18/10/2026
Master studio - THE TOWER & THE PAVILLON - Karlsruhe
SS26
From the atelier system of the Académie des Beaux-Arts to the Bauhaus and its total vision of art and craft to the pedagogical experiments after 1968, architectural schools have continually redefined themselves. Once hierarchical and authority-driven, they gradually opened to contexts shaped by sociology, politics, economy, and ecology. Transmission became exchange. The master’s desk turned into a shared table.
The spatial organization of a school is never neutral. It produces knowledge, frames positions, and structures encounters. Studios, seminar rooms, and libraries are not mere containers; they stage debate and collaboration. Pedagogy and space inform one another.
As our current buildings face major renovation, the high-rise and pavilion long occupied by the school of physics will soon become available. Moving the architecture school there would be more than a change of address. It would mean a radical shift in the spatial framework of our education and research.
Our present buildings, raised on a plinth, are introverted and courtyard-centered—generous yet rigid, almost invisible on campus. The former physics cluster operates as a counterpoint: an open pavilion engaging its surroundings and a tower whose skeletal structure promises adaptable floor plates.
Pavilion and tower create a productive tension. One spreads and mediates; the other compacts and focuses. Together they redefine proximity, exposure, and circulation, suggesting new modes of encounter and collaboration. Does this tension produce a framework for our school? From introverted to extroverted, hidden to visible, rigid to adaptable: a shift in spatial logic—and in architectural education.
Students:
Hausner Sophia
Ishizuka Yutaro
Kergoat Ivane
Kruszek Piotr Jan
Peter Niklas
Sanhueza Cristobal
Stamp Friedrich
Tooyserkani Maryam
Zhou Zimeng
External Jury Members
Manuel Leon Fanjul (Hermitage)
