Prada Transformer Vs Patrick Bouchain

Koolhaas has just designed this 3-in-1 structure for Prada. It's currently in Korea. Take a look at the website for yourself.
http://prada-transformer.com/

In the same way that a sofa bed is often not a good sofa or a good bed, I suspect that this will not be a very good exhibition space, cinema or fashion show space as it is trying to accomplish too much at once. How does this 'pavilion' allow the user to adapt and change it over time? Or it intended to stop the users from being able to adapt it as the need arises. We have become silly, making architecture that has such a small lifespan due to the complete nature of its design.

Looking towards the new design for the National Theatre, it's more about a non-architecture...a collection of spaces that are transformable and able to be recreated according the vastly differing and transformable nature of the company using it at any given time, and their work.

Patrick Bouchain is a figure that is much more inspirational. An architect from France, he builds with a much more sustainable and human approach in mind. Less of a controller and more of an opportunity creator, he first builds a temporary building that the builders and public use to eat lunch, socialize, and watch films in. Once this space is established, and relationships have been fostered between the public, builders and himslef, the architect, the building can then start to be created. This approach, far less monumental becomes about community, engagement, and realistic usage pattterns rather than imposed methods. He socially activates a site in order to increase the worth of the architecture.

Proposal Two (Development Centre) Itinerary

In the second of the three proposals I am currently working on, I am working towards designing a centre for the develpment of National Theatre. The idea is that three perfomance groups or individuals will come to London for one month and, working with professionals from the Existing NT, develop their piece.

The centre will not be a theatre. It will be a place where performances are discussed, analysed, rehearsed and made stronger. A team of professional directors, designers, and technicians etc will be on board to aid in this process. the centre will act as a physical place for this to happen. I'm concerned that the contents of the building do not become the physical objects used in performances, but a means to assisiting the making of performances. I have tried to keep it to a minimum, but maybe there are some things left off which i should include....

Wooden Chair x10
Trestle Table x5
Two Seat Sofa x3
Coat Rail x1
Coat Hangers x40
Large Black Curtain x1
Large White Curtain x1
Large Theatre Light x2
Laptop Computer x3
Printer x1
Drill x1
Toolbox x1
Can Red Paint x1
Can Blue Paint x1
Can Yellow Paint x1
Paintbrush x1
Roller x1
Flat Screen Television on Stand x1
DVD Player x1
CD Player x1
Large Speakers x2
Stepladders x1
Flats x5
Bicycle with trailer x1
Video camera x1
Digital Camera x1
Anglepoise lamp x1
Extention cable x1

DEMOCRATIC DESIGN MODELS FOR ALL

Justin McGuirk, editor of Icon Magazine, this month writes about Internet-based knowledge sharing systems that are influencing conventional systems for design (superstar creates, many consume). Click on the image below to get a larger version of his text. He does not specifically mention theatre institutes in his brief introduction, but does state,

Machine-like institutions run by professional monopolies will be broken down. It's a change that has profound implications for social systems such as education and healthcare

For an example of what he's talking about, follow this link to a review of Mydeco.com. This interior design website has 30,000 users producing hundreds of thousands of interior designs using real furniture, voting for their favourites and blogging about design.

These models, which are slowly emerging, grass-roots style, are challenging the widely upheld notion that the designer is a celebrity. National theatre, for a long time, has been a few people selecting work for the nation and world to see. Mydeco, amongst others offers a model of an alternative solution to this rather hierarchical way of making national theatre.

3 Proposals

The project so far has taken a few unexpected turns. Being thrown between theoretical ideals and practical necessity, I'm now in the place of acknowledging that the rest of the work could go in many directions. This project was always about the breaking down of the hierarchical structure of the way that pieces of national theatre are chosen developed and presented. As well as this, the project has always been about dispersing the chance to be involved in the National Theatre, without having to live in, or travel a very long distance to, London.
Click on the images below to see a more detailed view of the three proposals. i have made these as three separate preliminary proposals that can be taken to the National Theatre for development. I hope to meet with someone there who can assist me in developing one of the proposals or making a new one that is a combination of separate elements of the three.
What do you think?

Radicalism. Cedric Price.

Designing a radical change to a giant institution, such as the National Theatre is not simple. It is easy to become scared and give way to traditionalists who would prefer to keep things 'the way they've always been', therefore weakening the design into something way less than it could potentially be. One has to find the balance between timidity or becoming cynical and reactionary.

Cedric Price acts as a model of inspiration for me. Pictured above is his 1965 plan for Parliament. Price is better known for the London Zoo Avery, or his proposal for a giant wheel on London's sky line but this piece really shows some of his personal devotion to ensuring democracy.

If we want an efficient parliament, lets give it a whole efficient building to work in...replace the present historic monument with an up-to-date structure - flexible, accessible and dispensable. New Society, 1965

Price did not propose to move parliament to another location in London, and use the historic monument to, say, sell to a hotel developer. He chose to defy the historic monument by building a counter design in its place. With the proposal of destroying the existing building, he allows us to question the way that parliament, and politics in whole, are perceived.

I'm not necessarily proposing that we destroy the current National Theatre home, but if changes were made, what implications would that have on what is often seen as a 'complete' theatre building?

MANIFESTO!

Britain’s appeal for a re-nationalised National Theatre.

Britain’s national theatre is not relevant to its entire audience. Housed in London, it appeals to a small demographic of society, making little attempt to leave its monumental home in search for the nation’s performance capacity. It’s become a platform for indulging in celebrity as a means of civic pride. Rather than expressing its nations talent it seeks to maintain and glorify its own status.

The audience is limited and exclusive. The performance selection process is inherently biased. It’s become a place of representing what British theatre should be, rather than enhancing national theatre as it could be. Token gestures of ‘community engagement’ don’t encourage ownership, but limit involvement!

Today, a far more democratic performance showcase is already rising. This grassroots system is grown through making use of the Internet in a relevant and clever way. Utilizing video sharing technology, no one organisation body has to decide what is shown, neither are audiences targeted specifically. The success of work is based on the popularity, and therefore the ranking of the piece.

Britain needs a National Theatre that is completely renationalised, a theatre that exists not in one place, but is dispersed across the length and breadth of the country. In the streets, people’s homes, in schools, abandoned factories, leisure centres, church halls and fields the content is decided by its online audience.

Work would initially be selected for development through a democratic audience ranking system. The work is then eventually shown in the original location. This location could be anywhere in the country, not just London.

Our Monument of civic pride on the South Bank will inevitably be questioned. What is the need for a physical centralised building when there is a thriving self-supported National Theatre that is far more transient and broader than one geographical location?

Britain needs to take ownership of its theatre heritage, navigating its way forward, instead of leaving responsibility to a few, predominantly middle class people in one part of the country.

Conceive an institution known for creating politics rather than representing them, one that counters the hierarchical structure of our society in which we make theatre, one pushes our working method into the new millennium.

Test 3

The third and final of this round of performance tests. This time indoors at Wimbledon College of Art in the ground floor lift lobby behind the theatre foyer.

In this event, again making use of the same direction and actor, but a different scene being played out, the red cushions were used but not separated by space from the action.
The audience were invited into the room where the cushions were placed in a circle on the floor. Not only did they provide the audience with the unspoken message of where to sit, but they acted as a design element within the way the scene was played out by the actor. Invited to attend the group counseling session, the border between spectator and actor was merged. What the cushions did here was, on one hand, provide a seat for the spectator, but then also forced the spectator to become involved with the action through keeping a level of proximity and intimacy.