In the past decade, the rapid expansion of transportation and information networks has produced profound territorial transformations as well as radical mutations in the way we exchange knowledge and occupy space. A counter-effect of these technological changes is the contraction and devaluation of the physical public realm and the homogenisation of culture and our built environment. This year’s edition of latent territories operated within this critical condition and continued its investigations into the socio-political role of infrastructural and architectural form in defining new modes for coexistence in the contemporary city.
This year we focused our work on rethinking the organisation and experience of spaces for knowledge exchange in the age of digital content beyond institutional and professional frameworks. We observed widespread building obsolescence as well as greater informal use of space in the practices of learning and working.
We started the year by investigating form integration of multiple design objectives through a series of tectonic investigations. We prioritised the performative and behavioural attributes of form for their capacity to materialise relational spaces and re-position the body in society through action and the triggering of senses. We addressed informality through a greater emphasis on ergonomics and material definition. Concurrently we investigated the socio-political role of partition and vision as elements producing social organisation and control. Projects debated the changing notion of public space and the conditions through which architectural form reflects the relationship between the individual and the collective.
Within these conditions, projects questioned the role of programme and site as traditional drivers for architecture in order to develop formal apparatuses that prioritise both social interaction and a redefinition of boundaries to allow greater resilience towards change.
Miraj Ahmed
Win Assakul
Daniel Bosia
Barbara-Ann Campbell-Lange
Javier Castañón
Yannick Denayer
Cristina Diaz Moreno
Ryan Dillon
Shin Egashira
Didier Faustino
Felix Fassbinder
Kostas Grigoriadis
Thomas Jensen
Ilina Kroushovski
Tyen Masten
Pablo Ros
Nathalie Seroussi
Theo Spyropoulos
Robert Stuart-Smith
Brett Steele
Manja van de Worp
Carlos Villanueva Brandt
Andrew Yau
Dora Sweijd & Theo Sarantoglou Lalis are the founders of LASSA (lassa-architects.com), an international architecture studio with offices in London and Brussels. Dora and Theo have lectured internationally, lead workshops and taught undergraduate studios at Chalmers, LTU in Sweden as well as the AA since 2009. Theo has also taught postgraduate studios at Columbia and Harvard University.
