2014-2015

Forging the Ephemeral, 2014-2015

Exhibition Pavilion | Design by: Felipe Franco, Giulia Malesani and Franceska Pernigotti | Construction by all students | Support by Rozan Kaivan, Rita Chedid and Karl Graah-Hagelbäck (Tyréns)

Ephemeral effects are temporal, and immediate. Meaningful architecture on the other hand is often regarded to be long lasting and permanent, and temporal spatial needs are fulfilled by simple, fast and cheap construction. During the 2014-2015 academic year, KTH Studio 9 introduced the notion of the ephemeral as an architectural construct, in the ambition to explore how temporal architecture can be constructed with precision and intention, and as a catalyst for urban transformation – with cases from Söderstaden and the Stockholm Meatpacking District.

During 2014 - 2015 Studio 9 explored architectures and structures of different temporal duration, and their inherent performative qualities as social and cultural enablers and catalysts for urban transformation. Using advanced digital design techniques, the studio investigated how initial concepts could be developed iteratively into built structure, supported through direct links to digital fabrication technologies, and informed by expertise in other fields. In this sense design projects were used as experimental platforms for new modes of design and future practice.

Through the year, students developed and applied specific strategies, at sites of different scale and temporal longevity. Interior installations explored our immediate surroundings. Architectural installations at intermediate scale were developed for two sites currently in planning in the Stockholm area. At final stage, students had the option of developing a larger architectural scheme, or explore issues in depth following a research-by-design approach. Emphasis was put on the following aspects:

• Design proposals that range from a tactile relation to human interaction to an organizational affect on urban life.
• Solutions for details, structure and fabrication appropriate to scale and temporal longevity.
• The new roles that design and prototyping techniques can play in architectural practice.

Studio 9 Teaching Methodology
Studio 9 explores the critical implementation of digital techniques within architectural design practice. This year the studio takes on issues of temporality – how architecture can operate in time scales from the event, to a season, year or a decade, and the repercussions temporality brings to materials, modes of construction and programmatic use. Previous areas of application have included industrial architecture, landscape approaches and pedestrian infrastructures.
Areas of investigation include digital design techniques for computational design, performance simulation and digital fabrication, applied to conceptual design as well as full scale fabrication. Students will get hands-on expertise and explore techniques through design development, prototyping and critical examination.

Practical experience is accompanied by theoretical discourse, where architectural performance is related to issues of urban planning, critical studies and modes of practice. Experienced students and 5th year are encouraged to define their own agendas within the framework of the studio.

Project 1 – Immediate Intervention
Students will design and construct architectural interventions that incorporate function with the fusing of traditional and digital construction principles. Implemented in selected areas of the School building, they will remain until the move to the new building in the summer of 2015. Design techniques and fabrication strategies will be explored through workshops, including a collaborative workshop on concrete formwork with students from the University of Kassel and tutors from the renewed engineering office Bollinger + Grohmann, Frankfurt.

Project 2 – Temporal Displacement
The urban district of Söderstaden will act as a site for investigation with the development of a series of urban interventions of different scales, lifespan and use. The site is currently part of the Stockholm 2030 vision, and plans are being developed for its transformation. We will design proposals for the time span before the completion of the vision, ranging from the event to 15 years. In project 2, design strategies and digital simulation tools will be used in the development of temporal proposals that engage with the infrastructure linking Söderstaden to the inner city. 

Project 3 – Urban Interference
In project 3, proposals will explore new temporal infrastructures (bridges, walkways, bike routes), activities (culture, sport, communal venues) and aesthetics (enabled by applied digital design technologies) in Meat Packing District. Proposals will be developed in order to propose catalyzing interventions that would transform life and experience in the area during the time well before the full implementation of the current plans in 2030.

Project 4 – Advanced Design / Research
Students can now choose one of three routes of continued study. They may redevelop project 3 schemes into more complex and permanent architectural proposals relating to the future plans of Söderstaden. They may go deeper into research on selected design and fabrication strategies, conducting design experiments and documenting these in a paper for publication. They may as teams develop one proposal as a full scale installation on site in Söderstaden.

Contributors and Partners
Bollinger + Grohmann Structural Engineers, Frankfurt
University of Kassel School of Architecture
Concrete Performance Research Group, KTH
Design for Energy / Albano Research Group, KTH