GECKO THINK FORWARD / INNOVATION
Registration code : 068 In the newly developed VM houses in Ă˜restaden, Copenhagen, residents take pride exposing their lifestyle to their neighbours. Rather than hiding behind layers of hazed curtains, these dwellers seek to show off their homes: their furniture and their style, to other residents and the many architectural tourists. Living in the VM houses is a life style choice away from the secluded comforts of suburbia.
Ice-fern - a gecko window sculpture As a child, the windows in our hallway would freeze over and hair fine constellations would grow across them. These floral patterns looked like wild bregner and gazing at them, I always wondered how it could be that these particular patterns would be recalled by the frost‌ Residue is a window sculpture for the home. Imagined as a playful structure, Residue addresses the changing anatomy of our living environment. Modern architecture has created new boundaries for the home. The desire for light and airy surroundings presents us with a new typology of residential buildings defined by large window frames spanning from wall to ceiling. But this new way of living also introduces fundamental changes to the way we understand
the relationship between private and public. Rather than hiding the private away, these buildings present the spectacle of domesticity as a living stage for the city.
ited from changing them. Likewise in the pristine Farnsworth House, Pennsylvania, the curtains are an expressive part of the buildings ability to negotiate its environment and are listed along with the building.
This development is a consequence of the curtain wall. Where modernism celebrated the structural freedom of separating from the buildings core construction, it also created a new set of problems that were otherwise solved by the structural wall. Issues of solar gain and glare, temperature fluxes as well as those of privacy and isolation became the problem a new architectural type: the curtain. Where textiles traditionally been seen as belonging to the domestic furnishing of the home, and therefore outside the domain of the architect, a new type of buildings were developed that incorporated curtain design. In residential projects such Mies van der Rohe’s famous Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, the curtains were designed by the architect and residents were prohib-
Ice-fern uses Gecko fabric to playfully reflect upon this new style of living. Imagining a sculptural curtain, Ice-fern invites the user to actively construct their own constellations of privacy and public. The curtain is mounted on the window pane, but rather than drawing the curtains, it can pulled off and stuck on to the wall for the day. In doing so, Ice-fern leaves small traces on window and wall, telling tales of former days.