MCH

MAS in Collective Housing

ISBN 978-84-09-50596-8

© 2023 Master in Collective Housing. Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. ETH Zurich.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher.

MCH Directors

José María de Lapuerta- UPM

Andrea Deplazes - ETH

MCH Manager

Nuria Muruais

Concept

Nuria Muruais

Edition

Andrés Solano

Cover image by Andrés Solano selected by Dietmar Eberle from Workshop final submission

Printed and bound by Omán Impresores.

Sociology,

Construction

Leadership

Urban

Low

One house, one building, one public space Snapshots of collective life

Notes from the editor

Andrés Solano, alumni - 2022 edition

When reviewing the projects and work produced by my fellow classmates and exposed by our teachers and guest lecturers during the 2022 edition, I was impressed at the amount of high quality knowledge that had been produced.

It is only with the distance of time that one realizes what has been achieved in the months of duration of the MCH. Many of the ideas that are being discussed, designed and displayed in the Specialties and Workshops will undoubtedly be on the frontline of the discipline in the following years.

The knowledge portrayed in this first issue is still raw, in the melting pot. It is thus impossible to organize it outside the encasing frame of the courses. In this sense, the name #untagged makes reference to this myriad of ideas that flourish during the intense weeks of the Master but cannot be “tagged” as they flow freely in-between the classes. However, we believe the effort must be made to publish and externalise it, enabling to become raw material for something new.

“Only an idea has the power to spread itself so far.”

- Mies Van der Rohe

The name is a tribute to HOUSETAG, the first publication developed entirely by the MCH that catalogs and “tags” existing European collective housing buildings of the last two decades. The next decades, and the next HOUSETAG will hopefully involve the projects of our former students participating as architects, builders or promoters. Others will take what is being learned to infiltrate academia somewhere else, as the network of alumni grows ever more with each edition.

Letter from the Director - UPM Career development & housing research. They are not exclusive for the MCH.

Jose Maria de Lapuerta

For the MCH it is very important that students, when they finish, have a professional profile, knowledge and skills that are different from when they started. And that this can be measured, that it is not something subjective. Also different job and salary aspirations.

Non graduate program in the world, at any discipline, “contractually” guarantees a certain job position upon completion. However, much of the prestige and the reasons for investing in tuition depend on that Career Development.

At the MCH, two months before the end of the classes and four months before the delivery of the Master’s thesis, we begin with the Career Advise work.

Both in common talks for all students, as well as by groups with the same interest, as well as with individual interviews, as a director, I explain the different job and salary options, from different offices and countries. The differences are explained, the ways of approaching, the possible difficulties of visas depending on the country of origin, the “friendly” studies that usually employ MCH graduates, the total support for those who return to their country of origin and what the work that the director and the MCH team will do for each one.

Access is also given to the specific job bank for participants in the MCH.

Finally, the alumni association is supported, its connections around the world, its exchanges of opportunities. The culminating moment of this was the MCH FEST where all the participants of 15 editions and their partners were invited to the Parador de la Granja de San Ildefonso. Throughout the day and before the gala dinner, the former participants were grouped into large classrooms according to their profiles. The day was exciting. The class that was working in large offices, those who had founded their own study, those who worked for the public administration and those who dedicated themselves to teaching and research.

The other side of the MCH coin, with a clearly professional profile, is that it does not renounce the investigation. It seems difficult for us to talk about teaching if it is not linked to research. Every year a book or research is promoted. The TC Cuadernos publishing house, with international distribution and one of the most active in architecture, has an agreement with us and, in addition to publishing monographs for professors who pass through the MCH (Wiel Arets, Fritz Van Donguen, Felix Claus,...) believe in any proposal of the management of MCH ETH-UPM. Thus, the idea of any participating teacher is analyzed and the selected one will be published with a significant stake. In recent months, we have published two books:

PATRIMONIO ACCESIBLE: LA INTERVENCIÓN EN EL PATRIMONIO Y EL PROYECTO DE ACCESIBILIDAD

HOUSETAG: VIVIENDA COLECTIVA EN EUROPA 20002021 10/2021, this one developed entirely in the MCH classrooms and with the participation of MCH students, it has led to the most serious and important research in housing in Europe in recent years. It has already had its first consequences in an exhibition with a catalog at the ICO museum “Domestic Sunrises”. It will be a traveling exhibition throughout Europe.

The Master in Collective Housing knows that the success and future of our postgraduate course depends to a large extent on the professional future of its participants. But also that it is research that builds a chair, high, to see beyond the near horizon, to look into the future.