Student Competition “INFINITE STRIP” - apartments building

INTRODUCTION:

For its second conceptual competition ARQUITECTUM has opted for a subject that is not only “informative” but also “formative”, in that it purports to contribute to discourse of the practice of architecture as well as offering a specific exercise within the context of modern teaching. We are therefore pleased to invite all architecture students and graduates anywhere in the world to participate in the “INFINITE STRIP” Ideas Competition.

ARQUITECTUM sponsors this competition in order to contribute to the teaching of architectural design, whilst presenting a practical exercise that can be used as a learning tool for the understanding of modern architecture by any design workshop in the world.

BACKGROUND:

Students of architecture tend to gather information about architecture through architectural “images” in books, magazines and other publications. But images are always partial and flat and must be compared with whatever other information is available in order to “understand” the building being contemplated (plans, texts, aerial views, etc.).
Nevertheless, the question often remains: What is the method or system the architect has followed to conceptually define the building? The answer is almost always based on speculation, an approach distorted by the information as well as by the leanings – almost always reductionist – of the publication. In other instances the architect does not manage to transmit exactly his/her conceptual approach, because this is, rather than simply a “method” (which is what interests the student), also a “system” of parts which are assembled as they are incorporated. In other words: the architect’s system of thought is more “inductive” than “deductive”. And that is why it is so difficult to summarise. Or put in another way: one can only learn to think in such a way by doing the same work and never by observation or contemplation (hence Picasso’s much celebrated phrase: “painting is learned by painting”). Therefore, the “method” we present here is not a method for “making” architecture, but rather for “learning to make architecture”, so that the student discovers alone, through practising or exercising architecture, personal and creative ways to develop the “Infinite Strip”, whilst at the same time developing an understanding of themes such as: space, formal equilibrium, the plastic arts, etc.

OBJECTIVES OF THE COMPETITION:

The competition’s objectives are:

* To create a global competition that will lead to the selection of the twelve most original, creative and contemporary proposals for a new type of “Habitation Unit” that incorporates the values of modern architecture.
* To recover the spirit of a method based on the principles of modern architecture.
* To motivate students of architecture all over the world to learn about – and apply – contemporary “systems” of architectural composition.

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