This article questions how architects and urban planners can deal with atmosphere as a crucial quality of urban places. Their challenge is the mediating character of urban atmospheres; balancing between spatial and material arrangements and the embodied, perceiving subject, between urban places and the people using them. Following Arendt ‘s sensus communis, we argue that atmosphere requires a multi-perspectival view of the architectural or urban project. Literature provides a viewpoint to analyze urban spaces as well as to make projections for their future. A study using narrative tools to trace urban atmospheres in Antwerp’s former harbor docks will be discussed.

For more than five decades, Anglo-American architecture critic and historian Kenneth Frampton has played a prominent role in architecture culture. During this entire period, he has taken a rather exceptional position, operating mainly in the registers of historiography while simultaneously maintaining an engaged relation with contemporary architectural practice. His award at the 2018 Venice Biennale as well as the recent acquisition of his archives by the Canadian Center for Architecture in Montreal and of his library by the University of Hong Kong illustrate the appreciation for Frampton’s contribution to various domains of architecture culture. As a theoretician, he developed perspectives that forge connections between the past and the present, positioning contemporary practice within cultural temporalities. His position between critique and history has had a strong influence on his theoretical thinking. Through theorems such as ‘tectonics’ and ‘material culture’, Frampton has furthermore constructed compelling bridges between historical and present-day design practice

Searching for the public and political aspects of architecture, in order to define a societal meaning of architecture

De publieke ruimte staat onder druk. Dit artikel biedt een analyse van de druk op de publieke ruimte, en formuleert een argument waarom het belangrijk is dat ontwerpers zich hier druk over maken. Het artikel sluit af met enkele aanwijzingen voor ontwerpers, om 'ruimte te bieden voor verschil'.

Reflection on the theme of hospitality as it is addressed today in the architecture of hotels and urban dwellings, and how that might be applicated in issues regarding public space

Column - Met het aantrekken van de bouw komen ook de hoogbouwplannen weer op tafel – met de nodige discussies tot gevolg.

Review of the 180th issue of the literary magazine De Gids. Literair tijdschrift De Gids viert haar 180ste verjaardag met een nummer gewijd aan het Nederlandse landschap. Een grotendeels zelf gemaakt landschap, waardoor de behoefte aan verhalen en betekenissen misschien wel des te sterker is.

The modern emphasis on authenticity and the individual not only caused an ‘astonishing flowering of poetry and music’ and ‘the rise of the novel’ states the philosopher Hannah Arendt in her well-known book The Human Condition, but also the fall and ‘decline of the more public arts, especially architecture.’ In this study Hans Teerds takes up the challenge to address the public aspects of architecture, as they emerge from the political philosophy of Hannah Arendt. Starting from a reflection upon the contemporary urban landscape and its seemingly loss of public space, he challenges the contemporary theoretical discourses on the fall of the public character of architecture. Architecture, this study argues, shapes the experience of public appearance rather than being able to guarantee public life. It enables the human being to appear in public and to be ‘at home in the world’. The essential task of architecture is to shape and make tangible the common in society, to ‘thicken our understanding of the world.’ Architecture therefore is to be understood as a public enterprise, not simply a matter of the architect and other stakeholders only. After its fall, the challenge thus is to recover architecture as public art.

The name of John Habraken wül always be associated with the distinction that he made between 'support' and 'infill' in architectural and urban development projects. In Supports: an Alternative to Mass Housing,'' he argued that it is people themselves who 'make' their surroundings, with the support making it possible for them to do this within the broad sociocultural context of society By extension, the support allows for changes in layout and use over the course of time. Fifty years later, it seems that Habralcen's message has still not lost any of its importance and his thinking is more popular than ever. Particularly with the contemporary conditions of rapid change and economic uncertainty, under which the future of an architectural or urban development project is uncertain, designers are forced to search for approaches in which the factor of time can play a role in the design. So there was every reason to speak with John Habraken himself and discuss his ideas about time, changeability and the role of the designer in the light of recent architectural and cultural developments. On a wintry December afternoon we visited Habraken at his house in Apeldoorn, a house he built for his mother in the 1950s: a low-lying bungalow in the woods, in which a structure of columns and beams pronouncedly frames the interior. It is logical to limit the distinction of support and infill to the separation between the structure, the base building, and a more or less flexible infill, but that is just a fraction of what Habraken meant by his distinction.

Review of the book of Nina Rappaport, Vertical Urban Factory, Actar Publishers, 2015, 480 pp.

Today's professional field of architecture is characterised by rapid transformation. This heavily affect the role of the architect both within the building industries as well as in society. This article investigates the professional field, in order to develop a reflection on the role of the architect as it can be 'harvested' from the everyday practices of architects itself.

Book review: Vertical Urban Factory van Nina Rappaport, Actar, 2016, ISBN 9781940291635

Reflections on the history and current situation of Coney Island with a specific interest in the public and collective spaces of the Island.

De economische crisis van de afgelopen jaren heeft haar weerslag op het gebied van ruimtelijke ordening en de bouwpraktijk: waar ook vroeger al werd geanticipeerd op verandering in gebruik of programma tijdens de levensduur van gebouwen en gebieden, is nu ook de voortgang van projecten zelf in het geding. De financiële instabiliteit maakt dat processen moeizamer verlopen, soms maanden of jaren worden stilgelegd of afgeblazen. Bovendien hebben snelle veranderingen in het politieke landschap ook hun weerslag op het beleid ten aanzien van ruimtelijke ordening en architectuur. De tussentijd, als de tijd tussen ontwerp en realisatie, is bijvoorbeeld een factor die een belangrijke rol speelt bij hedendaagse processen van stedelijke vernieuwing, zeker in een periode waarin veel projecten wegens financiële onzekerheden stagneren. Ontwerpers worden dus vandaag de dag geconfronteerd met onzekerheid ten aanzien van proces, gebruik en ontwikkeling. Nu is dat op zich niet nieuw. (Landschaps)architecten en stedenbouwkundigen bewegen zich per definitie tussen een bestaande en bekende situatie en een toekomstige, ongewisse. Ze hebben hoe dan ook te maken met aspecten als verandering en onbepaaldheid. In het ontwerpproces moet de ontwerper telkens opnieuw de afweging maken tussen bepalen, of definiëren en loslaten. Wat wellicht wel nieuw is, is de instabiliteit van de hele sociale, politieke, culturele en economische context waarin ruimtelijke projecten tot stand komen. De intellectuele en artistieke constructie van een nieuwe situatie, op welke schaal dan ook, vraagt vandaag een visie van de ontwerper; niet alleen ten aanzien ruimte, maar ook ten aanzien van tijd. Daarom vindt OASE het noodzakelijk de vraag te stellen, hoe de ontwerper deze onzekerheid productief in kan zetten. Met andere woorden: zit er een potentieel voor ontwerp in die onstabiele en veranderende samenleving en stedelijke context? En zo ja, welke houding dient een ontwerper dan aan te nemen? [...]