Open Architecture: Migration, Citizenship and the Urban Renewal of Berlin-Kreuzberg by IBA 1984/87

Esra Akcan

Published by Birkhäuser 2018

Open Architecture

Migration, Citizenship and the Urban Renewal of Berlin-Kreuzberg by IBA 1984/87

Esra Akcan

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783035613773

Overview
Contents

About this book

Toward an "open architecture"

The International Building Exhibition 1984/87 in Berlin constitutes one of the most remarkable examples to discuss "open architecture". Almost 10,000 dwellings were constructed or restored in the Kreuzberg districts adjacent to the Berlin Wall, inhabited about halfway by immigrants. The renowned author Esra Akcan, related in many ways to Turkey, Berlin and the USA, narrates the history and reverberations of this architectural-political event.

A new perspective on IBA Berlin
Architecture, research and politics: a path-breaking event
Architectural history of current relevance

Author / Editor information

Esra Akcan, Associate Professor, Department of Architecture, Cornell University, NY, USA

Reviews

„Einem derart häufig publizierten Thema wie der West-Berliner IBA 1984/87 noch eine neue Facette zu entlocken, ist kein einfaches Unterfangen. Umso erstaunlicher, mit welch wissenschaftlicher Leichtigkeit das Esra Akcan in ihrem Buch gelingt.“ (In BauNetz, 02.2020)

„Open Architecture is a tremendous accomplishment that invites the reader to act as a kind of postcolonial fläneur, a non-gendered figure who strolls Kreuzberg's streets, peering— at times voyeuristically—into the open doors, hallways, courtyards, and stairwells of its trademark buildings and the intimate places that inhabitants call home. [...] Open Architecture is much more than a city tour or a history of buildings and their visionaries. It is a somber reminder of the human stakes involved in a participatory urbanism that privileges rights-bearing citzens. Akcan's call for an attention in urban planning to migrants, exiles, refugees, and other stateless persons who lack the legal and social protections of citizenship could not be more prescient at this moment.“ (Christina Schenkel in The Berlin Journal 32, S. 102-103, 2018)

„This is a commendable undertaking a field that has traditionally been dominated by coffee-table books and biographical accounts. Akcan wonderfully lays bare the tensions between the ideals of the designers of our built environment and its everyday experience, offering us insightful and the same time entertaining anecdotes about impractical floor plans and creative resident interventions. [...] This book is clearly a work of love and passion by someone interested in the history of Kreuzberg and its residents for more than academic reasons.“ (Tim Verlaan in H-Soz-Kult, 09.2021)

„In her pathbreaking book Open Architecture: Migration, Citizenship, and the Urban Renewal of Berlin-Kreuzberg by IBA–1984/87, Esra Akcan achieves three quite different things, each of them enormously important. First, she provides the best account we have of the International Building Exhibition (IBA) held in Berlin in the 1980s. Second, she makes a major contribution to the literature on Turkish guest workers in Germany. Third and finally, she proposes a new approach to the production of architecture that she terms 'open architecture.' The ambitious interweaving of these themes cuts across the usual borders between architectural history, urban sociology, and architectural theory.“ (Kathleen James-Chakraborty in YILLIK. Annual of Istanbul Studies, 3, 2021)

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	1
Content Publicly Available Download PDF	4
Preface Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	6
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	10
PART 1 Open Architecture as Collectivity
STOP I Critical Reconstruction: Open Architecture as Collaboration? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	45
STROLL 1 From Schinkelplatz to Checkpoint Charlie Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	88
STOP II Buildings That Die More Than Once: Open Architecture as Collectivity Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	96
STROLL 2 From Checkpoint Charlie to Potsdamer Platz Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	150
STOP III Opened after Habitation Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	160
STROLL 3 From Potsdamer Platz to Tiergarten Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	194
PART 2 Open Architecture as Democracy
STOP IV Gentle Urban Renewal: Participation and Radical Democracy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	207
STROLL 4 From Kottbusser Tor to Schlesisches Tor Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	252
STOP V A Building with Many Speakers: Open Architecture as Critical Participation Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	258
STROLL 5 From Schlesisches Tor to Fraenkelufer Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	288
PART 3 Open Architecture as Multiplicity
STOP VI Open History in the Past Subjunctive Tense Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	297
STROLL 6 A History of a Possible Kreuzberg Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	336
STOP VII Exit Implies Entries’ Lament: Open Architecture in John Hejduk’s IBA-1984 / 87 Immigrant Housing Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	344
Appendix
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	371
Illustration Credits Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	375
About the Author Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	387
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	388
Captions to the “Map of Stops and Strolls” Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	404

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Birkhäuser
Audience: Architekten, Architekturhistoriker, Stadtforscher, Städtebauer
Pages
- Main content: 416
Illustrations
- Illustrations: 125
- Coloured Illustrations: 280

eBook

Published: April 9, 2018
ISBN: 9783035613773

Hardcover

Published: April 9, 2018
ISBN: 9783035613742