THE CHANGING NATURE OF ARCHITECTURE DISCOURSE AEDES IN BERLIN

Abstract

The article outlines Aedes Berlin’s work of exhibiting and discussing the inseparable interplay between the built and natural environment on its interdisciplinary and experiential cultural platform since the ‘80s, emphasizing the shared responsibility of the design and planning professions to reduce the impact of building on nature and its resources and to actively rethink our relationship with nature and non-human living beings. To explore the broad interconnections between architecture and nature, the article investigates an array of projects realized with built environment professionals, researchers, and students from around the world making use of Aedes’ multiformat platform and network. In the text, the authors underline the institution’s intention to act as a laboratory generating projects focusing on aspects such as Berlin’s in-between spaces, voids, and edges, where urbanism meets nature; contested spaces, where public and private interests are fiercely negotiated; productive nature in the form of urban agriculture; non-anthropocentric perspectives imagining spaces of non-hierarchical coexistence between different species; sustainable and innovative building materials and circularity for healthier cities as well as spatial strategies for natural disaster management, preparedness, and response.