co+labo radović    to all co+labo associates, friends, colleagues we wish a Happy New Year

co+labo radović      co+labo's Amami Iwata and Yuki Mori awarded@Haseko Competition    

And ... here is the proof that at co+labo the year never finishes with the end of the year party. The news has just arrived that our Amami Iwata and Yuki Mori have received the Second Award at Haseko Residential Design Competition. The composition of the Jury tells all about the importance and quality of this contest. The Chair was Kengo Kuma, and the members included Kumiko Inui, Sousuke Fujimoto, Motoko Tanaka and Kazuo Ikeda (left). 

The Theme of the competition was a multi-generation and multi-national housing complex. This proposal, entitled 部屋も歩けば人にあう - "When the room walks, it meets people".  Mori-san explains how they "proposed movable small rooms for each of the houses which make it possible for people to post their daily life like SNS. The rooms personified by their user would help interactions and span difficulties arising from diverse cultural backgrounds, with spaces capturing diverse characters of their residents. This movable rooms would also be able to venture into urban space, seeking the best space to stay. That would help discover the capacity of vacant urban spaces, such as parkings, streets and parks for acquiring new quality, in addition to multi-generational and multinational usage of these wandering rooms." The project will be published in the 2020 February issue of "Shinkenchiku" magazine.

Warm co+labo congratulations to Iwata-San and Mori-san!

co+labo radović    co+labo farewells 2O19 with bōnenkai party+welcomes new students   

The annual co+labo "forget-the-year-party" farewelled the 2019. Although "forget the year" is a literal translation of bōnenkai" the year behind us was certainly not a year that will, of should be easily forgotten. The list of colaboradović.blogspot entries for 2019 includes successful PhD theses defences and starts of new projects, hosting guest lecturers and delivering guest lectures at other places in Tokyo and abroad, organisation and participation in symposia and conferences in Japan and overseas, double-degrees and international workshops and the very important Comprehensive Design Workshop, which ended up with a highly successful exhibition, symposium and lectures - in organisation and delivery of which co+labo was - Keio Architecture. In 2019 we have made the strongest collective push towards helping the oldest university in japan establish a discrete graduate programme in architecture and urbanism. All those activities and achievements add up (in our collaborative + ++ +  ++++ + manner) to a great year, which should never be forgotten 2019. The bōnenkai was also an opportunity for everyone to meet our new two members - Yurino Oguri and Reiya Sasaki (who, in bōnenkai tradition, helped make excellent food for their senpai). Welcome+頑張ってください!

Sincere co+labo thank you go to all of our colleagues, friends and associates in Japan, Croatia, Slovenia, Italy, Serbia, UK, Sweden, Australia, Ecuador, Thailand, Serbia, Spain who have variously joined in, helped share and deliver those projects and whom we are planning new projects for the years to come.  

co+labo radović    co+labo's OB get First Prize for the best Thesis at Politecnico di Milano   

Politecnico di Milano has formally awarded the prizes for Best Graduation Thesis, Migliore Tesi in Ingegneria Edile-Architettura at their campus in Secco, and the winners were three co+labo+PoliMi boys - Akitaka Suzuki (who is also first Keio-Polimi Double Degree laureate), Nicoló Panzeri and Enrico Sterle (who have both spend a semester at co+labo). Aki-san went back to Milano to join the ceremony at his second Alma Mater and for reunion with friends (including some from EMBT, where he did his internship) and professors. Local Lecco News have informed the broader audiences about this, well-known  and highly regraded award.
The Jury explained the reasons for choosing Aki, Nikoló and Enrico's design-research project, summarising how " the work is characterised by highly unique theme, and it achieved an uncommon maturity and design complexity. In particular, the strong visual/graphical communication ability and analysis on its production and realisation aspects are underlined."
co+labo congratulations to Aki, Nikoló and Enrico and their supervisors, including Gabriele Masera (at the selfie below).

co+labo radović     co+labo research projects accelerate towards Masters+UG completion  

As work on various co+labo research projects accelerates towards final presentations at the end of the school year, Keio captures the moment by taking official photos of all research laboratories. Above is co+labo, as of 26.11.2019. Top row: Jumpei Kawamoto, Sanja Žonja, Ivan Filipović, Xuan Yang; Mid row: Yuki Mori, Yumi Ishii, Muxi Yang, Nikolaj Salaj, Paolo Turčić, Amami Iwata; First row: Shinichi Nishibori, Koki Suzuki, Masahito Motoyama, Darko Radović, Norimi Kinoshita, Shun Kato. Absent (in action elsewhere) were: Satoshi Sano, Mei Morimoto, Shohey Yamashita and Hiroki Shigemura.

Besides projects at PhD level (Sanja Ronja, Satoshi Sano and Ivan Filipović), current individual projects at co+labo are:

      Masters Theses 2019

Yumi Ishii, The quality of pedestrian spaces along urban waterways - A Case Study of Meguro River   

Shun Kato, The role of tourism in sustainable urban development of urban coastal areas - A Case Study of Fujisawa

Norimi Kinoshita, The impact of urban morphology and intensity of use on the quality of urban life - A Case Study of railway station hiroba spaces of Tokyo

Mei Morimoto, The relationship between shop facades and affordances in Tokyo - A Case Study of Jiyugaoka, with partial comparisons with Stockholm

Masahito Motoyama, The POPS in high-density urban areas, and their capacity to contribute to public interest - A Case Study of Daimaruyu

Shohei Yamashita, Adaptive reuse of World Cup Legacy and its potential environmental improvement in the megacity - A Case Study of a football stadium project in New York

Xuan Yang, Spatial quality and place attachment - A Case Study of izakaya culture in central Jiyugaoka

      Undergraduate Theses 2019

Koki Suzuki, The Creation of Marine Atmosphere in the Waterfront - A Case Study in Minato Mirai

Yuki Mori, The Morphology of Houses on Saka-michi in Central Tokyo

Muxi Yang, Impacts of Chinese elements on spatial experience of Yokohama Chinatown

      Masters 1 Theses - due 2020

Jumpei Kawamoto, Vacant Land in Minato-ku and its Spatial Composition

Shinichi Nishibori, The social potential of urban canals - typological analysis of canals in Kanda area

      Masters Exchange 

Matej Kranjc, Tokyo and its Preparedness for Disasters: The places to escape to

Nikolaj Salaj, Urban Voids and Public Realm in Tokyo

Paolo Turčić, Mediterranean Piazza and (Non)Equivalent Social Places in Japan

co+labo radović   Yang, Yamashita and Mori finalists in an International Design Competition 

A team of three co+labo students, Yang Xuang, Yamashita Shoei and Mori Yuki have decided to enter the “Sport Citadel” Competition for Young Architects, and managed to reach the finals. The competition Brief, declaring that “a sport arena is an ancient gesture […] which is balanced between function and theatricality”, asked for design of such “architectural gesture” that would be capable to generate and support high quality of urban life.

In response to that request, Xuang, Shoei and Yuki-san proposed a comprehensive green plain for the site of Mappano, as the future heart of revitalization process, which would be generated by integration of new, local sporting facilities into the daily life of the nearby city of Torino. Their project proposed reinterpretation of old civilizing processes, exploring how the sports culture could become a driving force for broader urban regeneration. In their vision, the sports will not offer only competitive and spectator-oriented games for passive audiences, but provide incentives for healthy and active lifestyles to the locals. Their arena blends into the landscape, evoking the forms of the Alps in the background. Its permeable borders both define discrete activity zones and keep them integrated, stimulating a variety of possible interactions between sport, recreation and other activities to emerge - which, significantly, include urban agriculture and farming. At architectural scale, the proposed permeable polycarbonate roof keeps the interior and natural environment directly related, while enabling substantial energy savings. In that way, the arena promises to become a place where various urban activities will melt and produce quality that reaches beyond simple local cultivation.

A truly outstanding international Jury included Peter Eisenman, Hitoshi Abe, Gianluca Mazza, Giuseppe Ferrero, Giovanni Palazzi, Dang Qun, Andrea Maffei.

co+labo radović    co+labo's Yumi Ishii - invited artist@Smart Illumination Yokohama 2O19  
The winner of 2018 Smart Illumination Competition in Yokohama, Yumi Ishii was invited to exhibit her new work at Smart Illumination Events 2018 - this time in the capacity of Invited Artist. Ishii-san explains how the competition and exhibition were conceptualised in response to the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, with an aim to "increase awareness about the importance of sustainable environmental technologies in urban spaces." When invited, she proposed a work called "Pain × Art, an research-driven installation which explores multi sensorial experiences of space. Her"pond-like space" gently shines ultraviolet rays generated by stored solar energy and invites visitors to step in barefooted, and experience pleasant sensations. Her work was recognised a "a new night-cap that uses existing renewable sources of energy". Warm co+labo congratulations to Ishii-san, an System Design Engineering student who became an invited Artist!

co+labo radović  co+labo wins Jury Award+3rd place @ Ginza Tea Ceremony Competition    

A team of eight co+labo students, which included Shigemura Hiroki, Kinoshita Norimi  Samejima Takuomi, Morimoto Mei, Nishibori Shinichi, Iwata Amami, Muxi Yang and Mori Yuku has received 3rd prize and a Jury Award at an interesting design competition for the Tea Ceremony Pavilion in Ginza - 銀茶会の茶席. Shigemura-san summarises that "year's theme was 綾, Aya, or Pattern. As the 2020 year approaches, Aya's characters express efforts towards recognition and h diverse people and harmonisation of various peoples and cultures, mixed in a wide variety of places. Ginza is the precincts of Tokyo whose broad streets invite and welcome many cultures and offers a lot of Aya. The intention behind co+labo entry, entitled "織折庵", Oriorian, was to express the global culture of Ginza by using simple, everyday element of western origin, an ordinary cloths hanger t, through repetition and variation, generate Japanese geometric pattern. The pavilion is highly adaptable, in terms of its volume, shape and patterns, and capable to fit any of Ginza's diverse spaces and events." 
The members of the Jury which recognise design quality of co+labo hanger pavilion were Motonami (Mushanokouji senke), Tomohiro Kimura (Executive Director of Tange Architecture Office), Noriaki Shoji (MitsukoshiGinza CEO), Masato Tajima (Executive Director of Ginza groups), Tatsuya Ukai (Kyushu University), Hiromi Sakaguchi (Taisei Kensetsu), Jun Sato (Tokyo University) and Koko Nakamura (Nikken Sekiei).

Warmest co+labo congratulations to all team members, whose way of work and thinking confirms the essence of our way.

co+labo radović    co+labo research semester follows an intensive summer of  workshops       
co+labo celebrates multiplicities, not only in what we chose to do, but, importantly, in the ways how we work. Those activities, the selection of which gets presented at this blog, follow a loose tripartite structure: Spring - dominated by design and making; Summer - mainly focused at international activities; and Autumn - the completion of undergraduate and masters research, many projects which are in progress throughout the year. Almost feverish action of Spring and Summer 2019 are now getting translated into the slower pace of investigations and writing up. As co+labo  seeks to discover and nurture individual sensibilities, in research that results in a broad variety of themes, shared and cross-fertilised through frequent meetings, presentations and discussions. 

co+labo radović   co+labo competition team & success of an unawarded competition  entry 

In 2018, co+labo team headed by Ivan Filipović has submitted their entry to one international competition of ideas - for the new Embassy of the Republic of Serbia in the Australian capital of Canberra. The work, based on Ivan's PhD investigations of Soft Power Architecture, an important expression of which are diplomatic buildings and complexes, was designed by Ivan, Akitaka Suzuki, Mayuko Mikogami, Daisuke Kobayashi and Takuomi Samejima. The entry has not received an official award but the recognition  and awards from other sources started coming. While the entry has not received an official award, the recognition  and awards from other sources started coming. That points at the importance of academic teams taking part in design competitions and communicating the right message, even when clear that that might not be the award-winning scheme. Competitions mainly operate within the paradigm, for the "real world". On the other hand, one of the key roles of academia is precisely to challenge the paradigm, to question the business as usual, with approaches which are founded in research desire to create a better world. Ivan's PhD investigations at co+labo open such horizons. The ideas based on that research were transformed into a concrete design proposal have received the Grand Prix for Architecture of the Institute of Architects of Serbia and, most recently, an award at the International Association of Unions of Architects, this year held in  the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek. Ivan explains: "While pondering a new approach to embassy design, the focus oftentimes lies in control, limited freedom of movement and inaccessibility. These typological realities were identified as weak points and the proposed architectural design aimed to solve these issues.

The first question that arises is what is the (preferred) identity of the Republic of Serbia? How to present the qualities? In addition to direct, formal metaphors, an observed cultural specificity was: a spirit of community, interpersonal relationships, and enjoyment of various group activities. Taking into account the main concept, the embassy as a home, as a meeting place, the two fit perfectly.

Embassy as a meeting place, embassy as a community center, embassy as (a piece of) home. The size of the Serbian expat community in Australia is significant, so it was the obligation to create spaces that would offer quality and support the main concepts. Although direct transplantation of individual activities was not possible (nor justified), the design sought to create a meeting place with the characteristics of the Serbian culture.

In parallel with the conceptual solution, which allows freedom of movement and choice of activities, the main function of the facility is not forgotten, nor is the necessary level of safety and security. These factors have contributed to the multilayered solution that gives the design manipulation and "softening" of boundaries the illusion of complete openness, however, in reality, the facility and activities are highly controlled and the facility meets all security requirements."