Conference: ARCH+ features Legislating Architecture
Frank Barkow Arno Brandlhuber with Maria Hudl
March 2015
18
With Frank Barkow, Architect, Harvard Studio Berlin; Jochen Becker, curator and critic; Arno Brandlhuber, Architect, Harvard Studio Berlin; Sam Chermayeff, Architect; Florian Hertweck, Architect; Regine Leibinger, Architect; Niklas Maak, Author and Journalist; Imke Mumm, Technical University of Munich; Fritz Neumeyer, Architect; Markus Rosenthal, Managing Director, nuances; Dubravka Sekulic, Architect; Jean-Philippe Vassal, Architect; and the Students of the Harvard Graduate School of Design Studio, Berlin.
In addition to the numerous preconditions that exist before the design of architecture can begin (gravity, geometry, program etc.) it is the power of text that is focused on. These pre-conditions or regulations are known to planners and designers as rules, zoning, or code and are accepted as unavoidable conditions that can be “interpreted� in the best case. Can these preconditions be considered as proactive instruments or tools for design rather than obstacles? Can the designer be instrumental in establishing these conditions rather than the recipient of them? How can legislation be instrumentalized to support initiatives or rather how could legislation adopt new thinking? All of these questions followed the studio throughout the semester with answers stimulating new ways of thinking. The conference discussed the studio topic with architects, urban planners, researchers, writers and art editors, a lobbyist, and the Senate Department for Urban Development and the Environment. The limitations of legislation and how this creates form were introduced by looking back into the history of building regulations. Together with examining realized examples and case studies of student projects, the necessity of new building typologies and dwelling concepts for future housing was addressed. How is the legal definition of privacy and common ground shaping our idea of dwelling? How could we regain the power to define these terms ourselves? What if some restrictions of legislation could be alleviated to seek for a both/and instead of an either/or approach?