BIGamy (you can have both)

The traditional image of the radical architect is the angry young man rebelling against the establishment. The avant-garde is defined more by what it is against than what it is for. This leads to an oedipal succession of contradictions where each generation says the opposite of the previous. And if your agenda is dependant on being the opposite of someone else’s, you are simply a follower – in reverse.

Rather than being radical by saying fuck the establishment, fuck gravity, fuck the neighbours, fuck the budget, fuck the context – we want to try to turn pleasing into a radical agenda.

What if design could be the opposite of conflict? Not by ignoring it, but by feeding off it. A way to incorporate and integrate differences – not through compromise or by choosing sides, but by tying conflicting interests into a Gordian knot of new ideas.

We propose to let the forces of society decide which of our ideas can live, and which must die. Surviving ideas will evolve through mutation and crossbreeding into an entirely new species of architecture.

An inclusive rather than exclusive architecture. An architecture unburdened by conceptual monogamy. An architecture where you don’t have to choose between public or private, dense or open, angled or curved, blond or brunette etc. An architecture where you can have both.

Would you sign up to this manifesto?

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