“Being Junk”. That is the title of this issue. Being a worthless or useless object for the context on which one’s existence is based. Being someone whose purpose feels threatened, unsustainable or undefined.

But if the object were reusable for a new purpose, or the purpose adaptable to a new context, the concept would be a different one.

Accordingly, if architecture were able to respond to a new necessity or a new moment in time and space, such as that which we are now living, would it stop being “junk” in times of crisis? After all, “being junk” is nothing more than an invention of man and his will to classify things thus when there is now awareness of other possibilities. In nature there is no junk.

For one reason or another, over time architecture has grown from the debate of ideas, from the tension between styles and technological advances, which we students and future architects have helped to sustain. We have helped to create forms of success and failure in the light of the image or the text. We have helped to hierarchise society, space and history; to favour the materiality and originality of each creation; and, above all, to make architecture an exercise dependent on a political or economic context, which, in times of crisis, disdains or suspends it. To use Alain de Botton’s theory, one could say that “we have wanted the wrong kind of success”1.

But this is no reason for architecture to now become junk. For was it not being built even before the discovery of its own concept? Nor is it a reason for it to be solely dependent on policies and economics. For was it not created to protect man from the elements and the cold? So what are we missing?

If architecture is, and always has been, a response in terms of man’s adaptation to the conditions of the space and time he lives in, and which in periods of ostentation became grandiose and the symbol of a lifestyle, in times of crisis it has also adapted to a search for more urgent responses for the subsistence of the population and has turned simply to the resources it had around it. Because crises come in cycles and, so far, architecture has survived them all. Look at the 20th century, where architecture was rationalised so as to respond to the social emergencies of the post-war periods and economic crises. Crisis factors were transformed into challenges and architects became direct interventionists in the building of solutions.

So, is it not time to once again adapt architecture, to extend its horizons and rethink the space and time in which it lives/survives? To rediscover it beyond the discourse of the “image” and the “spectacle”, or individuality and the icon, and, as Ole Bouman suggests2, to integrate it in the creation of solutions “to a crisis which we, after all, helped to create ourselves, and for which we are the right people to deal with it”.

But we cannot try out new egg recipes without breaking the egg shells first. For architecture, we also have to open up new futures, and make it more flexible and in context. We constantly speak of the transdisciplinarity of archi-
tecture but we continue to associate it with the complacency of the chair and the drawing table in the studio. Let us think beyond the conventional. It’s time to be creative in using the available resources, to work directly with those who know the space, use it and know what it needs.

That task includes us too, us architecture students. If there is a space for reflection on the role of contemporary architecture and to incubate the solutions it needs, that space is the school. It is up to us to ask it to help us break the shell. That it may provide us not only with the tools and know-how, critical appraisal and reflection but also the freedom of action we need to broaden our perspectives and come up with alternative strategies to that which, erroneously, is expected that an architect be in the 21st century. That it may break with the conventional model of the “architectural studio” developed around already tired programmes; that it may give up the over-valuation of “intuition” and the cult of geniality in favour of urbanity and field work and a spirit of collaboration with the collective around us, instead of the individuality of the classroom. And finally, that it may confront us with the problems of everyday architecture, with the magnum opus making way for the creativity of the ordinary, where architect and user work towards the same goal.

As Bouman argues, architecture can and should have a more active role in contemporary societies. The solutions may be small, but all architecture that is created as a contribution to the well-being of a community is always valid and generous. And it does not always have to be shut away in the comforts of the immediate world that surrounds us and which we think we know and control. New forms of thinking and building architecture are now being explored in the world out there by a wide group of architects, who, using local resources and responding to the urgent needs, help to create structures that improve the daily life of communities – be they shelters to sleep in, sanitary support, or places for people to get together or children to play in. Because, as Vera Sacchetti3 pointed out apropos the role of design in contemporary society:  “we’re no longer designing only lamps and chairs, we’re designing sometimes the only choice for people who don’t have choices.” And if that choice responds in a creative way to the needs, be it here in Portugal or elsewhere, then that will be our success. After all, being junk can also mean being renewable in one place or reusable in another, if one steps outside the box and rethinks one’s own situation. There will always be a need for architects who believe that social change can be brought about through the design and experience of the space. Without doing way with architecture as an object of multiple dimensions, it is up to us to understand its meaning and to believe that a crisis is the best moment to break through the shell. |

1 Alain de Botton. A Kinder, Gentler Pphilosophy of Success. Apresentação vídeo TED Talks. (Jul. 2009). [Consult. Nov 2011]. Available at http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/alain_de_botton_a_kinder_gentler_philosophy_of_success.html

2   Ole Bouman. Introduction. in Architecture of Consequence. Dutch Designs on the Future. [Online]. Rotterdam: NAi Publishers, 2010, p. 4-9. ISBN 9056627260 [Consult. Nov. 2011]. Disponível em www.architectureofconsequence.nl/mmbase/attachments/822239/Introduction_OleBouma_ArchitectureOfConsequence_klein.pdf

3 Vera Sacchetti. Design Crusades: Considering the Shortcomings of Social Design. in PRESENT TENSE: THE 2011 D-CRIT CONFERENCE, New York, May 4th. [Em linha]. (20 Maio 2011). [Consult. Nov. 2011] Available at http://verasacchetti.net