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co+labo radović co+labo competition team & success of an unawarded competition entry
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In 2018, co+labo team headed by Ivan Filipović has submitted their entry to one international competition of ideas - for the new Embassy of the Republic of Serbia in the Australian capital of Canberra. The work, based on Ivan's PhD investigations of Soft Power Architecture, an important expression of which are diplomatic buildings and complexes, was designed by Ivan, Akitaka Suzuki, Mayuko Mikogami, Daisuke Kobayashi and Takuomi Samejima. The entry has not received an official award but the recognition and awards from other sources started coming. While the entry has not received an official award, the recognition and awards from other sources started coming. That points at the importance of academic teams taking part in design competitions and communicating the right message, even when clear that that might not be the award-winning scheme. Competitions mainly operate within the paradigm, for the "real world". On the other hand, one of the key roles of academia is precisely to challenge the paradigm, to question the business as usual, with approaches which are founded in research desire to create a better world. Ivan's PhD investigations at co+labo open such horizons. The ideas based on that research were transformed into a concrete design proposal have received the Grand Prix for Architecture of the Institute of Architects of Serbia and, most recently, an award at the International Association of Unions of Architects, this year held in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek. Ivan explains: "While pondering a new approach to embassy design, the focus oftentimes lies in control, limited freedom of movement and inaccessibility. These typological realities were identified as weak points and the proposed architectural design aimed to solve these issues.
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The first question that arises is what is the (preferred) identity of the Republic of Serbia? How to present the qualities? In addition to direct, formal metaphors, an observed cultural specificity was: a spirit of community, interpersonal relationships, and enjoyment of various group activities. Taking into account the main concept, the embassy as a home, as a meeting place, the two fit perfectly.
Embassy as a meeting place, embassy as a community center, embassy as (a piece of) home. The size of the Serbian expat community in Australia is significant, so it was the obligation to create spaces that would offer quality and support the main concepts. Although direct transplantation of individual activities was not possible (nor justified), the design sought to create a meeting place with the characteristics of the Serbian culture.
In parallel with the conceptual solution, which allows freedom of movement and choice of activities, the main function of the facility is not forgotten, nor is the necessary level of safety and security. These factors have contributed to the multilayered solution that gives the design manipulation and "softening" of boundaries the illusion of complete openness, however, in reality, the facility and activities are highly controlled and the facility meets all security requirements."
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co+labo radović co+labo research semester follows an intensive summer of workshops
co+labo celebrates multiplicities, not only in what we chose to do, but, importantly, in the ways how we work. Those activities, the selection of which gets presented at this blog, follow a loose tripartite structure: Spring - dominated by design and making; Summer - mainly focused at international activities; and Autumn - the completion of undergraduate and masters research, many projects which are in progress throughout the year. Almost feverish action of Spring and Summer 2019 are now getting translated into the slower pace of investigations and writing up. As co+labo seeks to discover and nurture individual sensibilities, in research that results in a broad variety of themes, shared and cross-fertilised through frequent meetings, presentations and discussions.
co+labo celebrates multiplicities, not only in what we chose to do, but, importantly, in the ways how we work. Those activities, the selection of which gets presented at this blog, follow a loose tripartite structure: Spring - dominated by design and making; Summer - mainly focused at international activities; and Autumn - the completion of undergraduate and masters research, many projects which are in progress throughout the year. Almost feverish action of Spring and Summer 2019 are now getting translated into the slower pace of investigations and writing up. As co+labo seeks to discover and nurture individual sensibilities, in research that results in a broad variety of themes, shared and cross-fertilised through frequent meetings, presentations and discussions.
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A team of eight co+labo students, which included Shigemura Hiroki, Kinoshita Norimi Samejima Takuomi, Morimoto Mei, Nishibori Shinichi, Iwata Amami, Muxi Yang and Mori Yuku has received 3rd prize and a Jury Award at an interesting design competition for the Tea Ceremony Pavilion in Ginza - 銀茶会の茶席. Shigemura-san summarises that "year's theme was 綾, Aya, or Pattern. As the 2020 year approaches, Aya's characters express efforts towards recognition and h diverse people and harmonisation of various peoples and cultures, mixed in a wide variety of places. Ginza is the precincts of Tokyo whose broad streets invite and welcome many cultures and offers a lot of Aya. The intention behind co+labo entry, entitled "織折庵", Oriorian, was to express the global culture of Ginza by using simple, everyday element of western origin, an ordinary cloths hanger t, through repetition and variation, generate Japanese geometric pattern. The pavilion is highly adaptable, in terms of its volume, shape and patterns, and capable to fit any of Ginza's diverse spaces and events."
The members of the Jury which recognise design quality of co+labo hanger pavilion were Motonami (Mushanokouji senke), Tomohiro Kimura (Executive Director of Tange Architecture Office), Noriaki Shoji (MitsukoshiGinza CEO), Masato Tajima (Executive Director of Ginza groups), Tatsuya Ukai (Kyushu University), Hiromi Sakaguchi (Taisei Kensetsu), Jun Sato (Tokyo University) and Koko Nakamura (Nikken Sekiei).
The members of the Jury which recognise design quality of co+labo hanger pavilion were Motonami (Mushanokouji senke), Tomohiro Kimura (Executive Director of Tange Architecture Office), Noriaki Shoji (MitsukoshiGinza CEO), Masato Tajima (Executive Director of Ginza groups), Tatsuya Ukai (Kyushu University), Hiromi Sakaguchi (Taisei Kensetsu), Jun Sato (Tokyo University) and Koko Nakamura (Nikken Sekiei).
Warmest co+labo congratulations to all team members, whose way of work and thinking confirms the essence of our way.
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The winner of 2018 Smart Illumination Competition in Yokohama, Yumi Ishii was invited to exhibit her new work at Smart Illumination Events 2018 - this time in the capacity of Invited Artist. Ishii-san explains how the competition and exhibition were conceptualised in response to the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, with an aim to "increase awareness about the importance of sustainable environmental technologies in urban spaces." When invited, she proposed a work called "Pain × Art, an research-driven installation which explores multi sensorial experiences of space. Her"pond-like space" gently shines ultraviolet rays generated by stored solar energy and invites visitors to step in barefooted, and experience pleasant sensations. Her work was recognised a "a new night-cap that uses existing renewable sources of energy". Warm co+labo congratulations to Ishii-san, an System Design Engineering student who became an invited Artist!
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In response to that request, Xuang, Shoei and Yuki-san proposed a comprehensive green plain for the site of Mappano, as the future heart of revitalization process, which would be generated by integration of new, local sporting facilities into the daily life of the nearby city of Torino. Their project proposed reinterpretation of old civilizing processes, exploring how the sports culture could become a driving force for broader urban regeneration. In their vision, the sports will not offer only competitive and spectator-oriented games for passive audiences, but provide incentives for healthy and active lifestyles to the locals. Their arena blends into the landscape, evoking the forms of the Alps in the background. Its permeable borders both define discrete activity zones and keep them integrated, stimulating a variety of possible interactions between sport, recreation and other activities to emerge - which, significantly, include urban agriculture and farming. At architectural scale, the proposed permeable polycarbonate roof keeps the interior and natural environment directly related, while enabling substantial energy savings. In that way, the arena promises to become a place where various urban activities will melt and produce quality that reaches beyond simple local cultivation.
A truly outstanding international Jury included Peter Eisenman, Hitoshi Abe, Gianluca Mazza, Giuseppe Ferrero, Giovanni Palazzi, Dang Qun, Andrea Maffei.
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co+labo radović co+labo research projects accelerate towards Masters+UG completion
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As work on various co+labo research projects accelerates towards final presentations at the end of the school year, Keio captures the moment by taking official photos of all research laboratories. Above is co+labo, as of 26.11.2019. Top row: Jumpei Kawamoto, Sanja Žonja, Ivan Filipović, Xuan Yang; Mid row: Yuki Mori, Yumi Ishii, Muxi Yang, Nikolaj Salaj, Paolo Turčić, Amami Iwata; First row: Shinichi Nishibori, Koki Suzuki, Masahito Motoyama, Darko Radović, Norimi Kinoshita, Shun Kato. Absent (in action elsewhere) were: Satoshi Sano, Mei Morimoto, Shohey Yamashita and Hiroki Shigemura.
Besides projects at PhD level (Sanja Ronja, Satoshi Sano and Ivan Filipović), current individual projects at co+labo are:
Masters Theses 2019
Yumi Ishii, The quality of pedestrian spaces along urban waterways - A Case Study of Meguro River
Shun Kato, The role of tourism in sustainable urban development of urban coastal areas - A Case Study of Fujisawa
Norimi Kinoshita, The impact of urban morphology and intensity of use on the quality of urban life - A Case Study of railway station hiroba spaces of Tokyo
Mei Morimoto, The relationship between shop facades and affordances in Tokyo - A Case Study of Jiyugaoka, with partial comparisons with Stockholm
Masahito Motoyama, The POPS in high-density urban areas, and their capacity to contribute to public interest - A Case Study of Daimaruyu
Shohei Yamashita, Adaptive reuse of World Cup Legacy and its potential environmental improvement in the megacity - A Case Study of a football stadium project in New York
Xuan Yang, Spatial quality and place attachment - A Case Study of izakaya culture in central Jiyugaoka
Undergraduate Theses 2019
Yuki Mori, The Morphology of Houses on Saka-michi in Central Tokyo
Muxi Yang, Impacts of Chinese elements on spatial experience of Yokohama Chinatown
Masters 1 Theses - due 2020
Jumpei Kawamoto, Vacant Land in Minato-ku and its Spatial Composition
Shinichi Nishibori, The social potential of urban canals - typological analysis of canals in Kanda area
Masters Exchange
Matej Kranjc, Tokyo and its Preparedness for Disasters: The places to escape to
Nikolaj Salaj, Urban Voids and Public Realm in Tokyo
Paolo Turčić, Mediterranean Piazza and (Non)Equivalent Social Places in Japan
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co+labo radović co+labo's OB get First Prize for the best Thesis at Politecnico di Milano
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Politecnico di Milano has formally awarded the prizes for Best Graduation Thesis, Migliore Tesi in Ingegneria Edile-Architettura at their campus in Secco, and the winners were three co+labo+PoliMi boys - Akitaka Suzuki (who is also first Keio-Polimi Double Degree laureate), Nicoló Panzeri and Enrico Sterle (who have both spend a semester at co+labo). Aki-san went back to Milano to join the ceremony at his second Alma Mater and for reunion with friends (including some from EMBT, where he did his internship) and professors. Local Lecco News have informed the broader audiences about this, well-known and highly regraded award.
The Jury explained the reasons for choosing Aki, Nikoló and Enrico's design-research project, summarising how " the work is characterised by highly unique theme, and it achieved an uncommon maturity and design complexity. In particular, the strong visual/graphical communication ability and analysis on its production and realisation aspects are underlined."
co+labo congratulations to Aki, Nikoló and Enrico and their supervisors, including Gabriele Masera (at the selfie below).
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The Jury explained the reasons for choosing Aki, Nikoló and Enrico's design-research project, summarising how " the work is characterised by highly unique theme, and it achieved an uncommon maturity and design complexity. In particular, the strong visual/graphical communication ability and analysis on its production and realisation aspects are underlined."
co+labo congratulations to Aki, Nikoló and Enrico and their supervisors, including Gabriele Masera (at the selfie below).
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The annual co+labo "forget-the-year-party" farewelled the 2019. Although "forget the year" is a literal translation of bōnenkai" the year behind us was certainly not a year that will, of should be easily forgotten. The list of colaboradović.blogspot entries for 2019 includes successful PhD theses defences and starts of new projects, hosting guest lecturers and delivering guest lectures at other places in Tokyo and abroad, organisation and participation in symposia and conferences in Japan and overseas, double-degrees and international workshops and the very important Comprehensive Design Workshop, which ended up with a highly successful exhibition, symposium and lectures - in organisation and delivery of which co+labo was - Keio Architecture. In 2019 we have made the strongest collective push towards helping the oldest university in japan establish a discrete graduate programme in architecture and urbanism. All those activities and achievements add up (in our collaborative + ++ + ++++ + manner) to a great year, which should never be forgotten 2019. The bōnenkai was also an opportunity for everyone to meet our new two members - Yurino Oguri and Reiya Sasaki (who, in bōnenkai tradition, helped make excellent food for their senpai).Welcome+頑張ってください!
Sincere co+labo thank you go to all of our colleagues, friends and associates in Japan, Croatia, Slovenia, Italy, Serbia, UK, Sweden, Australia, Ecuador, Thailand, Serbia, Spain who have variously joined in, helped share and deliver those projects and whom we are planning new projects for the years to come.
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The Theme of the competition was a multi-generation and multi-national housing complex. This proposal, entitled 部屋も歩けば人にあう - "When the room walks, it meets people". Mori-san explains how they "proposed movable small rooms for each of the houses which make it possible for people to post their daily life like SNS. The rooms personified by their user would help interactions and span difficulties arising from diverse cultural backgrounds, with spaces capturing diverse characters of their residents. This movable rooms would also be able to venture into urban space, seeking the best space to stay. That would help discover the capacity of vacant urban spaces, such as parkings, streets and parks for acquiring new quality, in addition to multi-generational and multinational usage of these wandering rooms." The project will be published in the 2020 February issue of "Shinkenchiku" magazine.
Warm co+labo congratulations to Iwata-San and Mori-san!
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co+labo radović to all co+labo associates, friends, colleagues ww wish a Happy New Year
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We have entered a significant, twelfth year of co+labo@Keio University! The plans are being drafted, discussed ...
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With pleasure we are taking one news from the closing days of 2019 into 2020. co+labo's Mei Morimoto has completed her Masters Degree at KTH Royal Institute of Technology, School of Architecture, which was awarded to her in the ceremony that was held in her favourite building, the Stockholm City Hall (above). She is now preparing defence of the second part of her Double Degree, which is schedules for early February at Keio. She will be joined by our Shohei Yamashita, who also needs to complete his Double Degree - with Politecnico di Milano. Sincere co+labo congratulations!
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co+labo radović co+labo's Takasu Yukie completed her MastersThesis@AA in London
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Yukie Takasu has completed her Masters Thesis at Architectural Association in London, and will be returning to co+labo her ambitious plan with another Masters Degree at Keio University. In this brief summary she explains her AA project entitled Multi-level Ecology (see images below) as "an exploration of multi-leveled open spaces in high-density urban environments. The lack of public spaces in contemporary cities is a pressing concern as it correlates to physical and mental illnesses and social isolation. An alternate circulation system at higher levels is proposed to enhance urban connections where the population density increases vertically. The research aims to incorporate more than the provision of spaces, by enhancing programmatic variation, where once isolated institutions - residential, commercial, office, leisure, now overlap through these spaces, creating multi-layered opportunities in the urban area. Exploring varying sets of urban conditions, this research proposes an integrated response that generates spatially diverse public spaces.
The work is contextualized in the urban area of Sai Ying Pun located in the city of Hong Kong. The high-rise high-density urban fabric of the city is characteristic of the issues of social deprivation. Additionally, the research deals with seasonal climatic conditions and local hydrological problems of self-sustainability and flooding that are pertinent to Hong Kong.
A multi-scalar approach incorporated in addressing the problem at the urban as well as the local scale establishes the need to accommodate a layered network of recreation, culture, and wellness."
A multi-scalar approach incorporated in addressing the problem at the urban as well as the local scale establishes the need to accommodate a layered network of recreation, culture, and wellness."
Congratulations to Yukie-san and - a warm welcome home to our co+labo senpai.
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co+labo radović co+labo members finishing 2019-20 with good Design&Research projects
The end of the school year is always busy. Two new members who will be officially joining us from April 2020 (but have already become part of co+labo life), Yurino Oguri and Reina Sasaki have defended their final 3rd year Design Projects ...
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Yuki Mori, Muxi Yang and Koki Suzuki (below with Darko) have graduated with presentations of Research Theses ...
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The end of the school year is always busy. Two new members who will be officially joining us from April 2020 (but have already become part of co+labo life), Yurino Oguri and Reina Sasaki have defended their final 3rd year Design Projects ...
Yuki Mori, Muxi Yang and Koki Suzuki (below with Darko) have graduated with presentations of Research Theses ...
and co+labo M2 students and finalising their Masters Theses.
- an update follows soon -
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After all exams and presentations, the school year ends with the announcement of the new school year. This year, the party at one of our fairly regular places in Shibuya included, besides Darko, Davisi and David Sim, Akitaka Suzuki + Amami Iwata + Ayako Ishikawa (Tsuruse) + Ayumu Magome + Hiroo Maruyama + Ivan Filipović + Ken Akatsuka + Mayuko Mikogami + Mei Morimoto + Muxi Yang + Satoshi Sano + Shinichi Nishibori + Shun Kato + Takuomi Saikawa + Takashi Takei + Taku Ikeda + Tomotake Miyagaki + Xuan Yang + Yuta Sato + Yurino Oguri.
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co+labo is an international laboratory. Even at the times when all of our activities were conducted in the laboratory at Keio Yagami Campus, due its general structure, make-up and members we have simultaneously operated across at least a couple of continents. co+labo was designed to, precisely in tune with the old adage, think globally while always acting locally, operating with the heightened sensibility to, and responsibility towards the exact places.
In these crazy times of Corona Virus pandemic, we have found ourselves literally stretched across two continents – Asia and Europe. Amidst an academic trip, which included lectures and an exhibition at the University of Ljubljana (images at the bottom of this post) and discussions about the planned September workshop, Darko and Davisi have found themselves stranded in Split (above: captured by public WebCam at an empty Riva, the main seafront promenade; below: equally, eerily empty but irresistibly beautiful Peristil of Diocletian Palace and the nearby Fruit Square/Voćni Trg).
At the same time, the rest of co+labo members are in Tokyo. With start of the new school year postponed and Keio Campuses closed, all our activities have moved online. Despite these extreme conditions, co+labo operates (almost) as planned. As we do in the Spring semester, these days the key focus is on design. Under the guidance of our honorary guest Bratislav Gaković (an award-winning architect from Belgrade, with whom we have already collaborated at an exciting workshop in Manchester, in 2012), new co+labo Research Fellow Rafael Balboa, and Sano Satoshi and Darko Radović, almost all members are involved in an international professional competition. How does all that work? See below: at the ZOOM screenshot, left to right, in the first row are Rafa, Shigemura, Braca, Mori; in the second row: Oguri, Nishibori, Kawamoto, Sasaki; in the third third row: Sano, Yang, Iwata. Next to them, on the right side are two lonely co+labo PhD candidates, Sanja pondering over some important issues related to the street art, and Ivan - adding final touches to his Thesis. Darko’s (a bit less tech and a bit more messy) coordination table is - next to the (empty) Fruit Square (above).
Below ... Darko's lecture and Davisi's exhibition and lecture at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Ljubljana - where they are Visiting Professors 2019-20.
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Looking at these two images (above and below this post), one could conclude that, since our previous entry, nothing has changed. These photos depict exactly what was on the two which were posted exactly two weeks ago. Then and now, Darko and Davisi stand at an empty Riva in Split (above), sending their regards to co+labo, as co+labo design competition team works online, (below) on their current competition project. While on photos all looks the same, in reality everything that we used to take for granted in our everyday lives has been altered. That, most dramatically, applies to some of the key issues related to our research, the themes associated with public and public-like places across cultures. This uncanny condition, in which "nothing happens" while everything around us changes rapidly, will be one of the key co+labo and co+re themes in 2020-21, and beyond.
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That will be organised in coordination with City Space Architecture (CSA), organisation based in Bologna which brings together an international circle of academics, practitioners, activists and others interested in public space, and publishes high quality Journal of Public Space. In responses to these unusual times, the core team members have (in collaboration with Chinese University of Hong Kong) initiated new project entitled "2020: A Year without Public Space under the COVID-19 Pandemic“. From this year, Darko co-Chairs the CSA Advisory Board of Public Space Experts, and he will coordinate co+labo efforts with that important project. We will strive to help identify the key questions arising from this moment which enforces an unusual level of global uniformity.
As the crises of this magnitude have the capacity to initiate paradigm shift, Darko and co+labo radović will insist on radical, critical and creative perspectives, and strategies of response. We need to be aware that Coronavirus has not accelerated the processes of globalisation (turning us all to Zoom, Webex and similar tools which, as safe and as sterile they are, question all that public sphere, realm, space are and should be about, everything that we take for granted when exercising our right to the city). Not only that this virus has not accelerated globalisation, but the truth is precisely opposite: the globalisation itself made this pandemic possible. Choosing one, environmentally and culturally unsustainable kind of development, as part of an overall spectacularization of our daily lives we have also globalised the virus. An epidemic became - pandemic. A positive, co+labo hypothesis could be that, in a similar fashion, some minor, local, infraordinary practices orientated towards creating a better world might spread globally. (That is an utopian thought, of course. They only might succeed. But - it is worth trying.)
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Some things do change, and sone do not, yet: co+labo Competition team advances work towards submission, while another Webcam snapshot of Davisi and Darko in Split show that there is still nothing new in the West.
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