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Volume #13 AmbitionArchitect’s ambitions in a landscape of misguided purpose

Volume #9 SuburbiaOn opportunities for suburbiaafter the crash

Volume #5 Power 1A photographic essay focusing on the relationship between powerand architecture

Volume #12 Al ManakhHistory, culture and architecture of the Gulf region and beyond

Volume #8 ChinaNew ideas about the futureof the Chinese city

Volume #4 SharewareA portable exhibition of ideasto break through architecture

Volume #11 Cities UnbuiltArchitectural dimension of destruction – special focus on the Caucasus, Kosovo and Lebanon

Volume #7 Power 3On architectural thinking asfoundation of power structures

Volume #3 BroadcastOn methods and potentials ofbroadcating architecture

Volume #10 AgitationAgitation as vitalizing conditionfor architecture

Volume #6 Power 2Power at the scale of the building

Volume #2 Do less!An analysis of the architectural willand how to decide on the right dose

Volume #25 Getting There Being ThereLiving on the Moon

Volume #26 Architecture of PeaceHow can we materialize peace?

Volume #27 AgingLife beyond the nursing home

Volume #28 Internet of ThingsWhen things start talking back …

Volume #29 The Urban ConspiracyThe grey take-over of city and society

Volume #30 Privatize!We are all individuals

Volume #31 Guilty LandscapesThe creative use of guilt

Volume #32 Centers AdriftCenters are on the move: are you in or are you out?

Volume #21 The BlockHousing for the billions:mass-produced, custom-made

Volume #17 Content ManagementCollecting, organizing and sharing information through architecture

Volume #24 CountercultureHow protest informs architecture

Volume #20 StorytellingAnother way of understanding our era

Volume #16 Engineering SocietyNew options for social engineering

Volume #19 Architecture of HopeDesign for a multicultural society

Volume #23 Gulf Cont’dThe Gulf inside-out: forces, experiments, influences

Volume #15 Destination LibraryMethod and canon for the architecture of library 2.0

Volume #22 The GuideArchitect as guide, guide as architecture

Volume #18 After ZeroA new contract with ecology

Volume #14 Unsolicited ArchitectureUnsolicited Architecture: the pro-active practice

Volume #1 BeyondOn going beyond the office, the school, and the magazine

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OUT!

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OUT!

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INT

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Volum

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12

Archis 2012 #3Per issue € 19.50 (NL, B, D, E, P) Volume is a project by Archis + AMO + C-Lab …

To beyond or not to be

Ansuya BlomJimenez LaiShane KrepakevichInara NevskayaPhilippe RahmKlara van Duijkeren Vincent SchipperAndrés JaqueIgnacio González GalánRonald RietveldErik RietveldPetra BlaisseMark PimlottAdam FramptonJonathan D SolomonClara WongSimona RotaErnst van den HemelRob DettingmeijerAgata JaworskaDirk van den HeuvelBrendan CormierJames KhamsiEthel Baraona PohlAnna PuigjanerCésar Reyes NájeraHans VenhuizenJessica BridgerCarrie SmithVincent van VelsenLin Ying TzuMehruss Jon AhiArmen Karaoghlanian

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Volume #33 InteriorsThink inside the box

Volume #34 City in a BoxCorporate takeover of public domain

1

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um

e 3

5

1:04 PM, 20 Jan 13 The weird way to eliminate or evoke phantom limbs

2 Editorial Arjen Oosterman and Brendan Cormier4 Glossary of Terms6 Miracles and Monsters Urte· Rimšaite·

Convergence →←11 Verging on Convergence Rinie van Est and Virgil Rerimassie interview15 Why Don’t You… Brendan Cormier 16 Artifice Earth Adam Rutherford interview20 Same As It Ever Was Timothy Morton

Feedback ←25 It’s All Here: Pardisan and Zoopolis Adam Bobbette and Seth Denizen30 A Performance of Bodies and Architecture Seth and Ariane Lourie Harrison36 This Will Never Last Jamie Campbell40 Watching You, Watching Me Michelle Kasprzak42 A Stroll Through the Bubbles of Chemicals

and Men Etienne Turpin

Current ↓49 The Prefuture of Synthetic Biology Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg52 Generating Community Oliver Medvedik interview 56 Mounds at Work Julie Bogdanowicz60 Living Among Pests Joyce Hwang

65 Structuralism insert Dirk van den Heuvel, Salomon Frausto

97 Synthetic Dementia Kas Oosterhuis interview101 Assimilation Dillon Marsh

Feedforward →105 Nature through the Windshield Koert van Mensvoort interview110 Coming to Terms with Synthetic Biology Rachel Armstrong118 Exploring the Invisible Simon Park124 How to Build a House:

Fairy Tale of a Sustainable Future Simone Ferracina and Melka Myers132 Hackerspaces and the Act of Making Mitchell Joachim and Melanie Fessel136 Air Mines Angel Borrego Cubero and Natalie Jeremijenko140 On the Surface of a Dust Particle César Reyes Nájera and Ethel Baraona Pohl

144 Colophon

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Ball of permafrost preserved mammoth hair. Scientists hope to revive the long extinct mammoth through implanting its DNA in an egg, and using a surrogate elephant to deliver the baby.

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5man or the subservient position that we should listen to nature or perish. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, certainly. But from now on we won’t leave it to nature to upcycle dust into complex organisms; we’re taking the lead! After millennia of trying to over come vulnerabilities, fight decay, and more recently the threat of extinction, today’s and tomorrow’s per spective is one of creation. Enter the glorious world of synbio and feel like master of the Universe! Well, the Earth at least. Are we finally solving problems instead of creating newer and bigger ones? Are we headed towards total control?

The development in sciences mentioned above is known as NBIC convergence, the merging of nano tech nology, biotechnology, information technology and cognitive sciences. If convergence is leading to greater amounts of control over our surroundings, then we should again look to the mechanisms of con trol, for hints of how to manage all of this. For this issue of Volume, we’ve taken three fundamental types of control, to assess the consequences of convergence:

Feedback control involves the reviewing of existing information and past experiences to see if orig i nal goals have been reached. We’ll look back at early experiments on the border of technology and biology to see how far we’ve come.

Current control involves the monitoring of the present system set against quality standards. So how are people grappling with synthetic biology and its related domains today?

Feedforward control looks to the future, in an attempt to identify and prevent deviations in stand ards before they occur. In this section, we’ll look to the near and far future of biotech, trumpeting new opportunities and raising cautionary flags, to help us focus our efforts in the research and design work to come.

Is all this biology talk not spatial enough for you? Then fast forward to our insert, where we’ve gone back to our architectural roots by digging up struc turalism. Working with The Berlage we look at struc turalism’s ambitiously modest attempt to create ‘open structures’. Looking back on its history and assessing current potential the question arises: is there room for a kind of structuralism reloaded today?

* This issue grew from a collaboration with ‘Yes Naturally’ in

The Hague: exhibitions, workshops and a conference on man’s

relation with nature as seen by the arts; spring/summer 2013

(www.ja-natuurlijk.com ).

In architecture a rat race is going on. Not another recordbreaking tower – that wouldn’t be new(s). The race is about the application of a fairly new tech nology in the building industry. What at first seemed a cute and somewhat clumsy machine to produce architectural models and small objects, is now being tested to ‘go live’. I’m talking 3D printing of course and the ambition of at least two architecture offices, in Holland alone, to be the first to print a fullscale building. One is pursuing a pavilion, the other an Amsterdam canal house, complete with gabled roof.

Whether the 3D printer will revolutionize the way we construct the spaces we want, or just add another option, or simply stay within the realm of smallscale complex form, is hard to predict. For the moment, however, it is promising; it could be the start of a further openingup of the building industry to make design and construction more accessible to everyman.

There is another rat race going on, and its con sequences for architecture and the production of space are even less predictable. Synthetic biology is devel op ing at a tremendous pace and will change both our daily reality and our under standing of our relation with the world. It’s already started. The dis tinction between organic and nonorganic, between life and matter, between biology and technology, between cognition and program is fading and blur ring. We’ll use products made by organisms we’ve pro grammed, and we’ll be sur rounded by manmade creatures that exist solely because they can perform a task we need done. We won’t be using nature, or exploiting it, or ex haust ing natural resources; we’ll be creating the nature we need. We’re finally entering a phase in which we can bypass the dichotomy between nature and

12:00 PM, 20 Jan 13 'Quadruple helix' DNA discovered in human cells

Researcher Rachel Armstrong (@livingarchitect) has one of the most active twitter accounts concerning advances in tech nology and biology in the world. With over 22,000 tweets and 7,000 fol lowers she regularly posts ag gregations of science headlines from across the globe, documenting the increasing con vergence between technol ogical and biol ogical worlds. A quick scan of these headlines provides a snapshot of the fantastic, speculative and very possible realities we face in the near future. Throughout this issue Volume is publishing selected tweets from two weeks in Armstrong’s twitter feed to suggest a hint of what is to come.

It’s

a H

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1954Ronchamp Church,

Le Corbusier

2014 (est. date)The Landscape House,Janjaap Ruijssenaars

1914Domino House,

Le Corbusier

2010The Transcendent City,

Richard Hardy

2009Filene’s Eco Pods,

Höweler + Yoon

1975Stanford Torus,

NASA, Stanford University

1960Dome Over Manhattan,

Buckminster Fuller

194415 Miles into the Earth,Hendrik Th. Wijdeveld

2000The Eden Project,

Grimshaw Architects

1928Second Goetheanum,

Rudolf Steiner

1972Robin Hood Gardens,

A. and P. Smithson

1930Villa Savoye,Le Corbusier

1961Helix City,

Kisho Kurokawa

2009Geotube

Faudlers Studio

1964Walking Ciy,Archigram

1962Spray Plastic House,

Archigram

1928Flying City,

Georgij Kroutikov

1920Exhibition Building,

Wenzel Hablik

1922Glass Skyscraper,Mies van der Rohe

2006 (project)Kartal-Pendik Masterplan,

Zaha Hadid Architects

1969John Hancock Center,

Bruce Graham

1891Wainwright Building,

Louis Sullivan

1851The Crystal Palace,

Joseph Paxton

1889Ei¢el Tower,

Gustave Ei¢el

1914The Glass House,

Bruno Taut

1951,Lake Shore DriveApartments,

Mies van der Rohe

2003Kunsthaus,Peter Cook

1919, Monumentto the Third International,

Vladimir Tatlin

1914, Paul Scheerbart:The surface of the Earth would change greatly if brick architecture were everywhere displaced by glass architecture. It would be as though the Earth clad itself in jewellery of brilliants and enamel.

1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

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IAN

AR

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Godzilla, 1954

Darth Vader, 1977

Concrete, 1986

The RoboCop, 1988

Agent Smith, 1999

Plasticman, 1941

The Hulk, 1962

Frankenstein’s Monster, 1931

Dracula, 1897

Princess of Mars, 18

97

King Kong, 1933

Batman, 1939

The Atom, 1961

Aquaman, 1941

Spider-Man, 19

62

Invisible Woman, 1961

The X-Men, 1963

The Iron Fist, 19

74

The Alien, 1979

Gremlins, 1984

E.T., 1982

The Predator, 1988

Captain Planet, 1990

Martian Ambasador, 19

96

Borg Queen, 2009

A.I. David and Joe, 2001

Superman (Man of Steel), 1

938


Avatar, 2009

Mutant Ninja Turtle

s, 1984

Maria Humanoid, 1927

Iron Man, 1965

The Invisible Man, 1933


GLASS GLASS

CONCRETE CONCRETE

STEEL STEEL

PLASTIC PLASTIC

AIRCRAFT/ SPACE TRAVEL AIRCRAFT/ SPACE TRAVEL

NUCLEAR POWER NUCLEAR POWER

ROBOTS ROBOTS

COMPUTERS

BIOLOGY/GENETICS BIOLOGY/GENETICS

IRON IRON

1914, Paul Scheerbart:Iron construction makes it possible to give walls any form that might be desired. Walls need no longer be vertical. Hence the possibilities which iron contruction enables to be developed are quite unlimited.

1928, Sigfried Giedion:It is pointless to discuss the new architecture <...> without touching upon its foundation: ferroconcrete. It is not extracted from nature as a compact material. Its meaning is: arti�cial composition. Its origin: the laboratory.

2011, Rachel Armstrong:With further technological development metabolic materials might become autonomus structures and not depend on existing infrastructures for ‘survival’.

2011, Koert van Mensvoort:Any su�cienlty advanced technology is indistinguishable from nature.

1961, David Greene:You can roll out steel –Any lengthYou can blow up a balloon –Any sizeYou can mould plastic –Any shape

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Le Corbusier


1914Domino House,

Le Corbusier


Richard Hardy


Höweler + Yoon

1975Stanford Torus,



Buckminster Fuller



Grimshaw Architects


Rudolf Steiner


A. and P. Smithson


1961Helix City,

Kisho Kurokawa

2009Geotube

Faudlers Studio



Archigram

1928Flying City,

Georgij Kroutikov


Wenzel Hablik





Bruce Graham


Louis Sullivan


Joseph Paxton

1889Ei¢el Tower,

Gustave Ei¢el


Bruno Taut


Mies van der Rohe



Vladimir Tatlin


1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

BU

ILD

ING

SIN

VE

NT

ION

SP

OP

CU

LTU

RE

MO

NS

TE

RS

AN

D S

UP

ER

HE

RO

ES

UT

OP

IAN

AR

CH

ITE

CT

UR

E

Godzilla, 1954

Darth Vader, 1977

Concrete, 1986

The RoboCop, 1988

Agent Smith, 1999

Plasticman, 1941

The Hulk, 1962


Dracula, 1897


97

King Kong, 1933

Batman, 1939

The Atom, 1961

Aquaman, 1941

Spider-Man, 19

62


The X-Men, 1963

The Iron Fist, 19

74

The Alien, 1979

Gremlins, 1984

E.T., 1982

The Predator, 1988



96

Borg Queen, 2009



938


Avatar, 2009

Mutant Ninja Turtle

s, 1984


Iron Man, 1965



GLASS GLASS

CONCRETE CONCRETE

STEEL STEEL

PLASTIC PLASTIC



ROBOTS ROBOTS

COMPUTERS


IRON IRON






Hig

h p

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stea

m e

ngin

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ajor

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rove

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ustr

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ycle

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ioac

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cast

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chno

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of

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lish

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m g

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For

d M

odel

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rst

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akel

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or im

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ustr

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ium

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ern

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hin

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-fue

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ht

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stic

)

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io t

eles

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of

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e la

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rad

io

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ce r

ecog

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on m

ach

ine

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ar

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or t

elev

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n

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erg

lass

Z3

, ¨rs

t p

rog

ram

mab

le, a

utom

atic

com

put

ing

mac

hin

e

Th

e ¨

rst

elec

tron

ic d

igit

al c

omp

uter

Syn

thet

ic r

ubb

er

Ato

mic

bom

b

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row

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oven

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nsis

tor

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ncip

les

of c

yber

neti

cs, b

asis

of

pra

ctic

al r

obot

ics

Use

of

tita

nium

for

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tary

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plic

atio

ns

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an c

ance

r ce

lls c

ultu

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out

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e of

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ody

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rog

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omb

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ix s

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r p

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nt

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tic

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y on

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tion

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st m

an in

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ace

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cone

bre

ast

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lant

s

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e ¨

rst

hom

e vi

deo

rec

ord

er

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t co

ntac

t le

nses

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etic

cod

e cr

acke

d b

y a

num

ber

of

rese

arch

ers

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rt t

rans

pla

ntat

ion

oper

atio

n

Com

put

er m

ouse

Man

on

the

moo

n

Fir

st f

ace

lifts

att

emp

ted

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rop

roce

ssor

Rec

omb

inan

t D

NA

Th

e et

her

net

(loc

al c

omp

uter

net

wor

k)

Fir

st g

enet

ical

ly e

ngin

eere

d o

rgan

ism

s

Lase

r p

rint

er

DN

A s

eque

ncin

g t

ech

nolo

gy

is d

evel

oped

Cel

l ph

ones

Dom

esti

c ro

bot

s

Art

i¨ci

al h

eart

suc

cess

fully

imp

lant

ed in

a h

uman

Ter

m ‘v

irtu

al r

ealit

y’ ¨

rst

coin

ed

Ap

ple

Mac

into

sh

Win

dow

s p

rog

ram

by

Mic

roso

ft

Fir

st 3

-D v

ideo

gam

e

Pat

ent

for

a g

enet

ical

ly e

ngin

eere

d a

nim

al

Wor

ld W

ide

Web

Tra

nslu

scen

t co

ncre

te

DN

A ¨

nger

pri

ntin

g, g

ene

ther

apy

Gen

etic

ally

mod

iëd

foo

ds

com

e on

to t

he

scen

e

Th

e p

enti

um p

roce

ssor

inve

nted

Aut

omat

ed D

NA

seq

uenc

ing

tec

hno

log

y

Clo

ning

of

a m

amm

al (

Dol

ly t

he

shee

p)

MP

3 P

laye

r

Goo

gle

Fir

st s

elf-

cont

aine

d a

rti¨

cial

hea

rt

Sm

artp

hon

es

Hum

an g

enom

e se

que

nced

Tou

chsc

reen

tec

hno

log

y fo

r m

ass

cons

ump

tion

Fac

eboo

k

You

Tub

e

Larg

e H

adro

n C

ollid

er

Sm

art

mat

eria

ls:

nano

str

uctu

res

livin

g s

truc

ture

sb

iom

imet

ics

shap

e m

emor

yb

iolu

min

esce

nce

self

hea

ling

ph

otom

ech

anic

s

3D

pri

ntin

g


Le Corbusier


1914Domino House,

Le Corbusier


Richard Hardy


Höweler + Yoon

1975Stanford Torus,



Buckminster Fuller



Grimshaw Architects


Rudolf Steiner


A. and P. Smithson


1961Helix City,

Kisho Kurokawa

2009Geotube

Faudlers Studio



Archigram

1928Flying City,

Georgij Kroutikov


Wenzel Hablik





Bruce Graham


Louis Sullivan


Joseph Paxton

1889Ei¢el Tower,

Gustave Ei¢el


Bruno Taut


Mies van der Rohe



Vladimir Tatlin


1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

BU

ILD

ING

SIN

VE

NT

ION

SP

OP

CU

LTU

RE

MO

NS

TE

RS

AN

D S

UP

ER

HE

RO

ES

UT

OP

IAN

AR

CH

ITE

CT

UR

E

Godzilla, 1954

Darth Vader, 1977

Concrete, 1986

The RoboCop, 1988

Agent Smith, 1999

Plasticman, 1941

The Hulk, 1962


Dracula, 1897


97

King Kong, 1933

Batman, 1939

The Atom, 1961

Aquaman, 1941

Spider-Man, 19

62


The X-Men, 1963

The Iron Fist, 19

74

The Alien, 1979

Gremlins, 1984

E.T., 1982

The Predator, 1988



96

Borg Queen, 2009



938


Avatar, 2009

Mutant Ninja Turtle

s, 1984


Iron Man, 1965



GLASS GLASS

CONCRETE CONCRETE

STEEL STEEL

PLASTIC PLASTIC



ROBOTS ROBOTS

COMPUTERS


IRON IRON






Hig

h p

ress

ure

stea

m e

ngin

eM

ajor

imp

rove

men

ts in

iron

ind

ustr

yR

ailw

ay s

team

loco

mot

ive

Por

tlan

d c

emen

tA

lum

iniu

m c

hlo

rid

e re

duc

es t

o m

ake

alum

iniu

mT

ypew

rite

rIm

pro

ved

cyl

ind

er s

hee

t g

lass

Tel

egra

ph

Bic

ycle

Rei

nfor

ced

con

cret

e

Zep

pel

in

Rad

io r

ecei

ver

Air

pla

ne

Rad

ioac

tivi

ty d

isco

vere

d

Pre

cast

con

cret

e te

chno

log

y d

evel

oped

Th

eory

of

Rel

ativ

ity

pub

lish

ed

Ter

m g

enet

ics

¨rs

t co

ined

For

d M

odel

T -

th

e ¨

rst

a¢or

dab

le a

utom

obile

Pla

stic

s (B

akel

ite)

Cel

lop

han

e

Maj

or im

pro

vem

ents

in s

teel

ind

ustr

y

Dyn

amit

e

Tra

©c

ligh

ts

Tel

eph

one

Lig

ht

bul

b

Inex

pen

sive

met

hod

to

pro

duc

e al

umin

ium

Mod

ern

seis

mog

rap

h

Mac

hin

e g

un

Coc

a-C

ola

Pur

e m

etal

lic t

itan

ium

pre

par

ed

Aut

omob

ile e

lect

rica

l ig

niti

on s

yste

m

Mot

oriz

ed m

ovie

cam

eras

Mod

ern

zip

per

Rad

io r

emot

e co

ntro

l

Col

ored

con

cret

e

Sta

inle

ss s

teel

Sh

ort-

wav

e ra

dio

Ble

nder

Tra

©c

ligh

t

Fro

zen

food

Liq

uid

-fue

led

roc

kets

Pen

icill

in d

isco

vere

d

Car

rad

io

ET

FE

(lig

ht

tran

spar

ent

pla

stic

)

Rad

io t

eles

cop

e

Use

of

tita

nium

out

sid

e la

bor

ator

y

FM

rad

io

Tap

e re

cord

er

Voi

ce r

ecog

niti

on m

ach

ine

Ph

otoc

opie

r

Rad

ar

Nuc

lear

¨ss

ion

dis

cove

red

Col

or t

elev

isio

n

Fib

erg

lass

Z3

, ¨rs

t p

rog

ram

mab

le, a

utom

atic

com

put

ing

mac

hin

e

Th

e ¨

rst

elec

tron

ic d

igit

al c

omp

uter

Syn

thet

ic r

ubb

er

Ato

mic

bom

b

Mic

row

ave

oven

Tra

nsis

tor

Pri

ncip

les

of c

yber

neti

cs, b

asis

of

pra

ctic

al r

obot

ics

Use

of

tita

nium

for

mili

tary

ap

plic

atio

ns

Hum

an c

ance

r ce

lls c

ultu

red

out

sid

e of

a b

ody

Hyd

rog

en b

omb

Dou

ble

-hel

ix s

truc

ture

of

DN

A d

isco

vere

d

Wor

ld's

¨rs

t nu

clea

r p

ower

pla

nt

Op

tic

¨b

er

Com

put

er h

ard

dis

k

PC

use

d b

y on

e p

erso

n an

d c

ontr

olle

d b

y a

keyb

oard

NA

SA

est

ablis

hed

Art

i¨ci

al p

acem

aker

Th

e ¨

rst

func

tion

ing

lase

r

Fir

st m

an in

sp

ace

Sili

cone

bre

ast

imp

lant

s

Th

e ¨

rst

hom

e vi

deo

rec

ord

er

Sof

t co

ntac

t le

nses

Gen

etic

cod

e cr

acke

d b

y a

num

ber

of

rese

arch

ers

Hea

rt t

rans

pla

ntat

ion

oper

atio

n

Com

put

er m

ouse

Man

on

the

moo

n

Fir

st f

ace

lifts

att

emp

ted

Mic

rop

roce

ssor

Rec

omb

inan

t D

NA

Th

e et

her

net

(loc

al c

omp

uter

net

wor

k)

Fir

st g

enet

ical

ly e

ngin

eere

d o

rgan

ism

s

Lase

r p

rint

er

DN

A s

eque

ncin

g t

ech

nolo

gy

is d

evel

oped

Cel

l ph

ones

Dom

esti

c ro

bot

s

Art

i¨ci

al h

eart

suc

cess

fully

imp

lant

ed in

a h

uman

Ter

m ‘v

irtu

al r

ealit

y’ ¨

rst

coin

ed

Ap

ple

Mac

into

sh

Win

dow

s p

rog

ram

by

Mic

roso

ft

Fir

st 3

-D v

ideo

gam

e

Pat

ent

for

a g

enet

ical

ly e

ngin

eere

d a

nim

al

Wor

ld W

ide

Web

Tra

nslu

scen

t co

ncre

te

DN

A ¨

nger

pri

ntin

g, g

ene

ther

apy

Gen

etic

ally

mod

iëd

foo

ds

com

e on

to t

he

scen

e

Th

e p

enti

um p

roce

ssor

inve

nted

Aut

omat

ed D

NA

seq

uenc

ing

tec

hno

log

y

Clo

ning

of

a m

amm

al (

Dol

ly t

he

shee

p)

MP

3 P

laye

r

Goo

gle

Fir

st s

elf-

cont

aine

d a

rti¨

cial

hea

rt

Sm

artp

hon

es

Hum

an g

enom

e se

que

nced

Tou

chsc

reen

tec

hno

log

y fo

r m

ass

cons

ump

tion

Fac

eboo

k

You

Tub

e

Larg

e H

adro

n C

ollid

er

Sm

art

mat

eria

ls:

nano

str

uctu

res

livin

g s

truc

ture

sb

iom

imet

ics

shap

e m

emor

yb

iolu

min

esce

nce

self

hea

ling

ph

otom

ech

anic

s

3D

pri

ntin

g


Le Corbusier


1914Domino House,

Le Corbusier


Richard Hardy


Höweler + Yoon

1975Stanford Torus,



Buckminster Fuller



Grimshaw Architects


Rudolf Steiner


A. and P. Smithson


1961Helix City,

Kisho Kurokawa

2009Geotube

Faudlers Studio



Archigram

1928Flying City,

Georgij Kroutikov


Wenzel Hablik





Bruce Graham


Louis Sullivan


Joseph Paxton

1889Ei¢el Tower,

Gustave Ei¢el


Bruno Taut


Mies van der Rohe



Vladimir Tatlin


1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

1800 1850 1900 1910 1920 1930 19501940 1960 1970 19901980 2000 2010

BU

ILD

ING

SIN

VE

NT

ION

SP

OP

CU

LTU

RE

MO

NS

TE

RS

AN

D S

UP

ER

HE

RO

ES

UT

OP

IAN

AR

CH

ITE

CT

UR

E

Godzilla, 1954

Darth Vader, 1977

Concrete, 1986

The RoboCop, 1988

Agent Smith, 1999

Plasticman, 1941

The Hulk, 1962


Dracula, 1897


97

King Kong, 1933

Batman, 1939

The Atom, 1961

Aquaman, 1941

Spider-Man, 19

62


The X-Men, 1963

The Iron Fist, 19

74

The Alien, 1979

Gremlins, 1984

E.T., 1982

The Predator, 1988



96

Borg Queen, 2009



938


Avatar, 2009

Mutant Ninja Turtle

s, 1984


Iron Man, 1965



GLASS GLASS

CONCRETE CONCRETE

STEEL STEEL

PLASTIC PLASTIC



ROBOTS ROBOTS

COMPUTERS


IRON IRON






Hig

h p

ress

ure

stea

m e

ngin

eM

ajor

imp

rove

men

ts in

iron

ind

ustr

yR

ailw

ay s

team

loco

mot

ive

Por

tlan

d c

emen

tA

lum

iniu

m c

hlo

rid

e re

duc

es t

o m

ake

alum

iniu

mT

ypew

rite

rIm

pro

ved

cyl

ind

er s

hee

t g

lass

Tel

egra

ph

Bic

ycle

Rei

nfor

ced

con

cret

e

Zep

pel

in

Rad

io r

ecei

ver

Air

pla

ne

Rad

ioac

tivi

ty d

isco

vere

d

Pre

cast

con

cret

e te

chno

log

y d

evel

oped

Th

eory

of

Rel

ativ

ity

pub

lish

ed

Ter

m g

enet

ics

¨rs

t co

ined

For

d M

odel

T -

th

e ¨

rst

a¢or

dab

le a

utom

obile

Pla

stic

s (B

akel

ite)

Cel

lop

han

e

Maj

or im

pro

vem

ents

in s

teel

ind

ustr

y

Dyn

amit

e

Tra

©c

ligh

ts

Tel

eph

one

Lig

ht

bul

b

Inex

pen

sive

met

hod

to

pro

duc

e al

umin

ium

Mod

ern

seis

mog

rap

h

Mac

hin

e g

un

Coc

a-C

ola

Pur

e m

etal

lic t

itan

ium

pre

par

ed

Aut

omob

ile e

lect

rica

l ig

niti

on s

yste

m

Mot

oriz

ed m

ovie

cam

eras

Mod

ern

zip

per

Rad

io r

emot

e co

ntro

l

Col

ored

con

cret

e

Sta

inle

ss s

teel

Sh

ort-

wav

e ra

dio

Ble

nder

Tra

©c

ligh

t

Fro

zen

food

Liq

uid

-fue

led

roc

kets

Pen

icill

in d

isco

vere

d

Car

rad

io

ET

FE

(lig

ht

tran

spar

ent

pla

stic

)

Rad

io t

eles

cop

e

Use

of

tita

nium

out

sid

e la

bor

ator

y

FM

rad

io

Tap

e re

cord

er

Voi

ce r

ecog

niti

on m

ach

ine

Ph

otoc

opie

r

Rad

ar

Nuc

lear

¨ss

ion

dis

cove

red

Col

or t

elev

isio

n

Fib

erg

lass

Z3

, ¨rs

t p

rog

ram

mab

le, a

utom

atic

com

put

ing

mac

hin

e

Th

e ¨

rst

elec

tron

ic d

igit

al c

omp

uter

Syn

thet

ic r

ubb

er

Ato

mic

bom

b

Mic

row

ave

oven

Tra

nsis

tor

Pri

ncip

les

of c

yber

neti

cs, b

asis

of

pra

ctic

al r

obot

ics

Use

of

tita

nium

for

mili

tary

ap

plic

atio

ns

Hum

an c

ance

r ce

lls c

ultu

red

out

sid

e of

a b

ody

Hyd

rog

en b

omb

Dou

ble

-hel

ix s

truc

ture

of

DN

A d

isco

vere

d

Wor

ld's

¨rs

t nu

clea

r p

ower

pla

nt

Op

tic

¨b

er

Com

put

er h

ard

dis

k

PC

use

d b

y on

e p

erso

n an

d c

ontr

olle

d b

y a

keyb

oard

NA

SA

est

ablis

hed

Art

i¨ci

al p

acem

aker

Th

e ¨

rst

func

tion

ing

lase

r

Fir

st m

an in

sp

ace

Sili

cone

bre

ast

imp

lant

s

Th

e ¨

rst

hom

e vi

deo

rec

ord

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24

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5:48 AM, 18 Jan 13 Nearly perfect, ultrathin invisibility cloak could have wide practical applications

Fee

db

ack

←

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Fig. 01 Pardisan regional plan with Karl Schlamminger designed icon indicating the proposed site.

It’s

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26

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IRAN

EUROPE

NORTH AMERICA

AFRICA

1/16 HCASPIAN SEA

AQUARIUM

DECIDUOUS DECIDUOUS

DESERT

DESERT

STAFF HOUSING

SEWAGE TREATMENT

PLANETARIUM

VISITOR FACILITIES

ADMINISTRATION AMPHITHEATRE

MOTOR POOL

DEPARTMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENT

ORIENTATION

NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM

UTILITIES

VETERINARYHOSPITAL ENVIRONMENTAL

RESEARCH LABS

MAINTENANCE

TROPICAL

TROPICAL

TROPICAL TROPICAL

TROPICAL

SAVANNA

PERSIAN GULF AQUARIUM

OCEANIA

SOUTHAMERICA

WOODLANDSAVANA

GRASSLAND

GRASSLAND

GRASSLAND

DESERT

DESERT

DESERT

DECIDUOUS

DECIDUOUSTUNDRA

TUNDRA

TUNDRA

SAVANNA

TUNDRA

GRASSLAND

DRY SCRUB &

WOODLANDDRY SCRUB &

WOODLANDDRY SCRUB &

WOODLANDDRY SCRUB &

DECIDUOUS

GRASSLAND

DESERT

DESERT

TROPICAL

TUNDRA

TUNDRA

CONIFEROUS

CONIFEROUS

CULTURE EXHIBITS

ANIMAL & VEGETATION EXHIBITS

OTHER

Fig. 02

Fig. 03

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Fig. 02 The world: overlay of bioregions and continents with Iran featured in the largest space in the centre. All managerial programs outside of the line are labeled “other”.

Fig. 03 Model of paradise.Fig. 04 A ha-ha separates visitor from buffalo.Fig. 05 Visitors delight in the architecture of groundhogs.Fig. 06 Underwater and above-ground views are

offered of the marine life.Fig. 07 A monorail brings visitors through hilly terrain.Fig. 08 The Aviary in Pardisan.

Fig. 01 – 08: McHarg, Roberts and Todd, Pardisan: Plan for an Environmental Park in Tehran (Philadelphia: WMRT, 1975)

Fig. 04/05

Fig. 06/07Fig. 08

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10:04 AM, 16 Jan 13 DNA Test Finds Horse Meat In UK Hamburgers

These examples, both historical and contem porary, demonstrate that it is possible for architects to engage performance in various contexts, provok ing a spectrum of responses while assembling hybrid collectives. As the role of the hybrid other expands in the biosynthetic world, architecture will be increasingly called upon to give evidence of its entanglement with living and non-living net works. The biosynthetic is one among several ways to describe such hybridizations. In attributing agency to each actor within this hybrid network, the per-for ma tive architecture outlined in this article is one that scripts the situations of site, forming intimate, temporary scales, and assemblages which bring together human and non-human beings.

1 Chris Salter, Entangled: Technology and the Transformation of

Performance (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2010), 352.

2 N. Katherine Hayles, How We Became Posthuman: Virtual Bodies

in Cybernetics, Literature and Informatics (Chicago: University

of Chicago Press, 1999), 3.

3 Ihab Hassan, “Prometheus as Performer: Toward a Posthumanist

Culture? A University Masque in Five Scenes,” The Georgia

Review 31 (1977): 830-850. Hassan characterizes the term post-

humanism as follows: “We need first to understand that the

human form – including human desire and all its external repre sen-

tations – may be changing radically, and thus must be re-visioned.

We need to understand that five hundred years of humanism

may be coming to an end, as humanism transforms itself into some-

thing that we must helplessly call posthumanism,” 843.

4 Ibid., 850.

5 Ralf Remshardt, “Posthumanism,” Mapping Intermediality

in Performance, Eds. Sarah Bay-Cheng, Chiel Kattenbelt,

Andy Lavender, and Robin Nelson, (Amsterdam: Amsterdam

University Press, 2010), 135.

6 Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline, “Cyborgs and space,”

Astronautics (September 1960): 27.

7 Gerard Cottin, “CYSP-1 danseuse-etoile est un robot,” Science

et Vie (September 1956): 65. See www.cyberneticszoo.com for

other articles on CYSP-1 from the 1950s.

8 Ibid.

9 Reyner Banham, ‘Monumental Windbags,” AD “Pneu World”

June 1968 reprinted in Marc Dessauce, The Inflatable Moment:

Pneumatics and Protest in ‘68 (New York: Princeton

Architectural Press, 1999), 33.

10 Karen Barad, “Posthumanist Performativity: Toward an Under-

standing of How Matter Comes to Matter,” Signs, vol. 28, no. 3

(2003): 826.

Per

form

ance

as

Arc

hit

ectu

ral A

ctio

n

Why Don’t You …genetically modify a goat so that it lactates spider silk?

A handful of companies are working on producing a high-strength fiber material made of a recombinant spider silk-like protein extracted from the milk of transgenic goats, made by Nexia Biotechnologies. The purified silk proteins are dried, dissolved using solvents and trans formed into microfibers using wet-spinning fiber production method-ologies. Revealed to have novel levels of strength and lightness, applications of artificial spider silk could include using it for artificial ligaments and tendons, bulletproof vests, and improved car airbags.

Why Don’t You… live forever by replacing your organs every six years?… scan your DNA and the DNA of a pool of potential

suitors to select which one will give you the best offspring?

… clean the ocean with plasticeating bacteria? You could make floating plastic villas out of them.

36

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Th

is W

ill N

ever

Las

tS

et in

ban

al h

omes

, bac

kyar

ds, a

nd a

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Fig. 02

Fig. 01

Fig. 01 Portal, 2011, from Looking AskanceFig. 02 An Image Idea Of A Tree, 2011, from Looking AskanceFig. 03 Portal No.2, 2012, from This Will Never Last

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Fig. 03

48

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2:18 PM, 17 Jan 13 R

esearchers expose new vulnerabilities in the security of personal genetic information

Cu

rren

t↓

2:25 PM, 15 Jan 13 We've Known Texting Was Going to Destroy Conversation for Over a Century

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Fig. 01 A Natural History of the Synthetic Future (from The Synthetic Kingdom)

How will we classify what is natural or unnatural when life is built from scratch? Synthetic biology is turning to the living kingdoms for its materials library. It promises no more petro-chemicals: instead, pick a feature from an existing organism, locate its DNA and insert into a biological chassis. Engineered life could compute, produce energy, clean up pollution, kill pathogens and even do the housework. Mean while, we’ll have to add an extra branch to the Tree of Life. The Synthetic Kingdom is part of our new nature.

Biotech promises us control over nature, but living machines need controlling. Biology doesnʼt respect boundaries or patents. Are promises of sustainability and healthiness seductive enough to accept such compromise?

Th

e P

refu

ture

of

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ill w

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’s v

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nd h

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ill it

be

eval

uate

d?

Ale

xan

dra

Dai

sy G

insb

erg

50

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Pho

to: C

arol

e S

uety

Fig. 02 PollutionSensing Lung Tumor A terminal pathology from a heavy smoker. A new species evolved,

combining glass-fibre fabricating bacteria and a carbon monoxide sensor species, still identifiable by its manufacturer’s DNA tag.

51

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5Somewhere between a vat of expensive face cream and a baby Neanderthal lies a probable future for syn thetic biology. While synbio start-ups – large and small – struggle with the reality of scaling up microscopic cellular factories into profitable business models, stories of DIY anti-cancer research, Neanderthal cloning, limitless ‘green’ kerosene, and tumor-killing bacteria are told as outcomes of a likely future where humans have full control over biology.

Over the last decade, many diverse interests have contributed to this ambition of an easy-to-manipulate biology, as the field of synthetic biology has spread around research labs all over the world. Scientists, engineers, policymakers, industrialists, space agencies, politicians, and even designers are constructing a future defined by the grand rhetoric of a world-changing, world-saving technology. Fig. 01

The engineering vision supported by governments and corporations tends towards the practical. These are liquid dreams of industrial chemistry and pipelines filled with expensive molecules oozing out of synthetic organisms, invisible biological factories locked in secure vats. The bigger aspirations of synthetic biologists to place engineered life into the ecosystem, from pollution-munching bacteria to hi-tech plants, need not be realized for synthetic biology to be deemed a successful venture in terms of investment parameters.

Meanwhile, designers and artists are increasingly intrigued by the promise of biology as a material to make things, programmed from the DNA up. These visions tend to sway between mild utopias, where ‘green’ tech nol ogies successfully displace existing dirty ones, growing trees as houses, or creating novel biodegradable materials; and unfamiliar states of existence that to most, might seem more like soft dystopias: futures where algae is farmed on bodies, or pigeons defecate soap. Fig. 02

‘Official’ biological futures tend to occupy what Drew Endy, a pioneer of the field, describes as “the half pipe of doom”. At one end lies biological perfection, where our needs are met and our behaviors are thank-fully unchanged: we’ll fly endless miles in planes fuelled by kerosene, secreted by yeast that has gorged on sugar-cane. At the other end are the scenes of biological terror and human error, disastrous calamities where the boun-daries between designed and un-designed life is indistin-guishable, or beyond our financial or physical control.

All these futures are not equally likely, but progress lies somewhere in here.

What are the mundane realities of designing biology today? Synthetic biology is a predicted technology that still has a lot of science to grapple with. Computer logic and biological survival are not a natural fit. While the discipline is increasingly enabled by exponential advances in DNA sequencing and synthesis technologies, in labs around the world, engineers and scientists are painstak-ingly trying to wrest control over biology’s complexity. The visions are necessary to fuel this research, especially in an application-driven climate. George Osborne, the UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced twenty million British pounds of funding for UK synthetic biol ogy in 2012, with the justification that: “They say that syn-thetic biology will heal us, heat and feed us.” It may be some time yet.

For a technology that promises it could make all living matter into viable material with which to build use-ful things, it is vitally important to consider the future now. Investment and law-making shape the path of pro-

gress, as can public opinions. Can we influence the path of our biological future? This is where I see a valuable role for design and art in these early stages, upstream in the development of a technology. Navigating the space between the mundane visions of chemicals, tethered in the technologically possible, and dreams unconstrained by existing science can help us test out what we might want from a future. It may also inspire new research areas, and make us think more carefully about others.

The drive to engage in synthetic biology research is, for many engineers and scientists, underpinned by a desire ‘to make the world a better place’. How these beliefs are defined and evaluated, and whose ‘better’ will ultimately shape our common future, is something that is less clear. As companies turn to synthetic biology, they are investing in muscled-up salmon, rubber-secreting microbes, and long-lasting plastics made by bacteria. Es-tab lishing what we want from ‘better’ is essential, other-wise we may well end up replicating existing, troubled systems of production with ‘biosimilars’. The discourse around synthetic biology tends to placate, soothing our concerns, yet this still is a technology that can be applied equally to the production of anti-malarial chemicals as to the design of ‘greener’ explosives.

As such, working as an artist or designer building futures upstream in a technology comes with a respon-sibility. Through my own experiments testing out different kinds of collaborations in synthetic biology, I have discov-ered that by imagining a future, you might make it more likely. Arthur Clarke famously noted: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Building alternative visions that are indistinguishable from possible reality can contribute to the hype around an emerging technology. This runs the risk of desen-sitizing us to the issues that we need to face, or less seriously perhaps, triggering disappointment when the future doesn’t come to pass.

Now, in the prefuture of synthetic biology, is where designers, artists, activists, DIY experimenters can cri tique and direct the path of this possible future. As engineers, synthetic biologists ask: ‘How do we make algae make fuel?’ We also need to challenge what’s being asked. This means not only designing ways to use less fuel, but also imagining systems that don’t need fuel.

The UK’s Design Council notes that: “Eighty per cent of the environmental impact of the products, services, and infrastructure around us is determined at the design stage.” By affecting the direction that a technology takes at a much earlier stage than problem solving, could we do better?

Synthetic biology won’t necessarily solve our problems. But it could make for a more interesting future if and when we get there.

I’d like to thank Autodesk for the generous support during the research and writing of this article.

1:25 PM, 15 Jan 13 Is the Human Body Redundant?

Why Don’t You …add calcifying bacteria to concrete so that it can repair itself when it cracks?

Concrete has one serious flaw: it cracks, leading to corrosion of its reinforcement steel. Researchers at TU Delft have engineered a solution by embedding calcite-precipitating bacteria into the concrete mixture. When water seeping through a crack comes into contact with the bacteria, it awakens the spores to start their calcite production, thus gluing the crack back together.

Why Don’t You… put computer chips and sensors on everything?… make a biokerosene from bacteria and stop

mucking around with oil?… grow giant mushrooms all over your building,

and harvest them as organic solar panels?

Open Structures

An Introductory Dossier on Dutch

Structuralism

[ 1 ]

Dutch Structuralism represents one of the most important moments in the devel-opment of twentieth-century architecture in the Netherlands, whether one cherishes its humanist and overall cultural ambitions or criticizes it for being an architecture of good intentions. The succeeding pages are a collection of ideas and possibilities aiming to introduce Dutch Structuralism to the next generation of architects and urban designers, as well as to expand its potential relevance for contemporary ar-chitectural practice and thinking.

A supplement to Volume 35: Everything Under Control, this introductory dossier is a collaboration between the Delft University of Technology’s Architecture Department and the Berlage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design, and The New Institute.

Piet Blom

[ 2 ]

Introduction

Salomon Frausto

Structuralism does not withdraw history from the world: it seeks to link to history not only certain con-tents (this has been done a thousand times) but also certain forms, not only the material but also the intelligible, not only the ideological but also the aesthetic.

– Roland Barthes, The Structuralist Activity

The current economic crisis has increasingly left numerous buildings aban-doned throughout the world. From va-cant office space in the Netherlands to post-industrialized urban sites in China, the opportunity to rethink the reuse and transformation of the millions of square meters of available building stock is not only a major task for today’s architects and urban designers but it also affords them the opportunity to find alternative methods of design practice. It is within this context that the spirit of structur-alism – the ability to practice in trans-formable, adjustable, sustainable ways in

relation to constantly fluctuating circum-stances – that the new Berlage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design at the Delft University of Technology initiated this publication.

Continuing the legacy of the former Rotterdam-based Berlage Institute – a groundbreaking educational-cultural plat-form for study, encounter, and debate that operated from 1990 to 2012 – The Berlage today aims to open up questions that are relevant for the contemporary discipline, expanding the university con-text to a broader international audience. The former Berlage Institute closed its doors in 2012 after twenty-two success-ful years following the parliamentary and ministerial decision to cease funding for all post-academic institutions within the Netherlands. The Berlage continues the Institute’s mission to create a learning environment for students to test and communicate models, insights, and prin-ciples focusing on architectural, urban, and landscape issues.

Dutch architecture culture has never limited itself to local issues; in fact, its innovation has always been founded on an international outlook. As the building process becomes increasingly complex, ambitious, and global, The Berlage sees the challenge for architectural education today as the opportunity to directly en-gage with these transformations. At the same time, it aims to develop new types of architectural knowledge based on in-novative forms of collaboration between architects, designers, planners, citizens, politicians, and institutions.

The Berlage’s Open Structures mas-terclass, held in autumn of 2012 and led by Herman Hertzberger with Tom Aver-maete and Dirk van den Heuvel, serves as the point of departure for this publi-cation. The first collaborative effort of The Berlage – jointly produced with the Architecture Department at TU Delft, The New Institute in Rotterdam, which

houses the NAI and its archives, and Volume magazine – it aims for a global exchange of established traditions and experiences acquired from institutions, as well as for the worldwide distribution of Dutch expertise about the built envi-ronment.

Now more than ever, it’s vital for the discipline to open up to new ideas, histor-ical experience, and shifting paradigms that may radically transform the built en-vironment in this time of crisis. It is the aim of The Berlage to continue structur-ing a unique environment for educational experimentation, one that prepares the figure of the architect to imagine tomor-row’s future.

[ 3 ]

it, become very important. Both notions refer to an understanding of design that takes into account other spatial agen-cies than that of the architect and both define the architectural project beyond the articulation of a perfected image. Structuralism seems to have engaged with similar issues and this explains its topicality.

Dirk van den Heuvel: I’m really sur-prised that we still talk about it, and increasingly so it seems. When I was a student in the late eighties you wouldn’t touch the topic. Structuralism was not so much taboo, but old fashioned, a non-subject, and even Hertzberger himself was moving away from that position at the time. Piet Blom’s Cube Houses in Rotterdam had been finished for a couple of years and everyone was very dismissive about them. The new trend was coming from Mecanoo, and the first buildings by OMA were being constructed. So I couldn’t imag-ine becoming fascinated by Piet Blom at the time. My fascination is that the questions behind structuralism are still very fundamental, they are still on the table. If you look beyond just the Dutch Forum group (Aldo van Eyck, Herman Hertzberger and others) there are a lot of contemporary works, like work from OMA and MVRDV that are at least building on the legacy of Dutch structur-alism. So these questions are still being asked: To accommodate the masses in an egalitarian society the search is for open, all-inclusive systems, and to devise these is extremely tough.

TA: You are right to stress that the his-torical development of structuralism was embedded in the project for an egalitar-ian society and the question of ‘the great-est number’. However, it is in my opinion also strongly related to the emergence of a society of emancipated individuals who

The Agency of

Structuralism

Tom Avermaete and Dirk van den Heuvel interviewed by Arjen Oosterman and Brendan Cormier

Arjen Oosterman: We’re inter-ested in the present relevance of structuralism, so please tell us, what is so fascinating about structuralism?

Tom Avermaete: The masterclass we held was about structuralism, clearly, but also about ‘open structures’. Our contemporary fascination with structur-alism has a lot to do with the ongoing debates concerning the changing role of the architect and alternative definitions of the architectural project. At present a lot of people are searching for alter-native roles, ‘other ways of doing’, as Jeremy Till and Tatjana Schneider have recently called it. Out of this perspective notions like ‘openness’ and ‘generosity’, in the way that Lacaton and Vassal use

had their own ideas and practices – espe-cially concerning the built environment. Out of this perspective the knowledge of the architect was strongly repositioned. Structuralism illustrated that expertise concerning the built environment could also come from everyday users, in both more traditional as well as modernized societies. I believe that it is this reposi-tioned knowledge of the architect which strongly appeals to students nowadays. In contradistinction to the sometimes self-indulgent postures of architects in the 80s and 90s, students are today look-ing for other positions from which they can engage with different spatial agen-cies. This implies not only redefining the role of the architect, but also questioning the very idea of the architectural project. An architectural project is then no longer understood as a projection of a perfect state, but rather as an interaction with other spatial agencies: of communities, of inhabitants, of future users, and so on. Hence, it is certainly about open systems, but this openness implies particularly the engagement with other spatial agencies.

DvdH: Herman Hertzberger’s books are by far the most read by our stu-dents. We don’t tell them to read them, they just do. It’s quite amazing. One of the paradoxes of historical structur-alism is that, although it tries to avoid the issue of form, it developed a very strong formal language that is recogniz-able today. Surely that’s part of why we still talk about it. And that’s the para-dox, because the way it’s being revived now has two shapes. One is indeed a formal language, look at pixel power of MVRDV or the town hall in Rotterdam by OMA. And then there is a revival of those issues that you were talking about, Tom. How does architecture as a spatial system work with the other spatial agen-cies in the city? And then you get a very different sort of typology, configurations

[ 10 ]

Piet Blom; J.L.M. Lauweriks; Theo van Doesburg

[ 11 ]

Piet Blom; Willem Jan Neutelings; B. Mertens

[ 22 ]

know risk of exhausting procedures was a major argument for the Tate Gallery to move to an old factory building. Building new on a nice spot in the city would have taken at least eight to ten years more.

AO: Yes. Why don’t we change the system from one prescribing what can be done into one prevent-ing only the things that should not happen.

HH: Don’t get me started. Society is changing so rapidly. Regulatory planning was invented to prevent one function hindering another. Say, noxious indus-try in the middle of a housing area. The idea dates from the nineteenth century. But it almost killed a neighborhood like the one here, De Pijp, where our office is. Twenty years ago the streets had all kinds of workshops and activities; you could find everything you needed within a circumference of one kilometer. Today there are only shops and housing; and restaurants, fortunately. Production has been expelled.

Anyway, changeability is important and we as architects have to learn how to design buildings that can change. No building remains as built.

AO: So change is one of the foun-dational elements of structuralism.

HH: Not so much foundational as much as a reason why structuralism is again seen as meaningful. There are two reasons that caused this renewed inter-est in structuralism. First is the computer as a design tool. It made designers think in a much more structured way. By the way, from the start of my career I have been thinking in layers, never in sepa-rate spaces, each with their own char-acter (color, material, function) like most designs were created. Now, the computer makes this structured and layered way of

designing even stronger. It’s totally dif-ferent from how a much admired archi-tect like Le Corbusier worked, who made each element, each detail a piece of art. But his designs are so interesting, that you accept a strangely shaped window simply for being beautiful. On the other side, Mies van der Rohe always used one type of window frame, one door and so on. Pretty boring, I’d say, I don’t know why people get so excited about these buildings; apart from the Farnsworth House of course.

In the end Mies van der Rohe won the battle with Le Corbusier, so to say, by inventing generic space. Take his archi-tecture building at IIT in Chicago. You can do anything in it. The architecture is only occupied by itself, with what I call the ‘building order’. Not with function.

AO: Is that criticism or admiration?

HH: Admiration! Not without cri-tique, though. At my age I cannot sim-ply admire, I’m always critical too. So we have to strive for an architecture that doesn’t just provide boring boxes, only characteristic constructions even when filled in a boring way, still repre-sent quality.

AO: In your own work I see a shift from clustered small-scale elements, where the exterior is sim-ply the consequence of this spatial configuration, towards designs that address the exterior as a theme in itself in scale and detailing.

HH: Yes, people criticized me for this lack of ‘gesture’, so I thought, why not give it a go? These expressive forms have an external rationale. They form a lasting shell or envelope, covering its instable content. The ‘waving’ roof of the Breda theater for instance ties

together the space; it forces the usually awkwardly protruding stage tower into a larger composition.

But my latest project, the school in Italy, avoids this ‘greater form’. It is a structure that can be added to or sub-tracted from, to create a maximum num-ber of possible connections and configu-rations with an economy of means.

AO: Who are the architects

nowadays that you feel related to, that understand the issue?

HH: Lacaton and Vassal have very interesting ideas. Very inspiring. Also although quite differently Anna Heringer. What’s really great is the Basketbar from NL Architects in Utrecht. Within budget they created as an extra func-tion, a basketball court on top of this restaurant building. Still too many archi-tects are trying to create beauty. I’m not against beauty, far from it. But beauty is the gift that results from doing things right. It is not possible to intentionally make a beautiful building. It is not a goal to actively strive for.

Personally, I’ve always been fasci-nated by what is done by people with a building. All architects I know, even someone like Aldo van Eyck, think that people spoil their buildings. They won’t say that directly, but that’s how they feel. The interiors of my elderly home De Drie Hoven were completely changed, com-pletely ‘kitschified’. But that resulted in such great images, that it made me see the beauty of the banal.

For me the essence still is ‘make space and leave room’ as my first book was called (Ruimte maken, ruimte laten1). We’re living in a moment of change. The time of fairytale castles is over.

1 Herman Hertzberger, Ruimte maken, ruimte laten. Lessen in architectuur (Rotterdam: Uitgeverij 010 1996). The English version is titled: Lessons for Students in Architecture (Rotterdam: 010 Publishers 1991).

[23][ 23 ]

A Selection of Work from the

Open StructuresMasterclass

From November 19th to the 23rd, 2012, The Berlage initiated a master-class entitled Open Structures, led by the first dean of the former Berlage In-stitute, Herman Hertzberger, together with Tom Avermaete and Dirk van den Heuvel. The aim of the masterclass was to explore the adaptability, extension, and reprogramming of buildings, keep-ing the spirit of structuralism in mind. Participants investigated the essential architectural conditions and character-istics necessary for buildings to be con-sidered ‘open structures’, as opposed to buildings conceived as complete works of art, or ‘closed’ structures.

Students first researched existing ex-amples of both open and closed building types in order to critically assess each type’s capacity to allow for – or prevent – change, extension, and complete trans-formation. They analyzed architectural features that are characteristic for open structures, evaluating the field of tension between the rhetoric and reality of open-ness and closedness.

Working in groups, participants ex-plored the ability of their precedent studies to adapt to change, extension, or complete transformation. They made precise diagrams, selected keywords that defined openness, and drafted sketches envisioning the possible adaptation to change, extension, and complete trans-formation of the analyzed precedents.

In the second part, participants were asked to make design proposals for the Ministry of Social Affairs, originally de-signed by Hertzberger between 1979 and 1990. They were asked to envision how this example of an open building could be programmatically and spatially trans-formed while keeping initial characteris-tics intact.

Complementary to this task, the masterclass also consisted of lectures including ‘What are Open Structures?’ by Herman Hertzberger, ‘Dutch Forum and the (Im)possibility of a Universal Culture’ by Dirk van den Heuvel, ‘Mat Building: A Prime Figure of Structuralism?’ by Tom Avermaete, and ‘On LC’s Venice Hospi-tal’ by José Oubrerie.

Participants and invited guest engage in a lively debate during the final presentations

Tom Avermaete presents a lecture entitled ‘Mat Building: A Prime Figure of Structuralism?’.

Jeroen van der Drift and Herman Hertzberger discuss the Ministry of Social Affairs building.

Dirk van den Heuvel presents a lecture entitled ‘Dutch Forum and the (Im)possibility of a Universal Culture’.

Salomon Frausto, Tom Avermaete, and Dirk van den Heuvel discuss with Jonathan de Veen and other members of Group 1 research into select buildings by Louis I. Kahn.

[32]

Piet Blom

This introductory publi-cation is a supplement to Volume 35: Everything Under Control. It is a collaboration between the Delft University of Technology’s Architecture Department and the Ber-lage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design, and The New Institute.

The New Institute

The New Institute celebrates the innovative power of architecture, design and e-culture. The organization arose out of a merger between the Netherlands Architecture Institute; Premsela, the Netherlands Institute for Design and Fashion; and Virtueel Platform, the e-culture knowledge institute.

The Berlage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design

The Berlage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design is a new educa-tional initiative at the Delft University of Technology, continuing the legacy of the former Berlage Institute. It offers a new cross-disciplinary and international postgraduate master’s degree from the TU Delft in an experimental setting, characterized by guidance and exchange with leading and emerging designers and scholars.

Architecture Department, Faculty of Architecture, TU Delft

Through its The Archi- tecture Project and its Foundations research program, the Architecture Department of the TU Delft’s Faculty of Architec-ture has established itself as a leading voice on the revision of twentieth- century architecture and its impact on contemporary practice and thinking.

Open Structures: An Introductory Dossier

Editors: Salomon Frausto and Dirk van den Heuvel

Editorial assistant: Robert Gorny

Graphic Design: Joris Kritis

Special thanks to Guus Beumer, Herman Gelton, Alfred Marks, Behrang Mousavi, and Jonathan de Veen.

Why Don’t You …terraform the moon by bringing a bucket of bacteria with you that turns moon dust into solid bricks?

One of the greatest challenges of colonizing the moon or Mars, is in transporting materials with which to build settlements. Students at Stanford and Brown univer si ties are working on a method that can transform lunar and Martian regolith (planetary dust) into solid bricks, through the use of bacteria. Instead of shipping a ton of bricks to the moon, it would suffice to bring a vile of bacteria and the right processing equipment.

Why Don’t You… turn your kids into cyborgs? They’ll thank you later.

… program cockroaches to seek out victims trapped in earthquake rubble?

… engineer pigeons to defecate soap, keeping our streets and buildings clean?

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When applied to architecture, Marshall McLuhan’s famous construct that ‘the medium is the message’ may suggest a radically different approach to the design and construction of buildings – one tilted away from the obsession with perfectly crafted and morphologically impressive objects and geared toward the re-examination and invention of the ideas, processes, and technologies that make up the very fabric of what it means to design, build, and inhabit. The view encapsulated in McLuhan’s writings is that buildings – understood as extensions of the human body and as media of communication – fundamentally shape the patterns of human association and community, determining and enabling changes in our individual and societal behavior.

Following McLuhan, architect Sam Jacob describes buildings as dense informational assemblages – instructions issued through built form:

“Buildings tell us that we should walk here and not there through the positioning of a corridor, that we should sleep in just such a room and eat in another, with the light falling in just such a manner over a table of particular proportions. In doing so, architecture is communicating to us a particular idea of use and experience.”1

Yet, if the ‘communicative mode’ of architecture is an attractive way to re-frame the profession – especially at a time where the primacy of physical space is in question – it is however telling that the most powerful illustrations in McLuhan’s text on housing have little to do with architects or their artistic intent, and everything to do with the adoption of disruptive technology. McLuhan writes that:

“If people are inclined to doubt whether the wheel or typography or the plane could change our habits of sense perception, their doubts end with electric lighting. In this domain, the medium is the message, and when the light is on there is a world of sense that disappears when the light is off.”2

Perhaps what architects can learn from Marshall McLuhan is not only that architecture is, as Jacob puts it, “just as fictional as any other form of communicative media”3, but also that the most profound changes to the built environment occur by means of technology, not form.

In other words: If architecture is the spatial dis ci pline par excellence, should it not help dream into existence the technologies that will shape our future cities, rather than surrender to the incre-mental logic of consumer demand and to the mere arrange ment of existing building materials and components? Should it not lead a conversation with scientists, programmers, engineers, and the public about what a biosynthetic, printable, digitally augmented building can or should be?

As the industrial framework within which architecture currently defines its identity and modus operandi proves increasingly inadequate visàvis social and environmental pathologies, these emerging technologies might offer designers a chance to expand and radicalize the discipline, precipitating a new age of sustainable development.

The narrative fragments that follow look into such an (im)possible future – a fairy tale of sorts.

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5:17 AM, 13 Jan 13 Interesting! It would be even better if the system actually produced

soil as a longer term outcome :)

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Fig. 01 Burrowing Worms: Different worm varieties correspond to different tunnel textures.

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“Magda? I have not seen you in...well, ever!” The two friends chatted often online, but had never

met in person. To celebrate their fortuitous encounter, Magda invited Perry to a cup of tea at her place, a short five-minute walk from campus.

“Mine is not your typical biosynthetic house,” she warned as they approached the coralline structure. “It is a bit more experimental.”

Magda worried that her strange abode might affect how people viewed her, and rightly so.

The house was a maze of soft ciliated structures and hard sedimentary branches. Natural light filtered from above through translucent crystals, and a salty smell pervaded the air. Serving a tea steeped in flowers harvested on a nearby roof, Magda informed Perry that her living house absorbed pollutants from the environ-ment and that, breaking them down, it continually secreted elaborate calcareous networks. Dwelling in the gaps between these exuberant stalactites and sta lag mites, she explained, consisted in adapting these forms to human use, in devising ways to inhabit them.

“Sometimes they spread over the entire space, or get so tall that I have to climb over them,” admitted Magda, “so instead of keeping keys to the rooms of the house, I keep a hammer, and break through space knocking down the sediments I can’t embrace.”

“Every discovery, however small, implies a redefinition of everything that we have so far comfortably accepted as the only possible yardstick of reality. Thus, the discovery of this unusual and disquieting botany was bound to upset the illusory consistency of our previous notions of reality and unreality.” – from Leo Lionni’s Parallel Botany6

“Tommy, can you fetch me a wall fruit?” “Interior or exterior?” “Interior, please, I am making a salad!” “The interior ones are sour,” Tommy muttered as he

stumped up the stairs and picked two off the bedroom’s wall. “I don’t like these.”

Back in the kitchen, his mother laid them on the fungal sink and pushed with both hands on the spongy pores. The inverted cap briefly filled with water. Linda dried the vermilion-colored fruits and began slicing.

“Who built our home, mom?” inquired Tommy. “Your dad did, honey, you know that” she responded

without lifting her eyes from the cutting board.Tommy persisted: “But where did he get the seeds?”Linda paused for a few seconds, stitching back

together the events of the past ten months in a way that her twelve-year-old son would understand. She put down the knife and began: “Well, do you remember when we set off fireworks in the plaza and Mayor Blooms teared up?” Tommy nodded. “That night we were cele-brating the Safe Seed Act (SSA) – the expiration of seed patents. From then on, anyone could collect, trade and plant seeds and spores from food and appliances.”

“I can too?” he interjected. “I don’t see why not,” she responded warmly.

“Your aunt Mary started growing bioluminescent windows in her backyard, Miss Marbles carpeted her roof with structural sticky leaves, the hairdresser began cultivat-ing organic chairs in the abandoned parking lot next to the chapel.”

Tommy cut in: “And dad? What did dad grow?”

“Come here, come here, men. Make me a door right here!” He specified the exact dimensions to the inch, and his orders were carried out. Then he walked into the house and smiled with pleasure as the builder remarked that the walls were precisely the height of a wellconstructed twostory house. Krespel walked thoughtfully back and forth inside. The builders, hammers and picks in hand, followed behind him; and whenever he cried “Put a window here, six by four; and a little window here, three by two!” space was immediately knocked out.” – from ETA Hoffman’s ‘Councillor Krespel’4

John was keen on the idea that interior space might be generated negatively – by excavation and ex trac tion. So when he heard of Negative Organic Building (NOB), a new construction method commonly referred to as ‘worming,’ he was intrigued.

The architect met him on a Monday morning in the café across from the library. He introduced himself and pulled two boxes out of a black canvas bag. One box contained different color samples of a high-density mycelium polymer.

“You see, your house would be first built out of this stuff as a solid, monolithic block. The soil preparation is minimal, and there is no need for foundations as long as the block is partially buried in the ground. The material provides excellent insulation and water resistance, so you won’t need the typical layering of additional sheets and membranes. What you see is what you get.”

He then opened the second, smaller box. The interior was lined with a yellow, slimy liquid and sub divided in small rectangular compartments. Each com part ment contained a two-inch long, half-inch thick, large-mouthed invertebrate organism.

“And these are our babies, the worms!” Said the architect proudly. “These little guys were engineered to chew through and quickly metabolize the polymer, converting it into a nutritious substance known as ‘worm oil’ – and carving out your home in the process.” John nodded; he had read about this rare oil and its prodigious medical applications.

“Worms can’t be farmed at industrial scales,” explained the architect, “their metabolism is too sen-sitive. They only feed after bonding with a small set of human co-inhabitants.”

As it turns out, NOB buildings were the by-product of a mutually beneficial inter-species enterprise. John signed the contract and proceeded in selecting his house volume, color, texture, and worm varieties.

“The spandrels originated as a nonadaptive side consequence of a prior architectural decision. These originally nonadaptive spaces were then coopted … as ‘canvasses’ for wonderfully appro priate designs. In biological terms, the mosaic designs are secondary adaptations, and the spandrels themselves then become exaptations for the residency of these designs.”5

– from Stephen Jay Gould’s The Structure of

Evolutionary Theory

“Hey Perry! Is that you?” she shouted from across the quad.

Wo

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4:08 AM, 13 Jan 13 Yes, exactly, systems theory is a different science to classical science.

We don't (yet) use it technologically

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Fig. 02 Fruity Wall: A thermally broken, cactus-derived organism that bears edible fruit.

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2:43 PM, 10 Jan 13 Can't sleep, robot spider dress will get me

Angel Borrego Cubero is an architect presently teaching at the ETSA Madrid. In 1999, he founded Office for Strategic Spaces (OSS), an office of art and architecture. www.o-s-s.orgSeth Denizen is a researcher, landscape architect, and biologist, currently teaching at the University of Hong Kong.Rinie van Est is research coordinator & ‘trendcatcher’ at the Rathenau Instituut’s Technology Assessment department. He also lectures at the School of Innovation Sciences at the Eindhoven University of Technology.Simone Ferracina (@oeverywhere) is a NY-based architectural designer and the editor of Organs Everywhere. Melanie Fessel initiated ONE (Open Network Ecology) Odyssey, an interdisciplinary research enterprise based on philanthropic design principles, to integrate ecological issues into the urban environment. Melanie is currently the Director of Design Research at Terreform ONE.Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg is an artist, designer and writer. Working in unfamiliar fields like synthetic biology, Daisy is exploring new roles for design and the implications of emerging technologies.Seth Harrison is writer and life sciences entrepreneur; Ariane Lourie Harrison is an architect and educator at the Yale School of Archi tec ture; together they founded Harrison Atelier (HAt) in 2009 and have pro-duced work that explores the intersection of design and biotechnology.Allyn Hughes is researcher and designer based in New York. She currently works at OMA*AMO. Joyce Hwang is Assistant Professor of Architecture at the University at Buffalo, SUNY, and Director of Ants of the Prairie, an architectural practice confronting ecological conditions through creative means. Agata Jaworska is an independent designer, researcher, and writer, currently working as content and project manager at Droog Lab.Natalie Jeremijenko is an artist and engineer. She is the director of the environmental health clinic at NYU. Jeremijenko’s projects have been exhibited by several museums and galleries, including the MASSMoCA, the Whitney, Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt. Mitchell Joachim is an architect, urban designer and founding Co-President of Terreform ONE. He is Associate Professor in Practice of Architecture, Urban Planning and Sustainable Design at NYU.Michelle Kasprzak is a writer and curator at V2_Institute for the Unstable Media and the Dutch Electronic Art Festival (DEAF).Dillon Marsh graduated from the University of Stellenbosch in Fine Art. He currently lives and works in Cape Town, South Africa.Oliver Medvedik is co-founder and Scientific Director of Genspace. He holds a PhD in molecular biology from Harvard University and majored in biology as an undergrad at Hunter College.Koert van Mensvoort is an artist, scientist and philosopher. It is his aim to better understand our co-evolutionary relationship with technology and help set out a track towards a future that is rewarding for both humankind and the planet at large.Timothy Morton is Rita Shea Guffey Chair of English at Rice University. He is most recently the author of Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology after the End of the World (2013), and Realist Magic: Objects, Ontology, Causality (2013). He blogs at www.ecologywithoutnature.blogspot.comMelka Myers is an illustrator and decorative painter based in Oakland, California.César Reyes Nájera is an architect and holds a PhD in Bio-climatic Construction Systems and Materials. His work seeks a thermodynamic approach to architecture and the city focusing on social issues and new developments in materials. He is also co-founder dpr-barcelona.Kas Oosterhuis is professor at the Faculty of Architecture, TU Delft, as well as director of Hyperbody and the Protospace Laboratory for Collaborative Design and Engineering. Since 1990 he has been the director of ONL [Oosterhuis_Lénárd] in Rotterdam.Simon Park is a Senior Lecturer in Molecular Microbiology at the Uni-versity of Surrey. He champions the Earth’s smallest but most important life forms, its bacteria using a unique blend of art and science.Virgil Rerimassie is junior researcher at the Technology Assessment department of the Rathenau Instituut. He has a background in Law and Science & Technology Studies.Adam Rutherford is a geneticist, author and broadcaster. He is an editor for the journal Nature, a writer for The Guardian and science presenter on the BBC.Etienne Turpin is a teacher, writer, editor and curator. He is a Research Fellow at the University of Michigan, and lectures at Taubman College and the University of Toronto. His public work and writing are collected at www.ANEXACT.org.Liam Young is founder of Tomorrows Thoughts Today. He also runs the ‘Unknown Fields Division’, a nomadic studio that travels to the ends of the earth to investigate unreal and forgotten landscapes, alien terrains and industrial ecologies.

Disclaimer The editors of Volume have been careful to contact all copyright holders of the images used. If you claim ownership of any of the images presented here and have not been properly identified, please contact Volume and we will be happy to make a formal acknowledgement in a future issue.

Colophon Volume 35

VOLUME Independent quarterly for architecture to go beyond itself

Editorinchief Arjen OostermanContributing editors Ole Bouman, Rem Koolhaas, Mark WigleyFeature editor Jeffrey InabaStructuralism insert editors Dirk van den Heuvel, Salomon Frausto

VOLUME is a project by ARCHIS + AMO + C-Lab + ...ARCHIS Lilet Breddels, Brendan Cormier, Jeroen Beekmans, Joop de Boer, Anais Massot, Urte· Rimšaite·, Matas Šiupšinskas, Kai Vöckler – Archis advisers Thomas Daniell, Joos van den Dool, Christian Ernsten, Edwin Gardner, Bart Goldhoorn, Rory Hyde, Vincent SchipperAMO Reinier de Graaf, James WestcottCLab Jeffrey Inaba, Benedict Clouette, Nicole Magnelia, Sean Connelly, Jillian Crandall, Aditya Ghosh, Igsung So – C-Lab advisers Barry Bergdoll, Gary Hattem, Jiang Jun, John S. Johnson, Lewis H. Lapham

Materialized by Irma Boom and Sonja HallerStructuralism insert designed by Joris Kritis

VOLUME’s protagonists areARCHIS, magazine for Architecture, City and Visual Culture and its predecessors since 1929. Archis – Publishers, Tools, Interventions – is an experimental think tank devoted to the process of real-time spatial and cultural reflexivity. www.archis.org

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ContributorsRachel Armstrong is a Co-Director of AVATAR at the University of Greenwich. She is also a 2010 Senior TED Fellow, and Visiting Research Assistant at the University of Southern Denmark.Ethel Baraona Pohl is an architect, writer and blogger. She is co-founder of the independent publishing house dpr-barcelona.Adam Bobbette is assistant professor at the University of Hong Kong, Faculty of Architecture, Division of Landscape Architecture.Julie Bogdanowicz teaches architecture at the University of Toronto and practices at Workshop Architecture.Jamie Campbell was born and raised in Niagara Falls, Ontario. He is a recent MFA graduate from Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, and currently lives and works in Toronto.

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