1: Reading Reflection

Having seen the size of our first reading, I promptly started on the second reading, Tobias Revell’s Master of Design Thesis Project. I love the way in which his thesis is ‘told’ through a historical narrative. By including elements like the economical and global impact his design has ‘had’ on the world through a timeline was engaging and entertaining. It was also interesting that his initial design for the transnational trading boat also lead to a second design for the Juche Stadium City. Tobias Revell’s approach to his thesis is quite exciting, and goes really well with our theme of ‘architectural fiction’, and definitely something I want to look into in representing my design, or even my design process. One thought is to structure the rest of my blog (once a theme/approach has been decided) as though I am an architect working on a project, rather than a student on an assignment. The added drama will make it more interesting (I hope!).

Maggie Koerth-Blaker’s 32 innovations that will change your tomorrow was another inspiration, reading on how far technology is predicted to go in the next couple of years, leading to a whole new appreciation for architecture. The idea of ‘electric cloth’ which generates power from body temperature changes would be fantastic along building facades in city centers, using pedestrian body heat, or the fumes from cars or sunlight to power services. Another idea would be for the façade to react to changes in temperature on an aesthetic level, either through colour or movement. ‘analytical undies’ could lead to architecture that detects inertness, and encourages engagement or physical exertion through adaptation or psychological manipulation (too far?). However the ‘morning multi-tasker’ could be an innovation that would have the most direct influence on architecture and interiors, with surfaces transforming into monitors and sources of information. Redesigning such surfaces could be quite exciting, as would the design of a ‘terrifying playground’, where children are encouraged to play in a more challenging and ‘dangerous’ environment. However, as I know my interpretation of these innovations are quite literal in their impact on architecture, I did think of the idea of ‘brain mapping’ in a more virtual sense; I heard somewhere (could have been tv, news, drunk philosophical talk) that people with eidetic memory sometimes use the technique of having a memory ‘palace’ where they store their memories in a virtual series of rooms, which they can access when needing to recall something. So the idea of having our memories scanned and stored lead me to think of how this could be recorded in a virtual ‘memory palace’.

After a while I finally got around to the torture that was Sandler’s Beyond Architecture reading on Archigram. And while I admire Archigram’s approach to architecture and their desire to push the boundaries of the industry, this reading made me wish I would never have to hear of them again. But I do take an important message from this reading, which was to explore and question architecture’s role and response to technology, society, economy and culture - to question the ‘norm’. However some of Archigram’s conceptualist theories frightened me, suggesting we should abandon nature, and live in synthetic and simulated virtual environments, or even ‘housing body suits’, almost indifferent to tradition and aesthetics. One quote on ‘conceptualism’ struck me, as it sums up why I am afraid to go too far into the virtual environment of architecture, or into too abstract theories:

“systematic attempts to facilitate spontaneity resulted in structures so unrelenting that they represented anything but a withdrawal of architecture”

Another quote caught my attention:

“In 1966 the range of choice we have in the ordering of our lives is very limited. In 2000 it will be almost total. We shall be entirely responsible for ourselves. In 1966 we may doubt we want this degree of choice. In 2000 we shall see this doubt as that of a slave, freed but asking that his manacles be put back on.”

As I read this, drawing upon design theory subjects I have done through my degree, and agreed that we do relish in the degree to which we can personalise our living environments. But with a second though, I reflected on what we are currently building and designing in high quantities; apartments and suburban housing. Both of these environments are so far from individual that I had to laugh; in an era where we should be “entirely responsible for ourselves”, we find the majority live in housing estates and apartment blocks created through copy and paste. True, we can decorate our interiors with our own personal touches, but we still produce architecture as though it was designed and bought from IKEA. And unfortunately this is all most people can afford, resulting in identikit neighbourhoods and high rise complexes. This reading has lead me towards the idea that we should be focussing less on what technologies are available and how to utilise them within architecture, but instead focus more on how people are expected to live as individuals in a non-individualistic environment. Ponder ponder.