It is now 20 years since Sir Richard Rogers wrote Cities for a Small Planet and we find ourselves more than ever before in the collective dynamic of an awakening society, one in constant movement and in need of change, flexibility and adaptation. Many cities have already experienced the same fate of gentrification which has been ongoing in Berlin since German reunification; the influx of a new population creating drastic change, leading to the movement of those no longer able to afford the city centre to it’s outskirts, which in turn increases urban sprawl. The iconic rooftop of the former Tempelhof Airport is chosen as a perfect playground for experimentation and testing of new nomadic, temporary housing possibilities. We ask you to imagine a new community which will live together on a 1,2km long and 20m wide space, 23m elevated from the street level – a community of inhabitants that might be in permanent change and not necessary permanently
settled.
We will start by asking: is architecture today too slow in responding to new societal requirements? We want you to focus on extra-fast architecture, requiring you to study, read, infiltrate, and extend existing buildings to create new situations. The designs should be quick to construct and quick to dismantle. How can architecture speed up? How can architecture become temporary? Can buildings be used for shorter periods of time, thereby creating more freedom of movement? The life-cycle of the materials, the ecological footprint of the buildings and the possibility of recycling and upcycling of its components are to be addressed. We would also like to address particular forms for social flexibility. Will housing in the future be reduced to core functions embedded as small-scale cells in a complex network structure of “third-party locations” such as co-working spaces, community lounges or urban gardening projects?
In this Summer School we will take a critical position and try to answer all or some of these questions. We will use strategies of dissection, infiltration, and parasitical intervention as a means of operating within and extending existing structures- and as a way to create density.
We invite you to use architectural, technological and ecological activism to imagine bold and utopian housing proposals for a new Berlin Tempelhof Airport, full of life and future.