As it is the case of many post-industrial towns, the condition of Stoke-on-Trent in the UK is defined by its backwater location, with its own logic of urbanisation and economy, quite different to those of the metropolitan areas. In the 1960’s architect Cedric Price proposed a project called “Potteries Thinkbelt” for Stoke and its circumjacent towns. Operating in a network, the project injected education into the territory, trying to facilitate the shift from the former industrial economy of ceramic production to one of tertiary focus. The project was never realised. At the same time as Price proposed his project, the “Stoke-on-Trent Greenbelt” was installed as a planning policy: a large encircling landscape, defining a border to the Stoke-on-Trent agglomeration. The aim of our studio will be to test today’s validity of these different approaches to urban renewal – programme and landscape, or where do they meet? - and to discuss transformation at a territorial and architectural scale.

Photography: Bas Princen, Potteries Series 2014

With the opening of the exhibition "C'est Aujourd'hui" by Christine Aymon in the new Galerie Oblique on the ground floor (from September 15 to October 21, 2018)

Photo by Séverine Rouiller

Photograph by Robert Świerczyński

Illustration by Louisa Gagliardi

Architect Hermann Czech saw transformation as "an important subject in the theory of architecture; perhaps the most central after all, as, basically, everything is transformation”. The studio considers transformation as a distinct position in architecture: a way of thinking and operating on the territory, the city and the building. We will start the semester with a study trip to Lille, France, and the Flemish part of Belgium, in order to familiarise ourselves with the approaches on transformation by contemporary architects active in this region. The studio will use the knowledge acquired abroad to formulate its own positions by working on the transformation of a site in Switzerland: the Giovanola industrial plant in Monthey in the Valais. This area of 100'000m2 with about twenty industrial halls, was the headquarter of a metal construction company, specialised in pipelines, cable cars and roller coasters. Founded in 1888 by Joseph Giovanola, and active worldwide, the company closed in 2004. Since then, the City of Monthey manages the site and rents the halls. Contrary to the formulation of a purist architecture, the students will try to negotiate between the contradictions and the qualities found on site. Transformation projects present an excellent training ground for designing an architectural position that cultivates richness and complexity.

The jury of an international student competition has appointed Mathieu Hofer and Mickaël Minghetti of the EPFL to design and build the Swiss stand at the Seoul Congress. Catherine Gay coordinates the project “Swiss Room” on site on behalf of the candidature committee and the FAS Romandie. Special thanks to the Department of Architecture, Seoul University, Professors Sung Hong Kim and Jung Won Yoon, students Eun Woo Jung, Jong Hoon Jung, and Inje Yi. Special gratitude to Dong Joon Lee of the architectural firm Stocker Lee.