Domus 1047 on newsstands: “Looking for community”

Eric Klinenberg’s research has starkly revealed that the strength of a community can directly influence one’s expected lifespan. He argues that we must recognise the spatial conditions of social infrastructure as a public investment priority. Not only rebuilding our deteriorating public places but also “engineer[ing] civility” into every new project through smarter interdisciplinary collaborations and committed participation.

Rory Olcayto considers how our primitive trust in architecture has been corrupted following decades of domination by the marketplace. To restore it, he argues, architecture should be “ultrapractical”, creating spaces of potential for our bodies and buildings to “learn together” again.

Vittorio Magnago Lampugnani reminds us that “the city is a built community”, and the areas not built on should determine its form, leaving the private sector to occupy the residual spaces instead. However, he advises that we must “actively” design these vital open spaces, studying the “memory of strategies” embedded within our inherited urban architecture “to find solutions for contemporary requirements”.

Adapting to the conditions of lockdown, this month we conduct a virtual visit to the studio of Tatiana Bilbao in Mexico City to talk about her career, recent projects and the future of our profession. Both deeply embedded in the extreme social issues of her country as well as a wider international discourse through teaching and projects abroad, she has developed a highly coherent and engaging form of practice that consistently places the need for community and quality of life at the centre of a project regardless of client or location.

More than Living, Zurich. Duplex Architekten

La Borda, Barcelona. Lacol arquitectura cooperativa

Star Apartments, Los Angeles. Michael Maltzan Architecture

Studio Formafantasma’s definition of design questions the dominance of human-centred thinking, urging it to evolve into a more synergetic approach between species and disciplines. It should be “essential to the development of tools of conversation and exchange”, and is needed more than ever.

In considering the sustainability of design, Jasper Morrison and Francesca Picchi explain how we must also pay better attention to the full range of qualities that make a “good object”,
from initial ideas through to consumption.

This month we publish artist Anselm Kiefer’s ongoing project to restore the house in which he spent his childhood. Renowned for his often-monumental works exploring myths, history and collective memory, this ongoing project focuses on a more personal world.

Jaume Mayol explains the design methodology of TEd’A Arquitectes while reviewing the drawings for a private house in Mallorca which allowed the team “to find the rules” of the project before building on site.

Rik Nys considers the history of prefabricated constructions, charting the cultural and political associations of this approach. The ability to build faster and cheaper, as well as greener, could go a long way to addressing housing shortages today but we must not repeat the recent mistakes of compromising on quality of life in the process if it is to be a lasting solution.

In Paris, Carlos Moreno’s proposal for a 15-minute city has gained the mayor’s attention. Perhaps more relevant than ever, his “chrono-ubanism” aims to reduce commuter travel and increase local community in the capital.

Fulvio Irace revisits Domus under the editorship of Ernesto Nathan Rogers, who led the publication in the aftermath of World War II. His call to “build society” offers inspiration for how we might respond to our own uncertain times in words and plans.

Being forced to stay at home for weeks on end on account of the lockdown imposed by the Covid-19 health emergency has driven many of us to find unconventional ways to connect with colleagues, friends, school and family. Many of us have spent this time in our own homes trying to get used to the radical change in lifestyle that the virus has brought with it. Now that we have begun to think about an end to the crisis and what the world will be like afterwards, let us look with confidence at this newfound centrality of the domestic sphere that will probably lead many to want to invest in improving their living spaces.

The Berliner Stadtschloss stood in the centre of Berlin from the 15th century and was home to successive kings of Prussia and German emperors. In 1950, its war-damaged remains were blown up by the East German, and in 2007, the German Bundestag agreed that three sides of the Stadtschloss would be recreated around a modernist core, adopting the layout of the original building. Thomas Demand has depicted a fusion of these divergent approaches.