne’s laneways, long a city-sized sanitation device in themselves. Despite radical changes to the form and fabric of the city, and as such to the buildings abutting their edges, the laneways have retained their utility as a “backstage” to Melbourne’s streets. A place (once you move away from the lattescented alleys of the south-eastern corner of the city) where garbage bins rest in neat rows, leant upon by piles of cardboard boxes and pyramids formed by used drums of cooking oil. Even the rings of empty bottles circling upturned milkcrates like sharks seem familiar, even somehow necessary within this environment – certainly not a surprise, in any case. It is in this safe, familiar, utilitarian order of “things” that the site of our proposed project lies.
In wandering the laneways – whether they are the sanitized, the overdesigned, the messy, the commercial or the deserted variety – all the mystery seems to be located inside the buildings, in the places that you can’t go, through the back doors with their industrial locks, whilst the laneways themselves dissolve into a predictable repetition of a basic material language (bin, bin, bin, oil drum, boxes) which becomes rapidly oversaturated: after a while, it all somehow fails to register. From a sociological perspective one might pose that objects only become visible to us, only register, when they access controversy – when they are acclaimed as “innovations”, when they are at a distance and thus “foreign”, when they break down, or when they become a “fiction”1. It is this final category that motivates the present proposal, which aims to make the gritty and utilitarian laneway objects a momentary fiction, in order that we might see them again, and as such see the spaces which they define in a new way.“
Project by: Helen Runting, Tristan Main, Ola Keijer, Rutger Sjögrim, Sara Liberg, Markus Wagner.
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A collaborative project by japanese and swedish architects initiated by Studio un/real. People involved: Daiki, Michael, Ichikawa, Toru, Caroline, Junichi, Kristin, Yuli, Margus, Simon+ more
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Söder om Tullinge, i Botkyrka kommun mellan Stockholm och Södertälje, håller bostadsområdet Riksten på att växa fram. Etapp 1 byggs just nu och till hösten startar etapp 2. Sammanlagt omfattar de 600 bostäder. Fullt uttbyggd kommer Rikstens Friluftsstad, som den har döpts, att omfatta 2500 bostäder. I etapp 3 planeras en grundskola från förskoleklass till årskurs 9 som ska rymma 600 elever. Det är den skolan som ligger till grund för det här projektet.
Projektet utgår från klassrummet som grundblock. I allt fler skolor de senaste tio åren så har klassrumsmiljön ersatts av ytor som mer liknar kontorslandskap. Flera klasser delar på större, öppna ytor och mindre grupprum som ger möjlighet för genomgångar och enskilt arbete. Resultaten har varit varierande. Ofta har de stora öppna ytorna blivit för stökiga och det har varit svårt att bedriva en fokuserad undervisning. Det har lösts genom att grupprummen förvandlats till klassrum och glaspartier täkts för. Ibland har man blivit tvungen att dela av ytorna i efterhand. Konsekvensen har varit små klassrum utan dagsljus eller tillräcklig ventilation. En miljö som är den raka motsatsen till det den från början var tänkt att bli.
Den här skolan kan ses som en renäsans för klassrummet och de kvaliteér som det representerar.
Genom att tillhandahålla avdelbara klassrum skapas en lugn och fokuserad miljö för undervisning. Men med klassrummets fördelar kommer också alla dess nackdelar.
De flesta svenska skolor som är i bruk idag är byggda under 50-70 talet, även om senare tillägg har gjorts. De representerar den traditionella klassrum-korridor typologin och här blir klassrummets nackdelar tydliga. Den tydliga uppdelning gör det svårt att bedriva undervising på ett tematiskt och klassöverspännande sätt. Klassrummen är skapade för 20-25 elever, varken mer eller mindre, och de korridorer som kopplar dem samman förstärker i realiteten uppdelningen och är svåra för pedagogiken att ta sig över. Då de flesta klasser idag inehåller uppemot 30 elever blir det även svårt att skapa olika miljöer innom klassrummen. På så sätt blir det svårare att bedriva ett pedagogiskt arbete som fokuserar på individen och söker att anpassa miljön efter barnens individuella förutsättningar och personligheter.
Lösningen har i det här projektet blivit att helt enkelt göra klassrummen större, de är ca 75 m2 stora, och kvadratiska. På så sätt blir det enklare att möblera eller dela av dem och skapa rum i rummet.
Den andra viktiga faktorn i skolans utformning har varit hur klassrummen förhåller sig till varandra. De sprids ut över tomten på ett närmast slumpmässigt vis och justeras sedan i förhållande till varandra så att fungerande ytor skapas mellan dem, vissa ytor är innomhus medans andra är utomhus. Alla erbjuder möjlighet för pedagogiken att “rinna ut” ur klassrummen. Ytorna som ligger innomhus kan sedan delas av med ett system av skärmväggar som fästs mot undertaket. Ytorna utomhus är formade som sekvenser av gårdar med varierande storlek. De blir som utomhusklassrum och de stora öppningsbara glaspartierna gör det enkelt för undervisningen att flyttas utomhus.
Skolan försöker på så sätt ta tillvara på de bästa egenskaperna från klassrums-korridor typologier såväls som från de öppna lösningarna. Skolan blir till en by, ett minisamhälle och kan på så sätt klara av de förändring som ständigt sker och fortsätter att ske inom pedagogiken.
Klassrummen är organiserade i kluster på 3 – 4 klassrummen som delar på en gemensam yta innomhus. Klustrena är grupperade tre och tre i en lågstadiedel, F-5, och en högstadiedel, 6-9. Mellan dem ligger de gemnsamma delarna av programmet som laboratorie, slöjdsal, matsal och personalutrymmen. Den redan befintliga gymnastiksalen används som den är och blir en del av den nya skolan.
Som en ekonomisk eftergift för skolans kvaliteér (stora ytor, stora fasadytor, stora och öppningsbara fönster samt många takfönster) så blir skolan konstruktion och material enkla. En stomme av träreglar bär upp en balkrost och kläs i korrugerad plåt. Insidan av skolan kläs i obehandlad plywood och fungerar som en målarduk för undervisningen att lämna avtryck på. Den kan målas efter behov och smak, hyllor kan spikas upp, tavlor flyttas runt och när den slitits ut sätter man enkelt upp en ny skiva som i sin tur anpassas till den undervisning som pågår. Ett undertak av akustikplattor och lampor hänger över klassrummen och de gemensamma ytorna. Det gör det möjligt att dela upp ytorna i mindre delar och gör det möjligt att enkelt ändra det artificiella ljuset. Genom taket slår lanterninger upp öppningar mot himlen och släpper in dagsljus i de inre delarna. Installationer dras enkelt genom balkrosten övanför undertaket.
Skolan färgsätts i en färgskala som går från grönt till gult. Det kan ses som en referens till den tidigare verksamheten på platsen (flygbas) men är framför allt till för att förstärka skolans uppbrutna och fragmenterade karaktär. Den gröna färgen smyger in i den omgivande grönskan samtidigt som den starkt gula färgen sticker ut och ger variation och karaktär åt de olika uterummen.
Ett kanalsystem som fångar upp regnvatten rinner genom skolans lågstadie del och i högstadiedelen finner man en asfalterad skolgård.
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