2. Universidad Cardenal Herrera-CEU

La Arquitectura es una actividad integradora en la que conviven arte y técnica, materia y vacío, pasado y futuro, tecnología y artesanía, individuo y sociedad. En ocasiones la enseñanza del primer curso se ha troceado y distribuido en asignaturas que aparecen ante el alumno como islas inconexas. La voluntad del presente texto es proponer unos ejercicios transversales que permitan tender puentes entre ellas que faciliten al alumno la comprensión global de la Arquitectura.

El viaje siempre ha estado ligado a la formación del arquitecto, incluso para alguno de los maestros constituyó su única educación arquitectónica. Sin embargo, esta práctica ha sido generalmente planteada en las Escuelas de Arquitectura como una actividad extracurricular desconectada del contenido y desarrollo del Plan de Estudios. Los autores del presente texto presentamos un caso en el que este mecanismo docente no se plantea como un acontecimiento esporádico e independiente sino que se erige en el auténtico eje vertebrador del aprendizaje e integrador del conocimiento. Planteamos una nueva “materia troncal” en la titulación, a través de la cual el alumno se forma de manera paralela y complementaria a la docencia en el aula.

In 1984, German furniture-maker Axel Bruchhäuser reached out to architectural duo Alison (1928–93) and Peter Smithson (1923–2003) with a playful letter ostensibly written by his cat and addressed to theirs. The letter between cats inquired about commissioning the Smithsons to build several lookouts on Bruchhäuser’s home, known locally as the “Hexenhaus” (the “Witches’ House”—a common name in the area where the Brothers Grimm wrote their fairy tales). Started in 1986 and completed in 2001, and located in a dense forest in Hessen, the renovation that the Smithsons undertook constituted an example of what they called “law of the conglomerate.” Step by step, the house was expanded and opened to admit the light as well the trees, which became part of the interior. The house’s primary materials are wood and glass, providing a poetic example of latticework and a stunning use of natural light.

A series of four Christmas-themed exhibitions spanning 1976–81 formed cumulative parts of a single project and offered the Smithsons an opportunity to explore a renewed ‘art of inhabitation’.

Vocation is one of the determining factors taken into account by students when choosing their university studies. However, when the students start their studies, in their first year, they will find a series of basic subjects that barely motivate or stimulate them. In the specific case of mathematics, the problem is aggravated when many of the students already begin the first year showing rejection towards this subject. The lack of motivation for mathematics also affects the subject of physics because “the role of mathematics is to be the language of physics”. The EXPLORIA project proposed by the CEU Cardenal Herrera University is a potential solution to this problem. The objective of this project is the implementation of STEAM learning (Science Technology Engineering Art Mathematics) in the Degree in Fundamentals of Architecture at CEU Cardenal Herrera University through the EXPLORIA project. This article focuses on the activities carried out in the subject of physics in the Degree in Fundamentals of Architecture, corresponding to the part of mechanical engineering in order to show that through the realization of different challenges, we can develop creative products, new buildings with their logos and storytelling, as well as connect with the rest of subjects. For its development, students must use everyday objects within their reach, such as forks, spoons, knives, shoes, etc., to build an object or structure that must remain in a “creative balance” and this will serve as an inspiration for new buildings. These new creations are evaluated by an architecture team who fills in a rubric to evaluate the creativity and originality of the products. The number of students included in this project was 24 and the participants’ age ranged between 18 and 20 (similarly distributed). At the end of the work, an anonymous ad hoc questionnaire was carried out to show the students’ assessment of the new teaching methodology and the challenges developed in the subject of physics.

“Tree is leaf and leaf is tree House is city and city is house A tree is a tree but it is also a huge leaf A leaf is a leaf but it is also a tiny tree A city is not a city unless it is also a huge house A house is a house only if it also a tiny city” Aldo van Eyck’s “Tree – Leaf” diagrams presented at the Team 10 meeting at Royaumont in 1962 trying to demonstrate the inseparable reciprocity between the house and the city is the starting point in this paper. But it reveals that it is even possible to go beyond on this parallelism: the tree is the result of its many leaves -as the city form is based on each architectural intervention-, and the leave is an answer to the structure of the tree -as the house to its socio-cultural realm. The aim of this paper is to present a reflection about inhabitation and its mechanisms not so much as architectural objects but as generators of a shared social and cultural space. Hence, the presence of life in architecture gains momentum on non-defined spaces that spontaneously become in-between realms that connect a building with its surroundings through the expansion of the relationships between the interior and the exterior, between the built and the unbuilt, or between the public and the private. Lastly, these linking ideas between the house and the city will be analyzed in specific cases of study. Particularly, the paper examines three projects of abalosllopis architects that deal with the meaning of habitation not focusing so much on their materiality but on the perspective of this non-material condition of architecture: a nursery school, a nursing home and a public space.

Si algo define la obra de Barclay&Crousse diríamos que es la pertinencia. Esta afirmación podría ser el resultado de una primera mirada que se topa con la energía y la solidez que transmiten sus proyectos. Una energía firmemente unida al territorio y al clima, y una solidez profundamente anclada en la cultura y la tradición. Tras esa primera mirada, queda el análisis detenido de sus obras, sus dibujos, sus maquetas, para constatar tras él que su arquitectura es de todo menos arbitraria. Como si hubieran sido guiados por fuerzas ocultas nunca muy explícitas trabajan obstinadamente conectados con el contexto peruano; un contexto complejo tanto por sus condiciones geográficas como por sus condiciones socioeconómicas, que asumen y entienden con una actitud no enjuiciadora que les permite operar de forma consciente con las posibilidades reales de las que disponen.