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Artikel

In Defence of Messiness

If we give up the right to have a say in the mess of our environments, that’s when they become clinical

Arkitekturen forfladiges, når den reduceres til, hvilken farve teglsten der vælges til at forskønne de bagvedliggende betonelementer
Måske er det på tide, at vi sætter os for at redde det 21. århundredes arkitektur fra spekulation, kedelige standarder, livløse byrum og lavloftede lejligheder uden sjæl.
Cobe
In Defence of Messiness
If we give up the right to have a say in the mess of our environments, that’s when they become clinical
The Very Nature of the Pandemic is about Human-Environment Relations
Scientists have warned for a while that we overstep planetary boundaries, but our current economic system rests on and reproduces other boundaries
Photo by Mulyadi on Unsplash
The World’s Recovery
We who live in industrialized society have almost completely lost the ability to see the world in its otherness: an-human, unfathomable, existing, shifting, fecund, myriad.
Painting by Madeleine Hatz, “Camouflage Painting”
Nye sammenhænge
Store samfundsforandringer har før skubbet og udfordre, men også udviklet samfundet og arkitekturen. Det vil ske igen, og arkitekten skal tage et medansvar for, at verden ikke lukker sig om sig selv.
Photo by NOAA on Unsplash
The Corona Crisis and the Built Environment
Planning of the Utopian City
Potential of Borders and Shared Cultural Infrastructure
We set the borders out as the first thing but no longer think about their lifecycle or how we treat them
Mac Bohme
Curated Apertures
A guide to placemaking in isolation
Daniel Terry
Re:habilitation
A graphic recording of the activities and equipment needed during this chaotic time
Tanker i en forandret by
De tomme gader i byen lader arkitekturen stå tydeligere frem
Photo by Vlado Paunovic from Pexels
A Naked City and a Creative Lockdown
For the first time in 30 years, I was able to feel the energy of a city I thought I knew. A naked city perceived for the first time completely different.
Byen blev pludselig meningsløs
Fjerde uge af samfundets nedlukning: Solen skinner, for foråret er ikke sat i karantæne sammen med alle os andre
Covid-19 and Cities
The impacts of COVID-19 have only been felt for less than two months in North America yet the number of articles already declaring the end of the city as we know it is staggering
Tam Wai
The Corona Curtains
Proposing a simple system to subdivide guest areas without the heavy impact that a 1.5 metre distance would have.
Spring Doesn’t Pause
It feels like I have the keys to the park.
Gillian Vann
Pandemics & Architecture
Teachers and students of the Master 'Emergency + Resilience at the Università IUAV di Venezia search for a common understanding of the health crisis that is currently facing our planet
Justin Paul Ware
Pandemien vil sætte sig dybe spor
Engang troede vi, at vi var usårlige. At teknologi og videnskab havde fortrængt overtro og fordomme, og at fremtiden tilhørte den teknologiske nyskabelses vidundere
Manuel Toz
We Need to Reorganize the City
'Home' has rarely been more of a life or death situation
Iwan Baan
Skrevet af
Lotte Kofod Møller, Anthropologist and MSc in Social Science and Spatial Design
Udgivet
March 25, 2020
September 15, 2021
Samarbejdspartner
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Corona Essays
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Imagine the most sterile place you can think of.

Chances are you are thinking of a hospital or maybe a laboratory. White coats, squeaky clean surfaces. A vague smell of cleaning chemicals. That clinical feeling.

These are usually places we might describe as impersonal and a bit cold. Everything is highly controlled. As they should be—in a hospital or a lab. But these places stand in contrast to many of our everyday environments because they have no messiness. There’s nothing random, rather everything has a specific reason, a specific rationale. There’s nothing superfluous.

A certain level of messiness is usually a part of all places and environments. And we have always sought to control that messiness or at least convince each other and ourselves that we could. Think of neatly kept gardens as a display of humans’ control over nature. Neatly designed cities illustrating how life can be orchestrated and organised. With design and planning comes a reduction of messiness or so it used to. With today’s design ideals, we like to incorporate designed mess. Think for instance of the ‘Vild med Vilje’ initiatives, or ‘Wild on purpose’, a movement to encourage more wild nature in Denmark by way of design and planning.

While we prefer to keep the illusion that we can control the mess, we nonetheless thrive with at least a little of it. It’s the thing that gives a place identity because it has elements for us to reflect on. To feel connected to. Attach memories to. We can recognise our personal spaces—say our homes—by the fact that we get to choose the mess. We decide the amount and the location and the shape of the mess. This makes a place personal.

The lack of control is the real source of the sterility of the place, not the amount of disinfectant used.

In responding to the corona outbreak and as an important part of avoiding a spread of the virus, we have a task of designing places that are easy to clean. But at the same time the task is to avoid designing overly controlled environments. For us to thrive in an environment it shouldn’t be clinical or sterile—it should be clean yes, but offer us at least a small degree of mess.

If a place is overly controlled—by someone else—it rarely feels personal. Imagine your living room controlled according to certain standards that are already given. For instance a maximum number of seats with a minimum distance between them. You have nothing to say in the matter, no influence. The lack of control is the real source of the sterility of the place, not the amount of disinfectant used.

If we give up the right to have an influence and have a say in the mess of our environments, that’s when they become clinical and can’t provide anything for us to grab a hold of or to reflect on or relate to. Then they become reduced to a representation of moral—that is sanitary—prescriptions.

So in responding to the corona virus, how many benches to remove from the park? How many toys to remove from the kindergarten? Obviously there is no magic answer. But it’s worth keeping in mind that attachment to places comes from messiness and that to lose these attachments would affect our wellbeing in our environments. Especially with prospects of living with restrictions for a long time, the challenge for designers and others is to ensure that we still feel welcome in all of our everyday environments and that they remain interesting to us.

‍

sundhed
Det offentlige rum
Corona Essays
The World’s Recovery
Artikel
The World’s Recovery

We who live in industrialized society have almost completely lost the ability to see the world in its otherness: an-human, unfathomable, existing, shifting, fecund, myriad.

Corona Essays
Artikel
Covid-19 and Cities
Artikel
Covid-19 and Cities

The impacts of COVID-19 have only been felt for less than two months in North America yet the number of articles already declaring the end of the city as we know it is staggering

Corona Essays
Artikel
Spring Doesn’t Pause
Artikel
Spring Doesn’t Pause

It feels like I have the keys to the park.

Corona Essays
Artikel
Pandemien vil sætte sig dybe spor
Artikel
Pandemien vil sætte sig dybe spor

Engang troede vi, at vi var usårlige. At teknologi og videnskab havde fortrængt overtro og fordomme, og at fremtiden tilhørte den teknologiske nyskabelses vidundere

Corona Essays
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Pandemien vil sætte sig dybe spor
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Pandemien vil sætte sig dybe spor
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A call to architects in every part of the profession to take action in their own architectural practice
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A call to architects in every part of the profession to take action in their own architectural practice
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Manifest Stafet
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