The project "White Elephant" investigates the relationship between individual and the public space by looking at the practices of the "Homo-Sacers" who are excluded from the public sphere, yet occupying the public space. By analyzing how they inhabit and appropriate the space for their needs, the research brings up important questions about how we experience the space and objects. The design continues the position of the research and deals with the center point of the public space of Bogota; Plaza de Bolivar. As it brings all the excluded spaces, practices and individuals to the center of the city, it starts a provocative debate on who owns the public space and who has right to control what is happening in the space. This provocative discussion leads to question the position of the architect, the architectural discourse and bias towards certain practices in architectural education.

In my graduation project I have researched the relation between built space and open space in the urban context. With the current densification challenge in Utrecht much more built volume is added to the city, increasing the pressure on open space. Open space is of great importance in securing urban liveability and has in particular many environmental values. By proposing redesigns in the neighborhood of Rivierenwijk, both the quantity and quality of open space is improved, enabling a sustainable densification potential. Central in these redesigns are environmental aspects regarding climate resilience and biodiversity and how they can be reinforced in the urban open space. Therefore contributing in the transition of Utrecht to become a more climate resilient and nature-inclusive city.

In the middle of the picturesque quarter of Kosančićev Venac in Belgrade, a small empty crater is to be found. Once, the National Library of Belgrade stood here, but it got bombed during the second world war. Now it seems there is nothing more but some ruins of the original building. In multiple cases in Belgrade, the questions of how to deal with these scars in the urban fabric remains unsolved. This graduation project investigates the site of the former National Libray of Serbia and how to deal with the historical continuity of its narrative. For the design of the intervention, the concept of layering will be used as a formative method. To strengthen the memorial function of the site, the intervention will serve as a place that allows for the experience of an abstraction of daily life. To achieve this, research into religious architecture is conducted.

The green strips can be found in many roads/streets in Bogota as an urban infrastructure for dividing vehicles and traffic. However, on top of this regulating function, it can be observed that the citizens of Bogota have the tendency to spontaneously appropriate the green strips in ways that’s convenient for them.

Over the last century, Casablanca has become the economical capital of Morocco. To deal with this ever congesting metropolis, the French Europeans and later wealthy Moroccans, have established an entire region to escape from Casablanca's everyday. The research investigates this relationship between the escape from the everyday into spaces for the holiday. Spaces wherein the political and economical norm are suspended, resulting in an opportunity for play (in contrast to work, labor and action). In Casablanca, beach club structures barricade the relation between the coastal boulevard and the Atlantic as natural common resource, resulting in a condition wherein one needs to pay to enjoy the ocean and its consequent holiday. Through investigating the characteristic figure of the club, the research unfolds its strategies and motives, to subsequently learn from it for a counter-project. As a response to the disparity between the everyday and the holiday in Casablanca, to the research on the club and to the investigation on spaces of play, the project proposes a strategy to infiltrate the Casablanca with spaces for the holiday. By exploiting the newly established infrastructure of the tram network, the project taps into many daily routines, claiming territory adjacent to the strategically chosen tram stations. These territories are then reserved for the holiday, accommodated in an urban void, guaranteeing the possibility of refuge in the holiday and the livability of the metropolis. To offer an alternative to the exclusive figure of the club, the proposed spaces for the holiday must ensure to be inclusive, both socially and architecturally. The absolute architecture of the club is broken open and becoming, transformed into a dual project; a pliant surface and a set of autonomous architectures. Together, they provide a protected holiday space separated from Casablanca’s everyday visually, acoustically, thermally, emotionally. While still providing accessibility from all sides due to its resulting porous nature. Therefore offering a true and pleasant sanctuary in middle of Casablanca’s turmoil. Through the duality of the project, a certain ambiguity is achieved, resulting in a range of conditions wherein citizens can celebrate their holiday. In order to evoke direct associations of holiday within the interventions, the Casablanca’s collective memory is being exploited through abstractions of the coast in architectural form. The pliant surface is materialized in bright white natural stone, mimicking the tactics of Casablanca’s beach clubs, which imported white beach sand to create paradisaical beaches. The white (artificial) surface offers a first inversion of the everyday on which the autonomous architectural elements are imposed, in turn referencing to the beauty of the natural coast. Each element subtly referencing to phenomena of the Atlantic. Together resulting in a predefined set of elements and rules which can generate precise architectural interventions when confronted with given urban conditions. The project is therefore designed as a tangram, from the scale of the entire configuration to the detail. In the thesis, three sites are fully developed, as proof of concept, exploring the potential to offer an inclusive form of holiday, inverting Casablanca’s everyday life.

We think of architecture as an additive or accumulative process: a process where elements are added in order to create architecture. After you lay a brick, you lay another. But architecture can also be seen as subtractive, where portions of volume are removed to clarify an entity. In architecture school we learn how to create a building; to create something out of nothing. During my studies I started to get interested in a way of thinking of architecture in reverse, doing the opposite. To do a proposal for preservation and activation of empty space. To recognize empty space as a complex, multi-layered reality. In this graduation project I elaborate on this concept of subtraction. In which creating is still the essence, but instead of creating something out of nothing, something is being created out of the existing. I felt like the act of subtraction within the spatial environment has not been studied extensivelly. There is a relevance to reveal the potential of substraction as an act within our discipline. Therefore I collected relevant reading in this booklet. It started more as a sculptural fascination and exploration, and it developed towards a multilayered study — where I also explored and discovered a meaning of the act, the making, of subtraction. And therefore I call this project: Poetics of Subtraction.

The project proposes a rethinking of what it means to live in a high-density housing estate, wanting to establish how Functionalist Residential Architecture can make its residents feel "At Home". To this end, I propose understanding the differentiation between the concepts of "House" and "Home". Reflecting on the writings of Heidegger, Merleau Ponty and Gaston Bachelard, a house is a functional object, while the home becomes a narrative of living not confined to the extent of the physical dwelling. Depopulation comes at a high cost. Depopulation essentially entails the dissolution of existing social bonds, and ultimately, depopulation gives way to separation. Depopulation and its by-products, further enhanced by the existing architectures of New Belgrade, essentially give way to what Rod Serling labels "the barrier of loneliness". Given demographic projections, depopulation will become pervasive in all Serbian environments. However, I would argue that given the extent of the titanic functionalist housing blocks in New Belgrade, depopulation will be felt particularly harshly in the capital. This phenomenon allows us to pose a different question to the ones pressing during the Yugoslav housing construction periods: is a functional dwelling enough? In analysing and responding to this demographic situation in Serbia, the project was restricted to Block 23 and the Northern Slab Type Housing Building on site. Through the site's sheer size and status as a canonical example of socialist architecture in New Belgrade, Block 23, therefore, becomes the means to respond situationally to a broader societal issue.

Informal actors possess a practical knowledge of the city, a sort of ‘secret know-how’, of how to move and operate in an environment that is unwelcoming to them. How could this knowledge be used as a tool or input of urban design? By considering the knowledge and ways of operating of the informal actors in a city, the following research has moved away from the ‘designing for’ informality, and more towards ‘designing through’ informality. Incorporating the elements that have been observed in the interaction between informal actors and city infrastructure into the finished, non-prescriptive and multi-functional city interventions. Non-prescriptive, here, means spaces that are sensitive to the movement and way of living of its users. By incorporating that knowledge, this proposal hopes to create spaces of increased number of opportunities and affordances, and as such, to give voice to the informal, marginalized actors in the city, that are often dismissed and excluded.

Informal actors possess a practical knowledge of the city, a sort of ‘secret know-how’, of how to move and operate in an environment that is unwelcoming to them. How could this knowledge be used as a tool or input of urban design? By considering the knowledge and ways of operating of the informal actors in a city, the project incorporates the elements observed in the interaction between informal actors and city infrastructure into the finished, non-prescriptive and multi-functional city interventions. By incorporating that knowledge, the project aims to create spaces of increased number of opportunities and affordances, and as such, to give voice to the informal, marginalized actors in the city, that are often dismissed and excluded.

How could public spaces tell us about the city? How does public space take part in our thoughts and affect behaviors? What makes the groundscape? What embodies its essence? And what will people perceive when lowering their gazes? I argue the process of making groundscape is not only constructing a horizontal layer of urban tissue but also closely intertwining with the flow of knowledge, for instance in the sense of meaning and identity. Through transforming an unbuilt plot into a public space where the groundscape becomes a collective stage to hold different social possibilities and arouse the public consciousness, the thought behind this project is to understand the generation of things as an episode of the whole. Considering the episode as a process that performs urban life and bring inhabitants together, whenever a spatial intervention happens, the groundscape could provide a soft background for both human and nonhuman activities which grows with the city.

Skopje is city of architecture with a strong emphasis on their exterior. Looking at the image of the city, the variety of architecture present can seem a bit overwhelming; each type of architecture seems to claim that they are thé image of Skopje. Since Skopje is filled with these different types of 'loud speaking architecture', the image of the city seems noisy and crowded, with different types of architecture all talking over each other. Therefore, Skopje's retreat is a space for people to get out of this conversation of the exteriorized buildings, in the form of a bathhouse with the strong focus on the interior and perception of the visitor. With a sophisticated design, challenging architectural elements on the bigger scale; by redefining the concept of the room, calling it space, and on the smaller scale; finding ways in detailing to create the atmosphere we want, to create the most comfortable place for the visitor, the project creates a more silent space in the noise of the exteriorized buildings of Skopje. This results in Skopje’s retreat; the space for inhabitants to abstract from the conventions of the city.

Cities are becoming places for Instagramable experiences and Disneyfication. People are moving as fast as possible to get from one place to the other. We often forget to really look and be aware of our surroundings. I believe that some parts of the city should be dedicated to a more slower, more enjoyable, experimental way of moving through and being in the city. Within this thesis, the decision is made to intervene in an extremely sensitive and politically charged point in the urban context of Bogota. Not by traditionally transforming it by giving it back its original function, or by simply demolishing it, but by introducing an alternative way of transformation; namely transformation by ruination. This is inspired by Guillaume Apollinaire who says: ​“To prepare for ivy and passing time, a ruin more beautiful than any other.” Ruinating one part of the building creates opportunities for a biotope and gives the importance of time and imagination a place in the city. Besides that, I am also introducing basic and minimal architectonic elements to create a public space which connects the ruin to the river on the site. I have decided to only introduce platforms, plazas, and plateaus. By these 4 interventions, the area becomes an articulator of public and natural resources of the city. By being guided by genuine curiosity and evolved through multiple instances of trial and error, I have created a project that is elegant and provides clarity. Besides that, this project reflects upon the collective nature of architecture (e.g., architects layering their work on top of their predecessors), the acknowledgment of decay and destruction as necessary complements to creation and construction, and the possibility of developing serious, rigorous work with simplicity and happiness. This project is inspired by and operates at the work of Rogelio Salmona. The inspiration and underlaying guiding theme can be perfectly explained by an excerpt of a speech he gave at the Alvaro Alto Award: "…between the “elephant” and the “butterfly”; between the permanent and the ephemeral, there is a relationship that we cannot ignore, for it would mean sacrificing the enormous importance of diversity. .... The issue is to constantly extract, as Baudelaire used to say, the eternal from the transitory. There it is."

The project for a public bath in Belgrade offers a chance to reflect on the current transformations of the city. On the one hand, the rivers. The role that the Sava and the Danube played in the life of the city changed from borders to infrastructural arteries in the past century, turning the shores of the city into industrial areas. Connected by a railway that cut the city away from the river, these areas are today a dormant grey zone. As the Old Railway is being removed, the city can reconsider its relation to the water: what Belgrade will be reflected on the rivers? 
Taking into consideration the possibility of developments led by privatisation and land value, the project investigates what other approaches architecture can offer in considering the relation of the city to its territory. In order to root itself into the history of the city, the project revives a tradition which was recently interrupted: the one of public baths. Despite their diffused presence in the different cultures which contributed to today’s Belgrade, the segregation of bathing into the private sphere led all the baths in the city to shut their doors. Through a program that gathers collectivity and intimacy, protection and exposure, the projects aims at articulating a bath on a dismissed dock, on the edge of the city and the Sava river. In-between the body and the community, the city and the landscape, the baths aims at framing and connecting seemingly unrelated scales and experiences.

A proposal for a series of water plazas along the route of the Rio Arzobispo in Bogotá, Colombia. This follows extensive research on elements of the city and how they are perceived through my method: Narrative Inhabitation. The bed of the rio has been redesigned to increase its capacity to hold rainwater to be released slowly, mitigating flood risks downstream. Whilst not flooded the Rio is a linear park, site of interactions and urban life, transforming a forgotten space into a socially productive part of the city.

Public spaces are the places where people come together in the physical environment. They are precious as they have in them the possibility of bringing together people with different cultures and backgrounds. In some cases, however these important spots within our cities are not designed to maximize their capacity for human exploration. As seen in the city of Skopje (North Macedonia) large public spaces fail to attract users as they do not offer enough furnishing or objects of exploration. Design through Affordance can provide many of these underused spaces with additional layer of furnishing that aims to trigger the explorative nature within human beings. The concept appeals to the creation of spaces that are not defined in terms of functions, but rather in terms of possibilities for use. This enables public spaces to go beyond the concepts of aesthetics, style or identity and relate directly to human nature and the direct interaction between us and our physical environment.

In a world that is becoming more virtual by the day, there is a longing for physicality that yearns to be fulfilled. This thesis explores the potential of architecture to evoke diverse behaviors and emotions, drawing from the idea that individual perceptions of space are subjective and influenced by the memories and knowledge ours bodies have absorbed from our unique lived experiences. With Budapest as a dynamic testing ground, the thesis focuses on activating the Danube waterfront. The proposed project consists of a retreat that transitions the people from Budapest to the water fostering a more symbiotic relationship between the urban community and the river. The project comprises two parts. The first is a private bathhouse facility, nestled within a once-concrete expanse in a park and sheltered within a public layer. The result is a building that outwardly serves the public, while inwardly housing an introvert private bathing facility. The second is a public floating structure, paying homage to the evocative reminiscences of old pontoon pools with a purpose of re-activating the historical legacy of swimming in the river. By sewing these two worlds together in one area, while bridging the community physically to the river, the proposal becomes a revitalisation of the waterfront. The goal was to craft an architecture that delivers spaces capable of leaving a lasting impression on the mind and bodies of those who engage and experience them. Architecture is the set for life to happen, and we, as set designers, choreograph and orchestrate different scenarios and environments for different users to engage with - and the play plays out.

As architects, by constructing the conditions for people to collectively perform alternative ways of gathering, maybe we can agitate the impermanent boundaries around what is normal and accepted. My intervention along El Parkway is a paved ground that makes it possible for people to collectively experience the public realms anew through the movement of their bodies. This festive space has the capacity to hold big carnivals and huge moving crowds. The landscape around it is part of a complex and interlocking network in which things, be it water, plants, identities etc., are all along never-ending paths of movement, cutting their banks as they flow.

In September 2018 I have traveled to Bogota - the capital of Colombia with a group of Methods & Analysis students and teachers. During the trip to Bogota I have repeatedly visited the campus of Universidad Nacional de Colombia – a national higher education institution. What stayed with me the most after these visits were not the sights of the most prominent university buildings and representative spaces but quite contrastingly – pictures of the forgotten lawns and the dilapidated fence which marks the boundary of the campus. Universidad Nacional has been isolated from the rest of the city by a fence raised in 1970’s and even more severely by busy traffic arteries. In spite of the separation, the campus plays an invaluable role in the lives of the inhabitants of Bogota. Not to mention the thousands of students, who daily cross the gates, innumerable families and groups of friends arrive at Universidad Nacional to rest and play there. The campus is a green resource for the city.Boundary is a social contract in which the sides agree that a contradiction cannot be resolved in any way other than separating the conflicted sides. If the separation is not questioned the status quo remains. An architect – a person whose work is to introduce change – is inclined to question the division. And what happens if we transform the environment in such way that the discourse, more intensive exchange between the sides and with each other realities become possible? The reality supplies one of the possible answers. In the present state of affairs many aspects of the functioning of the student life have been left to the informal market. In fact the informal markets flourish near the boundary. Vendors have discovered the boundary in a way that does not conform to the orthodox understanding of a boundary. The organic, unplanned, improvised erodes the stiff, regulated, formalized.What would it take to open the gates for the other realities though?

In the city of Casablanca, informal adaptation to the build environment are made on a daily basis. This shows the beautiful capacity of the users to adapt their environment to their own needs. Nevertheless in the need for more space, core qualities of architecture like light and ventilation can be compromised. In this research and design project I searched for a formal framework that preserves this qualities and, at the same time, creates space for the users to form their own environment.

Skopje has developed through a series of erasures and periods of rebuilding, each time with an aim to establish a new order. Conversely, the common culture can be best recognized in self organized commercial spaces in the city, which emerge from activities taking place and forming the physical. The city centre is fragmented in pieces of imposed developments of different historical periods. Despite being a very culturally and administratively charged site, the Mother Theresa square represents one of these undefined, uncomfortable spaces, left in-between disparate unfinished traces. The question becomes how to mediate between the surrounding highly prescriptive buildings, by making a space which can become used and appreciated for its embedded openness. By being unfinished, the traces offer an opportunity for reconfiguration, therefore parts of functions are taken from the existing buildings into the in-between, such as archives, exhibition spaces containing usually unavailable media from cultural buildings, rehearsing and performance spaces. From the tension of encounter, a dialogue can happen between the disparates, forming a smooth field of interaction. The intervention happens in the existing underground garage below the square for its inherent freedom from political imagery and hierarchies of the above ground, offering an unstaped potential. The rigidity of the existing building is softened by establishing a dialogue between the existing and the new, and making a permeable space, investigated through articulation of the relations between public and private, dynamic and static spaces, interior and exterior, light and shadow.