A collection of student projects presented in an exhibition organised during the 4th International Biennial “Vestiges of Industry” in September 2007, focusing on the applied new use of industrial heritage as a stimulus and instrument of regional development.

The objective of this exhibition and volume of student projects on the theme of the applied new use of industrial sites is to present alternatives to established planning and development practices. These projects confront the atmosphere and values of the industrial age with the contemporary aims of the architect and the real world of construction. The volume also contains comments from teachers and students, and it should therefore serve as a valuable aid in teaching and in planning work. Students’ opinions tend to reflect the wider picture of the general changes in lifestyle, the environment, and attitudes, and provide a cross-sectional view of the state of contemporary architecture and architectural education at schools of technology, the humanities, and art.

Exhibitions and publications of this kind moreover do much to better inform the public about this topic and consequently also to protect the values and material substance of industrial sites. To this end, after the exhibition of student projects opens in the former grounds of Jeřábek’s Ham Factory in Prague-Holešovice (symbolically, at the centre of the reviving industrial neighbourhood of Holešovice and in the raw industrial environment of the M Factory, revitalised according to designs by Olgoj Chorchoj Studio), it will then travel to other towns, and the published volume of work especially will be available as a source of information.

In the 2006 / 2007 academic year, the Research Centre for Industrial Heritage approached universities specialising in architectural education with a call for students to take part in this thematic exhibition. It is necessary to admire the willingness of the teachers and especially the students who took up this initiative as an opportunity to exhibit their projects outside the confines of the school and perhaps even to contribute to changing the way society regards and values industrial heritage. Many of the students clearly took the authenticity of the atmosphere of industry to heart and made the idea of sustainable development and the conservation of the vestiges of our collective past their own. However, it should also be noted that assignments in which students are asked to develop projects for the applied new use of industrial heritage sites has long been one of the more popular activities at universities. The frequency with which industrial heritage conversion projects are published in the professional architectural press is moreover a sign of the pressing and relevant nature of this topic today. Perhaps that, too, is why the disinclination of some of those approached to participate is surprising.

The projects included in the exhibition and the publication were submitted by students from the Faculty of Civil Engineering and the Faculty of Architecture at ČVUT in Prague, the Academy of Arts, Architecture, and Design in Prague, the Faculty of Art and Architecture TU in Liberec, and the Faculty of Architecture VUT in Brno. The forum for this confrontation of ideas was organised by the Research Centre for Industrial Heritage ČVUT in Prague as part of the 4th International Biennial “Vestiges of Industry” 2007.
Each of the student projects addresses a very specific assignment of converting a selected industrial site or zone, but each project also incorporates conceptual and more general ideas about formulating value criteria and strategies of urban development.

From some of the projects it is apparent that the powerful atmosphere evoked by a deserted site can at times be detrimental, because it influences the creators of such projects to such an extent that they rely more on their feelings and their emotional artistic perception of the topic and a rational analysis of the site’s historical context is somewhat overshadowed. Nevertheless, all the student projects are united by an effort to preserve at least something of the site’s genius loci. The conceptual focus and key to a successful project seems above all to be the right choice of a new function.

An interesting motif that runs through most of the projects is the emphasis on meeting spaces, communication, culture, and pleasant environments and an effort to revive and invigorate a space – perhaps as a reaction to the directed, mechanical, and impersonal planning conducted by the socialist apparatus. But this tendency may also be a result of the post-modern humanisation of the living environment or be influenced by the poetic atmosphere. Or it may simply derive from the fact that avid sociability is a natural part of student life.

Many of the views are based on a concept that in this country unfortunately has thus far only been reflected in academic circles. This is the assumption that the revitalisation of industrial heritage cannot be viewed as just a one-off investment effort and instead must be conceived as a long-term project – divided into stages and incorporating flexible strategies or creating the right conditions for natural, long-term development – and as an environment that will have a higher utility value because it is able to respond better to the changing conditions. This very broad spectrum of approaches to this understandably also reflects the diversity and innovativeness of contemporary architecture, ranging from Utopian, poetic, and graphics-inspired visions, to Neofunctionalist aesthetics, the prevalence of which obviously stems not just from current events but also from the rationalism of the industrial structures the students were working with. The selection of materials also usually has a strong influence on the atmosphere.

The powerful atmosphere of industrial heritage almost eliminated the differences between individual schools and studios – each project was more a reflection of the individual nature of each student, sometimes slightly steered by their teachers (but not necessarily). In this regard it is interesting to compare identical assignments addressed by different studios, showing that a simulation of the real environment is somewhat lacking from the assignments in school. A single assignment is addressed in one case purely in terms of urban development, in other in terms of landscape, in another as an interior, or eventually as an unrealistic Utopian vision. Perhaps this is a mistake – students enter into practice unprepared to confront reality. Or maybe this is a good sign, that they are still able to dream, usher in fresh air, and inspire.

Petr Vorlík (ed.), Industrial Architecture Gets its Second Wind, Prague 2007.

170 pages;  Czech, English summary; ISBN 978-80-01-03805-5 / translation Robin Cassling / graphic design Štěpán Macura  / published by the Research Centre for Industrial Heritage CTU Prague

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