Geology of the Baltic states
The project reads the built environment that overlays the space of the Baltic countries as sequential stratigraphy.
Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia - are the only members of European Union that were part of the USSR until the 1990s. Since, they are undergoing complex transformations. Policies are inscribed into sequential infrastructures and material assemblies.
The project is an inquiry into the logic of these articulations, taking a geological approach - reading things that compose this flat landscape as a stack of stratigraphic layers. It is through physical infrastructures that policies are inscribed in space.
There are myths and ideologies clashing and converging here but it is the ways subjects relate to things are at the core of recent return of geopolitics in Europe. The project re-articulates architectural practices as a set of inscriptions on a non-linear stratigraphy. The proposed practice places architecture in the middle, inside the stratigraphy of assemblies.
Mineral museum in Vilnius, Lithuania
It is through physical infrastructures that policies script the space.
Precast elements
Soviet planning institutions regulated construction projects through planning directives, the power of decision making was in the hands of teleological planners. The concept defines the approach that determined the objective functions of economy instead of following consumer preferences.
1 - 464LI series
1 - 464LI series
large reinforced concrete panel system prefabricated building
Lazdynai, Lithuania, 1974
60 flats
5 stairways
5 levels
1 basement level
width of the module 3.2 M
depth 5.76 M
height of one floor - 2.7 M
Locked-in space
After 25 years the inert stratum is in lock-in without major alterations. Mikrorayon - still and ageing space within the built fabric.
Soviet stratum - 60% of housing stock.
The articulation of Soviet policies - too big to demolish.
Energy supply networks
The inert stratum is locked to the supply chains of networks that defines geopolitics.
Maxima roof failing
21 November 2013 roof of Maxima shopping centre in the Zolitūde neighbourhood of Riga, Latvia, progressive failure of roof trusses killed 54 people.
Latvian Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis resigned taking political responsibility as government led by him dismantled the state Construction Bureau back in 2009 due to the austerity measures.
Multiyear spectral analysis of the Baltic states built fabric
Red 2000 - Green 2007 - Blue 2014
USGS - Landsat 7 and Landsat 8 band 1 data
New practice
The project re-articulates architectural practices as a set of inscriptions on a non-linear stratigraphy. The proposed practice places architecture in the middle, inside the stratigraphy of assemblies.
