Università Roma Tre

With a view on climate change but also on all other traces we leave behind on earth as humans, architecture plays a significant role. On the one hand, architecture and the construction sector account for 38% of the total global CO2 emissions and the extraction of raw materials changes entire landscapes for all time. On the other hand, architecture also determines how we behave on earth and is the interface between us and the natural world.
How does architecture contribute to a new age of climate consciousness?
In the future, more areas of everyday life could take place outdoors again; exposure to seasonal weather has the potential to create a new awareness of the environment and at the same time reduce the basic need for architecture. Our behaviour could adapt to the climatic conditions and lead to new types of urbanism in synergy with global and local natural processes.
For this “Learning from abroad” studio, we will leave the surface of the earth behind to create a new type of co-housing structure which is elevated from the ground as a new architectural model for a near future of material shortage and environmental consciousness. Each proposal will become a cell in the larger structure, while we experiment with lightweight materials in the spirit of Frei Otto, Yona Friedmann and Buckminster Fuller. As a purely physical experience, our studio will be material based, experimental and free. We will form groups of two who will be asked to develop own ideas on future structures through testing and prototyping. Throughout the semester, we will develop skills and knowledge in tensile membrane structures. Together, we create a project through direct communication, elaboration and joined forces. Just like with any experiment, the final result is undefined and open-ended.

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