It all started in 2008 when Raumlabor studio started working on a project to discuss the fate of the recently dismantled Tempelhof airport. At the same time Raumlabor noticed that the former airport’s rainwater catchment area had been abandoned. This space, located at a lower level than the street level and not easily accessible, remained hidden for years between the Neukölln and Kreuzberg districts.

The presence of water and the conditions of abandonment have led over the years to the formation of a landscape in which spontaneous vegetation and animals live together on the edge of an urban context increasingly dense and rapidly changing.

Thanks to a collaborative project between Raumlabor and numerous partners — including more than twenty European universities, artists and experts — since last year this area is open to the public, as a place to experiment with forms of interdisciplinary knowledge. Floating University — the first name of the project and in the process of being modified — was born as a laboratory to discuss contemporary practices in the use of public space, through educational, didactic and performance activities. Currently, the old technical infrastructure that made up the airport’s water collection basin is presented as a campus composed of several pavilions built over the water that, in alternating phases, floods the area. One of the buildings is the 1:1 scale model of the Urban Forest project by Atelier Bow-Wow in collaboration with Kooperatives Labor Studierender, exhibited in 2015. The other pavilions are connected by water walkways and host different functions, including spaces for workshops and auditoriums.

This summer, the Climate Care program curated by Rosario Talevi and Gilly Karjevsky, hosted by Floating University, discussed the theme of climate change, investigating the dichotomy between nature and the urban environment. A series of appointments have highlighted, through workshops and conferences, the coexistence between human and animal life forms and between anthropic and vegetable activities within the contemporary city. An emerging theme that concerns a wide debate on future scenarios of integration and conservation of natural heritage within the built environment.