Recently liquidARCHITECTURE entered the inaugural Streetworks competition organised by the AILA. The brief was to “re-imagine under-utilised spaces in the City of Sydney as innovative, sustainable and dynamic temporary public spaces that will bring people together in unique ways”.

View LA’s entry here: LA’s Streetworks Entry – hyperBOLE

Our proposal, hyperBOLE, was for an intervention to reclaim the under-utilised space at the street edge of Paddy’s Markets, Hay Street. The design employed used bollards, that would be otherwise recycled or dumped,  to fabricate the installation. In doing so, the proposal establishes a reversal of the bollard’s traditional function – as an object that defines zones, usually defining spaces that aren’t accessible – and creates an object that encourages more diverse pedestrian activity and more urban life.

While hyperBOLE was designed to interact with the current fabric of Hay Street, it is a prototype for linear street installations around the city. The module can be stretched or squashed to interact with buildings, intersections and urban squares to help form vibrancy within any streetscape, even one with very little occupiable space.

All Streetwork entries are currently displayed at Customs House (Ground Floor, 31 Alfred Street, Sydney) until 30 October. More information here.

Penshurst Avenue House

Read the article here: “Let’s think inside the box”

FILTER by Liquid Architecture (Photograher: Michael Ford)

FILTER is an exploration of the constraints of the modern-day design desire to flat-pack – creating a product that is sustainable and economically efficient. Through the integration of product and packaging, the design enables the filtering out of the excess that is often associated with consumables.

Waste is reduced in production through advanced modelling techniques, while an adhesive free construction means minimal assembly and maximum flexibility for the end user.

The manual dimming of the light and options for it to be a pendant or table lamp enables flexibility in use and control by the end user to determine the ambiance created by the light.

Filter is a holistic light fitting, where product and packaging come together to pack, form and market a product.

One of Liquid’s friends – Antony Di Mase of Di Mase Architects (Melbourne) – also entered. We thought the light was pretty cool, and so did the judges; the light was awarded second.

Lifecycle by Di Mase Architects

A light source that reflects on the simplicity of nature. Mimicking the nested egg, light is created in a playful and gentle way. The light is filtered by natural surrounding of grass branches and twigs emitting a glow with life.

A precious light – a form of life cycle.

The project was inspired by playing with my 9 year old daughter on the beach as we braided strands of grass together to make bracelets and hair ribbons. The abundance of material was overwhelming.  It occurred to me the light source looks like an egg and the idea quickly fell into place.

Filter, and the other Lightcycle entries are currently exhibited at Donkey Wheel House in Melbourne. However, if you don’t get a chance to get down there, you can take a look at the other entries here.

Looking a bit further though, and it was probably unintentional, I find it intriguing that there is no mention of the substantial increase of interest and participation in what I will call ‘humanitarian architecture’ – or more cynically, ‘the architecture missionary’. The poster child for this mode of practice would have to be Architecture for Humanity, with its social media savvy leader Cameron Sinclair at the helm. And of course there are numerous formal and informal groups that have also taken to occupying this space in practice. What is fascinating about these groups is that when the projects work well, the architect is possibly operating across more than one or two of the categories Rory utilises in his article – punching above their weight, no less!

On a number of levels, the efforts of these groups are completely admirable and promote the social good that architecture and architects can potentially bring to any public or community led project. However, apart from those fully immersed in this sort of work, one wonders what the motivating factors are for those involved on a casual basis. I do not doubt the sincere intentions and heartfelt convictions of those who participate, nor the logistical and cultural hurdles endemic to these architectural projects. But one has to wonder why the same people might  often not think twice about volunteering their time and skills in the local context, and both within and outside of the profession.

Is it the travel and the sense of adventure provided by these excursions? The opportunity to undertake “design/build” activities without the redtape and rigour expected in Western building cultures? The escape from the realities and difficulties that our mature cities and towns now only seem to offer us? Or the opportunity to purge one’s system from the First World glut of bespoke, luxe, elitist, privileged Architecture?

Even if on the most cynical level these projects assuage some forms of Western guilt, not for a second do I think that these projects should cease – for there are many positive outcomes in developing countries that can be tied back to the improvement of the built environment and infrastructure. And one only has to look at Paul Pholeros if you want the front runner in adopting a practice/business model that enabled him and others to pursue projects with limited external capital  http://www.healthabitat.com/

What I don’t believe is that if you want to exercise your ‘humanitarian’ or ‘charitable’ side as an architect that you have to burn your Frequent Flyer points in order to do so.As they say, charity begins at home.

For every architect trekking off to Nepal to build toilets, there are at least five* sitting on their backsides here in Australia, more worried about when they will next go sailing. Imagine then what  might happen for both the profession and the broader community  if all architects decided to invest themselves in doing a little bit of good (voluntarily or even for remuneration?) OUTSIDE of the profession and their daily work? If we could take the hero cape off and stop thinking that our everyday work is saving the world, then perhaps we’d get a more realistic picture of what the community could gain from our skills and expertise (flawed as they might be, according to the comments about Rory’s article).

An example – my least favourite statistic is the one about how architects are involved with some minute percentage of the houses built every year in Australia – and also in places such as the US, UK, New Zealand etc. In retort to this, many architects (and for some reason, particularly those involved in large practices who have little to do with residential architecture anyway) will whinge that it has to do with a whole range of issues outside of the profession’s control – project home builders, government legislation or the lack thereof, etc – what can we ever do about trying to change this statistic? Sure, some of the arguments put forward in this discussion have some traction. But what is also clear is that people – THE PEOPLE -  just don’t know what we do or what we can offer. And yes, we’ve all heard that before too, I know – but only because it’s sadly very true.

In this day and age of the digital and the all pervasive social media, nothing beats real human contact and relationships. If we want to have a lasting impact on others, being involved in community based or other public activities that are partly or well outside of our professional activities will speak volumes to others about what architects can contribute to their processes and activities. I’m not just talking about baking a few fancy, well-designed cakes for the school fair either – I’m challenging the profession about the serious involvement of architects on school boards, corporate boards, NFP boards, advisory committees, Council and government groups, charitable organisations, politics – the list goes on.

Oh,  just think of the places you’ll go….

* my opinion and not based on any formal survey data … in fact I don’t think anyone has ever surveyed the profession about individuals’ community or public activities outside of daily practice…hmm…

AA2010_liquidARCHITECTURE_Advertisement

Here’s liquidARCHITECTURE’s entry for the Advertisements for Architecture – click on the link. This exhibition was held as part of the Sydney Architecture Festival and is currently on display at the Surry Hills Library, Crown St, Surry Hills.

Considering the brief, we wanted to engage with the wider community utilising the channels by which this audience is most often exposed to architectural ideas.

We cannot  assume that any given individual views  or understands  architecture in the same way as the next person. Generally speaking, however, we can assume that the point of experiential commonality for this audience is the ability to see and thereby consume architecture -  consciously or not.

In appealing to that audience, we wanted to provoke the viewer to identify with an obvious “seeing” mechanism. The 3D glasses are a reminder of our desire to seek escapism via “bigger than life” experiences.  Tapping into the re-emergence of experientially enhanced cinema provides a humorous vehicle for reminding the general public of the excitement in architecture, in the real 3D around them every day….

We also wanted to engage with popular culture to remove the elitism commonly attached to architecture  – which is amusing in itself because architecture is everywhere, it’s highly accessible. So we developed this advertisement to demonstrate this attitude whilst having a little fun.

My paper and presentation will be uploaded very soon, as well as being accessible on Continuum, the online CPD portal from the Australian Institute of Architects. The positioning of practice is crucial to the future of architecture and it is important that diverse modes of practice are fostered. On some levels I’ve actually moved my thinking along a little bit from what I presented in July, although one cannot underestimate the potential of the embedded practice models evident in Europe, and also evident here in North America, where I am presently travelling.

Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson has written a great piece on adaptable living and housing for our “older citizens” – a relevant topic considering our aging population and the changing face of the over 45 demographics. The article features liquidARCHITECTURE’s Coal Point house, and here we pay tribute to our fabulous clients who helped us make this project such a success.

ok, that means a little personal, for the non-Dutch readers out there.

this is my blog, so I am going to indulge a little, just once for the time being.

I have been thinking a lot about where I’m at, where I see myself in the world. and how what i do in this world is valued, too.

no, its not a midlife crisis arrived early.

rather, the reason for this reverie is that the age I am now is the age when my father was cruelly taken from this mortal coil (courtesy of a freak industrial accident).

this situation forces me to reflect a little…

what have I achieved?

and where are we all at? are we all really doing any better than 25 years ago?

I certainly think that my father had achieved a lot. and that was without the cosy, dulling comforts of modern tehcnology and all that it brings.  he lived in a time without Twitter, blogs, FB, email – these “props” by which we claim to have relationships in this day and age. not one of his relationships was the result of anything but his commitment to the other person – family member, work colleague, church friend, sailing buddy.

of course, our digital props can be very successful for us. i personally have been able to meet up with new people on my research trip because of contacts made via FB and Twitter, and they’ve proven to be worthwhile, interesting contacts.

but i wonder where these digitally enhanced relationships leave us when we come to the classroom, the studio, the lecture theatre, the tutorial session: to the educational relationship.

at TU Delft, where I have spent the past couple of days for my research project Build/Ability, I have seen the power of  face to face educational relationships – the studio space hard at work. the students here have wholeheartedly embraced the opportunities of having a stable, functional and useful studio space as the backdrop for their learning. they have not quite taken up full residency, but the plethora of spaces, the technical and support facililties, in house library and seamless flow of cafes, model workshops and studios encourages total immersion.

with total immersion comes the opportunity to talk freely of design integration, because this teaching approach mirrors the interrelated nature of the learning spaces, the layered and varied student / staff relationships, and most importantly, the desire to present architectural practice as an acceptable past time, not an embarrasment to the academy.

there is much to be learned back home – we should stop talking about student to staff ratios for a while and instead start talking about student to dedicated studio space ratios.

we might then see the germination of some real educational and professional relationships too.