Architecture Land INitiative Timeline

Architecture Land Initiative has been awarded a second Design Trust grant! With this grant for our project “By Us, For Us: Hong Kong Co-operatives, Future-proof Narratives Goals,” we will be able to expand on the first stage of our research on Civil Servant Building Societies (CBS) as an alternative housing model.

There was a period in Hong Kong when the public had a stake in the formation of the urban settlement in the model of CBS, extending from the apartment to the yard, street front, block, and collective neighborhood. The project looks both to this past and to the future. It unfolds as two public forums, a publication, and an international exhibition, which together aim to chart a roadmap towards pilot proto-projects involving diverse stakeholders and communities.

Guillaume will give a conference as part of the IUAV lecture series in Venice. It will be an opportunity to share his current research into the disciplinary potential between archeology and architecture. The lecture will include an overview of ongoing progress in the development of an interpretation planning strategy for the Vedi River Valley in Armenia, which includes the collaborative design of an archeological field laboratory.

Aurélie and Dieter are pleased to join the Chair of Architectural Behaviorology for the Spring 2024 semester Studio Public Space Behaviorology intermediary reviews!

The studio is focusing in and around the Waldlabor forest in Zürich. It involves analysis of human and non-human relationships, as well as experimentation, design, on-site construction and observation.  

This weekend, we had the privilege of spending a day at the incredible Sitterwerk Foundation in the Sitter Valley near St. Gallen, where we benefited from its research facilities and materials. We spent the day working in contact with the Art Library and the Material Archive to conduct our own research.

Our time there proved to be incredibly inspiring, and we extend our heartfelt gratitude to the Sitterwerk Foundation for their warm hospitality and for graciously opening their doors to us. A special thanks to Felix Lehner for his generous and amazing tour. We hope to return soon!

Léonore contributes to the October issue of Tracés! Her contribution, entitled “Silence, on surélève”, focuses on a renovation project in Geneva carried out by Jaccaud & associés.

“Building the city on the city, without fuss: despite the effort and patience involved, once the scaffolding has been removed, this elevation operation by Jaccaud & Associés is virtually imperceptible from the street.”

We are thrilled to have had the opportunity to contribute to the exceptional book, “Drawing in Architecture Education and Research,” alongside numerous talented architects and researchers. In their contributions, Aurélie and Guillaume both delve into the ways in which drawing contributes to the ecologies of practice in which they are actively engaged.

In September 2023, Shared Landscapes will be staged in Hangelsberg in collaboration with Berliner Festispiele !

Caroline Barneaud, curator, and Stefan Kaegi, theatre director (Rimini Protokoll), invite the audience to leave the theatre and spend a whole day in nature on the outskirts of Berlin among trees, meadows, human, and non-human inhabitants. In the open air, a new kind of community emerges at the intersection of city and country.

Architecture Land Initiative is contributing to the show by producing the maps that accompany the theatrical journey through the landscape.

In July 2023, Shared Landscapes will be staged in Pujaut in collaboration with Festival d’Avignon !

Caroline Barneaud, curator, and Stefan Kaegi, theatre director (Rimini Protokoll), invite the audience to leave the theatre and spend a whole day in nature on the outskirts of Avignon among trees, meadows, human, and non-human inhabitants. In the open air, a new kind of community emerges at the intersection of city and country.

Architecture Land Initiative is contributing to the show by producing the maps that accompany the theatrical journey through the landscape.

In June 2023, Shared Landscapes will be staged in Chalet-à-Gobet in collaboration with Théâtre de Vidy !

Caroline Barneaud, curator, and Stefan Kaegi, theatre director (Rimini Protokoll), invite the audience to leave the theatre and spend a whole day in nature on the outskirts of Lausanne among trees, meadows, human, and non-human inhabitants. In the open air, a new kind of community emerges at the intersection of city and country.

Architecture Land Initiative is contributing to the show by producing the maps that accompany the theatrical journey through the landscape.

We are pleased to announce the successful conclusion of the first phase of ‘By Us, For Us,’ which culminated in the hosting of Forum 1 in the heart of Cattle Depot in To Kwa Wan. Thank you to all the participants—stakeholders, experts, colleagues, and friends—for their commitment and trust in this initiative. We are looking forward to the next stage of the research, ‘Forum II’ on governance and ordinances, which is likely to be held in Spring 2024. Stay tuned!

Aurélie had the great pleasure of taking part in the Studio Baumann 2023 final reviews at EPFL!

The jury had the opportunity to engage in discussions based on the multiscalar landscape proposals for Geneva’s Vernier district developed by the students. The proposals simultaneously addressed landscape continuities, tree typologies, planting strategies, and the qualification of spatialities and cohabitation.

Léonore was invited to present her work as part of the Midis Archi program organized by HEAD’s Interior Architecture Department. Her presentation was organized around the idea of active uncertainty as a condition and posture for the practice of architecture today. As part of this approach, she shared various projects carried out with Studio Nemec and Architecture Land Initiative.

Three musical evenings are organized at the Kiosque des Nations on September 15, 22 and 29 from 6pm to midnight. Bongo Joe and Canal54 join forces with Architecture Land Initiative for a series of events at the Kiosque on Place des Nations! On the last three Thursdays of September, the Kiosque will vibrate to the rhythm of a rich and varied program and a refreshment bar set up for the occasion. A great way to end the day or start the evening in a new venue in the heart of the Nations district!

The Swiss Federation of Architects (BSA-FAS) organized the FAS 2022 Day on the theme of experimental planning. Aurélie and Léonore had the opportunity to present our reflections on this topic based on the experimental approach we carried out in the Jardin des Nations neighborhood in Geneva. The various Swiss and European case studies presented during the day allowed for a collective exchange on the contribution of such approaches to the transformation of cities and the questions they raise for the future of planning as a whole.

Guillaume contributes to the June issue of Tracés! He offers a book review of Matthew Wells’ Survey: Architecture Iconographies. For Guillaume, the book is about exposing the power of drawing as transversal thinking.

“Survey highlights the figure of the architect/witness as a participating subject. The work reveals the need to immerse oneself in a given time and place in order to build a point of view and a thought capable of empathy.”

Architecture Land Initiative joins forces with Festival Explore to experiment with a new way of crossing the lake!

This new connection prefigures the soft and qualitative mobility solutions proposed in the mobility strategy developed as part of the vision for the Jardin des Nations. The right shore, which is currently highly privatized and lacking in public spaces, is gradually being reconnected to the Geneva area on several levels.

The fourth forum ‘Proto-projets’ is open to actors across the Jardin des Nations!

The aim of Forum 4 is to set in motion three proto-projects arising from the strategies outlined during the Forum 3. In the morning, workshops are held in key locations related to the three proto-projects. In the afternoon, all participants meet at the International Museum of the Red Cross for an immobile journey depicting the Jardin des Nations through history and time. The day concludes with a summary of the workshops and an open discussion of possible implementations of the proto-projects discussed and elaborated in the first part of the day.

HABITATIONAL SEEDS IN HONG KONG’S ODD LOTS

Student work from the studio taught by Dieter, Alexa and Kent at Hong Kong University is on show for a month!

The studio began by creating a linear tomographic cut through a portion of Hong Kong Island, extending without constraints towards the Earth’s center or the skies. This forensic drawing served as our site, where each point was envisioned as a potential for expansion into a small universe. Immersed in this section, our focus was on identifying and studying emerging residual “odd lots” within and in immediate proximity to the sectional cut, drawing inspiration from Gordon Matta-Clark. Within these discovered spaces, we sowed the initial seeds of habitation, intending to cultivate collective housing typologies.

The third forum ‘Visions’ is open to actors across the Jardin des Nations!

The Forum aims to share three complementary visions and build on them through exchange. Following on from Forum 2, which focused on the imaginaries of the territory, Forum 3 aims to set out territorial strategies and enable the various participants to appropriate and contribute to them. Strategies take shape both through territorial re-orientations and through a series of possible short-term actions and synergies, developed collectively.

The second forum ‘Mise en espace’ is open to actors across the Jardin des Nations!

The aim of Forum 2 is to share the ideas generated by the study and Forum 1, and to enable the various participants to appropriate and contribute to them. The morning is devoted to walks through the Jardin, enabling the participants to talk about the part of the territory they know best, and to listen to other nearby people and stories of places. In the afternoon, four digital spaces are made available. Each space contains documents that contribute to a new imaginary for the Jardin.

The first forum ‘Meta-themes’ is open to actors across the Jardin des Nations!

It aims to collectively exchange around four meta-themes in order to explore current and latent imaginaries in connection with three territorial figures constitutive of the district’s geographic and spatial conditions. These structured exchanges are an opportunity to mobilize everyone’s affects around emerging collective questions that are both specific and open-ended.