Table of contents for N. 113 in Topos

Admittedly, dealing with the topic of urban mutations is anything but easy. And why would we choose this topic and call on numerous authors and ask them to rack their brains over it? Because we want to talk about change, about transformation, and we want to dig deeper. The fact is, urban spaces are subject to constant change. They grow, flourish and shrink; their layers overlap. Crises, economic recessions and upturns, urbanisation and climate change all transform the look of urban spaces. By 2050 two-thirds of the world’s population will live in cities. The consequences of urbanisation are already visible everywhere, i.e. the struggle for open space, for greenery, for resources, for a raison d'être, for equality, and often simply the struggle for survival. This is especially the case in…

VSBA Architects & Planners is the next generation of Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates. They carry on the firm’s tradition of creating places that enhance their contexts – from sensitive adaptations and additions to new buildings in historic areas. The firm is led by president and principal Dan McCoubrey (right), who was with Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates for 31 years and founded VSBA in 2012 after the retirement of Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown. Principal Seth Cohen is an expert in the design and renovation of academic, civic and cultural facilities. He was with Venturi, Scott Brown & Associates for 14 years. VSBA strives to create healthy, sustainable places for living, learning and working. 1 INFLUENCED BY We’re fascinated by what’s come before and the variables that have…

“The collaged view of the urban space suddenly allows us to see utilitarian everyday space and artificial architecture side by side, at different stages of their execution, without the fiction of a pseudo-space leading us astray. In doing so, the collage deliberately disrupts our customary way of looking at things: it is an experimental representation of elements that cannot normally be seen together at the same time, despite being interrelated.” Taken from the paragraph“The essence of architectural space – Flatland and Aleph” by Jan Büchsenschuß from the book “City Life Collage” Urban space in mutation: In Klaus Theo Brenner’s collages different layers, different realities, different eras come together at the very same place and at the very same time. The urban realm is in a state of contemporaneousness and “same…

In October 2020, a large-scale ephemeral graffiti appeared on the vast lawn traversed by the remains of the Palatine Gate in Turin. Designed by Swiss-French artist SAYPE as part of his itinerant Beyond Walls project, the drawing - sprayed on grass with biodegradable paint - depicts a chain of four enormous arms entwined; a powerful symbol of acceptance, integration and solidarity.2 With slight variations in composition and size, the Beyond Walls graffiti were replicated in a variety of metropolises around the world, all characterized by long histories of migration, albeit with different patterns. They include Paris, Berlin and also Ouagadougou in Burkina-Faso, one of the cities in Sub-Saharan Western Africa where rapid urban development, also in the form of informal settlements, resulted from consistent migration phenomena. While, as scholars agree,…

Wildfires are, again, raging in California and its neighboring states. Since climate change contributes to an increase in the frequency and intensity of these wildfires, more communities are impacted in greater ways and more firefighters need to be on duty for longer periods of time across ever-greater stretches of land on fire. The people of the American West are dealing with a massive disaster, all the while the underlying environmental, spatial, institutional context is fragmenting, changing, mutating. However, we can only start talking about possible remedies once we disentangle the relevant socio-cultural ingredients. This also offers planners and designers of the built environment an opportunity to better understand how their work relates to the cycle of disaster management and its phases of planning, preparedness, response, recovery and reconstruction. The institutional…

The Munch Brygge residential quarter is located east of the centre of Oslo, between the opera house and the Munch Museum. In 2019, the red brick-clad buildings received an architecture award bestowed by the Oslo Association of Architects as an outstanding example of urban living. Lund+Slaatto Arkitekter focused on sustainability when it came to materials, using low-carbon concrete and recycled steel, among other materials. The bricks also partially consist of waste materials. The ecological profile is also reflected in the greening of the outdoor areas by the landscape architecture firm Gullik Gulliksen AS. The housing estate offers areas for private and communal vegetable and fruit cultivation; there are composting facilities and ornamental gardens. Roof gardens of various sizes are also available to the residents. They are equipped with benches, chairs,…

Peter Sloterdijk saw it coming. In his book Schäume (Foam), the third in his trilogy entitled Blasen (Bubbles), which concerns the fundamentals of human existence, he explicated that being human means creating our own micro spaces through the management of “atmospheres”. These atmospheres can only be managed by means of boundaries between humans and spaces. But not on a large scale, not by generating country-encapsulating boundaries. Sloterdijk is talking about the thin boundaries that we erect between ourselves and others, or between small groups of people. He’s talking about small apartments that separate us (safely, as we would say in times of coronavirus) from the street. Or about media that can be used as walls between human beings. And now for the “saw it coming” part: The strategies of masking…

Denise Scott Brown is an architect, planner, urban designer, theorist, writer and educator whose projects and ideas have influenced designers and thinkers worldwide. Working in collaboration with Robert Venturi over the last half century, she has guided the course of Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates by serving on the broad range of the firm’s projects in architecture, and as Principal-in- Charge of urban planning, urban design and campus planning. Her experience in interdisciplinary work, teaching and research has contributed to VSBA’s breadth and depth in architectural design. 1 INSPIRED BY I’m influenced and inspired by the landscape, architecture and social life of the South Africa I grew up in, and the America I have lived in. By a wide range of people, architects and non-architects equally. And by Robert Venturi,…

This article focuses on the notion of change as a phenomenon per se, rather than doing it indirectly through the themed presentation of case studies, the common format of most design publications. In doing so, it explores the ominous dimension of change as an overarching trend in which we, the proud shapers and makers of the built environment, struggle to play the active role that seems to be reserved for us. Here, the use of the word “mutation” further emphasizes this passive aspect, underlining on the one hand the alteration of a starting condition into a distinct new form, and, on the other hand, as a noun of the intransitive verb “mutate”, a certain fatalist and non-judgmental attitude in regards of this alteration: someone can undergo mutation, but he or…

CITIES ARE HOME TO 55 PERCENT OF THE WORLD’S POPULATION. The world will further urbanize over the next decade, with 56.2 per cent of the global population today increasing to 60.4 per cent by 2030 Country with the largest urban population by 2050: China MEGACITIES have been defined by the United Nations as cities with more than ten million inhabitants 70 per cent of cities are already dealing with the effects of climate change, and nearly all are at risk. Over 90 per cent of all urban areas are coastal, putting most cities on Earth at risk of flooding from rising sea levels and powerful storms. Largest urban agglomeration worldwide in 2018: Tokyo Larger cities consume ¾ of the world’s energy and create over 70 per cent of global CO2…

Carlos Mínguez Carrasco is an architect and curator based in Stockholm. He is Head Curator at ArkDes – the Swedish National Centre for Architecture and Design. Trained as an architect at ETSABarcelona and TU Delft, in 2006 he co-founded PKMN, an architects' collective. Carlos.Minguez@arkdes.se Charlie Clemoes is a writer, editor and podcaster from England, currently living in Amsterdam. He is an editor at Failed Architecture, with whom he is currently producing the Failed Architecture podcast. He is also part of the Amsterdam-based design platform fanfare. charlie@failedarchitecture.com Sigrid Ehrmann is a German landscape architect, author and translator based in Barcelona. She worked for various landscape architecture firms and universities in Melbourne and Berlin and held a position as Research and Innovation Associate at RMIT University’s European hub in Barcelona. sigrid.ehrmann@me.com Eric Firley a French-German national…

“WILL THE NEW EUROPEAN BAUHAUS BE THE FIRST STEP TO CREATING SUSTAINABLE, RESILIENT AND EQUITABLE CITIES?” “Good design can improve lives” is a catchphrase reminiscent of the influential German design school Bauhaus founded by Walter Gropius in 1919, which last year celebrated its 100th anniversary. With her appeal for a “new European Green Deal aesthetic combining good design with sustainability”, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen unveiled the Commission’s plans to revive the Bauhaus idea. The New European Bauhaus forms part of the European Green Deal’s action plan that aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 55 per cent by 2030 and make Europe climate-neutral by 2050. It will be financed through the EU’s 750 billion-euro Next Generation EU coronavirus recovery plan. In her State of the Union address…

Now, during the coronavirus crisis, many Manhattanites find the prospect of larger living spaces, a private yard and accessible public open space increasingly attractive, motivating them to consider moving across the Hudson to New Jersey, joining the ranks of the “bridge and tunnel people.” However, the Garden State still suffers a rather questionable reputation. Older folks will remember the smell of New Jersey when they crossed the large Meadowlands garbage dumps on the Turnpike, or their fear of the riots in Newark. Although the landfills are closed and Newark is back as a dynamic urban community, New Jersey is still not considered the place to go. Most of New Jersey is a polycentric urbanized region with two core economic hubs outside the State. The North-East is a suburb of New…

Especially now, during the Corona pandemic, exercise and “being outside” have taken on a new meaning in our everyday lives – whether in urban squares, playgrounds in parks and other green areas, in more rural recreational areas or even in private gardens or courtyards. When spending more time outdoors we demand high standards of the products we use. This includes high-quality furniture and play equipment that is made of durable materials, as the shown in the selection on the following pages. Stable Hercules ropes, parts made of stainless steel and Corten steel or the extremely resistant powder coatings of the roof terrace furniture on page 108 with the highest corrosion protection class contribute to the durability of the materials and products and thus ultimately to high quality of use and…

Augustiner-Stammhaus, Neuhauser St. 27 80331 Munich www.augustiner-restaurant.com Hotel Mariandl, Munich www.mariandl.com 089 Bittenbinder www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBIpAdORtXA Munich, situated in southern Germany, is famous around the world not only for its ‘Oktoberfest’ and the Bavarian beer. fiis “metropolis with a heart”, called this by its inhabitants despite their being only 1.4 million of them, was transformed into a European métropole in the early 19th cen-tury through monumental Neo-classical architecture by art-enthusiast King Louis I after a trip to Italy. This is how the Residenz, the Hofgarten, the Ludwigstraße, the Königsplatz, the Glyptothek and the Brienner Straße were created. Finding avant-garde architecture in Munich, how-ever, is a rather more difficult endeavour. One of these rare avantgarde projects is the Olympic Stadium; a design by Günter Behnisch with a pa vilion roof by Frei Otto.…