A one semester master studio that takes the concept of urban ecology as a starting point for urban and architectural proposals in the cross section between social and ecological transformations. How can we as architects take part in creating a just, inclusive and equal city?

The studio is organized by the research project Invisible Infrastructures and the Institute of Urbanism and Landscape at AHO

Urban ecology is described as the study the interaction between society and its physical environment. In this course we will initially learn and develop methods for researching the urban ecology and finally use this research to define and develop urban “places” taking as a simultaneous starting point Christian Norberg-Schulz’s thinking of the characteristics of places and their qualities. The relationship between man and nature, he writes, is:

...a relationship that is at the same time practical, theoretical and poetic. Man cultivate the earth, acknowledge the laws of nature and sing about the beauty of a place. These enterprises walk hand in hand - because it's impossible to take care of something that one hasn't experienced and to some degree understood. When cultivation becomes exploitation it's not necessarily because of greed but of a lack of knowledge. … It is the poetic experience, the joy of being here, that is the defining moment in our relationship to the natural surroundings.

In creating cities that provide good living and working environments, and to paraphrase CNS - where the relationships between men, and between man and nature are legible, we face two major challenges. First, cities are confronted with rapidly growing social disparities along a broad range of dimensions, including socioeconomic, ethnonational, and occupational lines. Second,cities are scenes of ecological breakdown. Urbanization leads to fragmentation, isolation and degradation of natural habitats, impacting crucial ecosystem functions and services such as pollination, water retention management and cleaning of air. Such essential ecosystem services are not evenly distributed throughout the urban landscape.

It is, or should not be, possible to work as an architect today and not discuss social exclusion and injustice as well as the impact we have on ecosystems. In Oslo the rapid urbanisastion of recent decades is followed by even greater differences within society.

In this interdisciplinary oriented master studio we will take the Gamle Oslo and Tøyen area in Oslo as a starting point for the development of urban research methods and urban design strategies. How can we describe the social, ecological and urban structures - and what is the relation between them? Is it possible to describe spatial strategies and methods that will produce a more just city. Tøyen, as a site for rapid gentrification as well as community organisation and urban poverty is an interesting starting point.

The outcome of the studio will be part of the research project invisible infrastructures:

http://www.oculs.no/projects/invisible-infrastructures/about/

INTRODUCTORY MASTER CLASS

The master course includes participation in an introductory masterclass held by Professor Alan Berger (Professor, MIT) and Fadi Masoud: Assistant Professor (University of Toronto) on resilient design and planning. In the master class we will use detailed data sets on the city as a resource and students will learn how to work with large scale data sets and developing proposals based on these data. The data will be made available by the data group in the Oslo municipality and is not generally available to the public so we expect this class to gain a quite exclusive view of the hidden structures driving the city.

Alan Berger and Fadi writes: In dealing with climate change-related urban design matters, notions of “resiliency” and “resilient design and planning” are becoming central pillars of education and practice. Yet this workshop will look at expanding the scope of these ideas through the establishment of “resiliency districts” and “flux codes”. These are terms coined at the MIT Norman B. Leventhal Center for Advanced Urbanism in an effort to progress upon the agency of design in the deployment of resiliency strategies.

This intensive pre-semester workshop will look at the ideas “resiliency districting” and “flux codes” in the Oslo context. We will select three different types of water/coastal urban conditions found in the Oslo region to test novel forms of resilient landscape-based strategies.

The studio will be headed by Joakim Skajaa (Eriksen Skajaa) with guest appearances for various fields including urbanism, architecture, social science, biology, ecology etc.

http://oculs.designresearch.no/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2017/01/Ecolog...

RESEARCH TEAM/ GUEST TEACHERS

Marianne Skjulhaug( AHO), Astri Dalseide (Kåmmån), Bengt Andersen (Sociologist HioA), Victor  Shammas (social anthropologist Uio), Hanna Bjørgaas (biologist), Arild Eriksen (Eriksen Skajaa), Zaccariotto Giambattista (AHO)

CONTACT: Joakim Skajaa, joakim@eriksenskajaa.no, 93204522, www.eriksenskajaa.no