TYPE: RESIDENTIAL BUILDING
LOCATION: SLAKTHUSOMRÅDET, STOCKHOLM
STATUS: CONCEPTUAL
COURSE: A11P3B :ARCHITECTURE PROJECT 1:3 LIVING, WORKING, CLIMATES YEAR 1
“New Babylon is a model for a new form of society that, Constant was convinced at the start of the project, could and must be achieved quickly. A society populated by a new type of person in which, thanks to technology, all ‘noncreative’ acts (such as work, shopping, and cooking) would be fully automated. The New Babylonian would therefore be able to devote his life entirely to his own creative development. Color, light, texture, temperature, and air quality could also be adapted to the mood of the moment. Individuality would be banished; the artist would no longer exist. ‘Atmosphere is to become an artistic medium with which to collectively reconstruct social space.’ New Babylon would be society as Gesamtkunstwerk—an artwork that owes its existence to Constant’s encounters and collaborations with other artists.”
— Laura Stamps, Constant’s New Babylon – Pushing the Zeitgeist to Its Limits, 2015
The project has been devoted to exploring the individual’s creativity and the enabling of personal expression through a physical manifestation. The project strives to create a dwelling for 13 people with an element of cohabitation among the residents.
In order to investigate what a home can be, the project drew inspiration from references. One of these was Sir John Soane’s own home at Lincoln’s Inn Fields in London. Soane’s home came to play a significant role in the project. Sir John Soane’s home expresses itself more as a self-portrait than a private residence. It is both a dwelling, a museum, and a mausoleum. The boundaries between these dissolve and create a home that is as much an inner world as a physical place. In his book Crude Hints, Soane narrates himself as a monk inhabiting a Buddhist temple. In a fictional future, his home is transformed into places of memory and identity, where the walls cease to be physical boundaries and instead become narrative surfaces with the purpose of creating a stage for the objects of the home (Soane, 1812). Crude Hints and the study of Soane’s home provided new insights into what a home can be, beyond the functional. A home with space for the personal, the emotional, the existential. In this project, the possibilities of architecture were explored to create scenographies for everyday life, altars for the objects of the home, and places where memory and body can take physical form, with the purpose of transforming the home into a place for esoteric worship of the inhabitant.
Le Corbusier saw a house as “a machine for living in” and offices as “machines for working in.” His designs were built from standardized elements so that they could easily be mass-produced. The danish artist Asger Jorn slowly but surely developed an aversion to the functional division of a city and its buildings. He saw a house as a place where art and architecture can merge into “a machine of expression.” Art was to be returned to personal life, and where better than in the intimate environment of one’s home? Jorn set an example by living in accordance with his own ideals: together with those who were nearest and dearest, each person could elevate his or her home into a temple of creativity (Stamps, 2015).
Constant Nieuwenhuys and Asger Jorn proposed another type of architecture. An architecture in which human creative force was given freedom, not limitation. Constant’s vision in his project New Babylon was an automated society in which humanity had the freedom to devote itself solely to creative exploration. In this new society, atmosphere functions not as a background but as a material with which to shape social space. Jorn continued to drive this vision into the practical world with his vision of the home as a “machine of expression.” The home becomes a place where art and everyday life intertwine and where the personal influences architecture. Nothing in the home remains neutral; every object and surface becomes part of a living work of art.
In the project, these ideas are materialized into a structure that is open to interpretation. Where the walls do not function as delimiting elements but as active surfaces for display and memory.
Life within the building circulates around a 20-meter-high atrium with the function of a social space where the residents can meet and be inspired. The niches of the atrium create a playfulness, an opportunity for unexpected encounters. At the same time, it conveys seriousness. It shows that every person and every object has value. The private spaces are stripped back yet expressive, where the individual’s sanctuaries and objects are given space within the mass of the walls. A home, but also an altar for human creative force.
Creation in this project is not limited to artistic production. What is important is not what is created, but that the structure gives rise to creation. The architecture is to remain a catalyst and not merely a shell for everyday life. The project does not strive toward any functionalist ideal; it seeks to approach a home with meaning. A home where the individual’s inner life is given physical form. Where the role of architecture is not to frame the individual, but to help the individual see themselves.
Constant Nieuwenhuys and Asger Jorn proposed another type of architecture. An architecture in which human creative force was given freedom, not limitation. Constant’s vision in his project New Babylon was an automated society in which humanity had the freedom to devote itself solely to creative exploration. In this new society, atmosphere functions not as a background but as a material with which to shape social space. Jorn continued to drive this vision into the practical world with his vision of the home as a “machine of expression.” The home becomes a place where art and everyday life intertwine and where the personal influences architecture. Nothing in the home remains neutral; every object and surface becomes part of a living work of art.
In the project, these ideas are materialized into a structure that is open to interpretation. Where the walls do not function as delimiting elements but as active surfaces for display and memory.
Life within the building circulates around a 20-meter-high atrium with the function of a social space where the residents can meet and be inspired. The niches of the atrium create a playfulness, an opportunity for unexpected encounters. At the same time, it conveys seriousness. It shows that every person and every object has value. The private spaces are stripped back yet expressive, where the individual’s sanctuaries and objects are given space within the mass of the walls. A home, but also an altar for human creative force.
Creation in this project is not limited to artistic production. What is important is not what is created, but that the structure gives rise to creation. The architecture is to remain a catalyst and not merely a shell for everyday life. The project does not strive toward any functionalist ideal; it seeks to approach a home with meaning. A home where the individual’s inner life is given physical form. Where the role of architecture is not to frame the individual, but to help the individual see themselves.