rchitects without architecture

Emerging models for a different kind of architecture due to different kinds of technology: transdisciplinary studios for 21st‐century challenges and ‘small pieces loosely-joined’ forms of urbanism

Dan Hill (Si apre in una nuova finestra)

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Dec 30, 2020 (Si apre in una nuova finestra) · 54 min read

Ed. In 2018, Mark Burry (Si apre in una nuova finestra) asked me to contribute to a special edition of Architectural Design journal (Si apre in una nuova finestra) that he was editing: AD: Urban Futures: Designing the Digitised City (Vol.90, Issue 3) (Si apre in una nuova finestra). I've written for AD before - on the tactical urbanism of pop-ups as a form of R&D (Si apre in una nuova finestra) in 2015; a 2050 version of 'the street as platform' (Si apre in una nuova finestra) in 2014 - and was delighted to be asked by Mark (Si apre in una nuova finestra), someone I've known since my Australia days, and a pioneer in digital architecture (he's perhaps better-known globally, along with Jane Burry (Si apre in una nuova finestra) and others, for their multi-decade work completing the Sagrada Familia (Si apre in una nuova finestra).) Although architecture faces many challenges and opportunities (Si apre in una nuova finestra), this piece had to focus on the urban questions posed by tech. Familiar themes are presented — cooperative blocks, participatory platforms, strategic design, libraries, streets, mobility etc. Please forgive any repetition, as I tend to worry away at a few core themes across several contemporaneous pieces, each framed slightly differently. Writing is like sketching, in this sense.I wrote one piece, and then split it in two for the journal: ‘Small Pieces Loosely Joined: Practices for Super‐local Participative Urbanism’ (Si apre in una nuova finestra) and ‘Architects Without Architecture: How Transdisciplinary Studios Reposition for 21st‐Century Challenges’ (Si apre in una nuova finestra). What follows below is the original mix, thoroughly re-edited. Given the recent rate of change, accelerated by Covid-19’s various forms of devastation and disruption, the AD articles feel almost out-of-date already. Certainly my list of studios could be twice as long, and more diverse, emphasising other practices, particularly around nature-based technologies (Si apre in una nuova finestra), radical indigenism (Si apre in una nuova finestra), virtual environments (Si apre in una nuova finestra), hi-tech/lo-tech cultural diversity (Si apre in una nuova finestra).The recent collection, Architects after Architecture (Si apre in una nuova finestra), does a great job of collating many of the most interesting contemporary practices in that respect. Other aspects of the pieces seem to hold up well to current events, further revealing that Covid-19 is simply underlining existing trends, exposing latent stresses. Do read the Slowdown Papers (Si apre in una nuova finestra) for more recent thoughts on those challenges for urbanism, and a deeper investigation of the ‘small pieces, loosely joined’ design pattern (Si apre in una nuova finestra) discussed here.