Arquitetura Entre Vistas

This episode, we travel to Zurich, Switzerland, to meet Pablo Donet, who together with Tim Schäfer and Tanja Reimerfounded Donet Schäfer Reimer Architekten (DOSCRE) in 2018.Their work doesn’t begin with a manifesto. “It’s not about dogmas,” they say. “It’s things we find out by doing things.” Drawing becomes a way of thinking. “Only by drawing, and drawing and drawing again, you suddenly see something, and then you work on it.” Nothing is invented in isolation; everything is tested, evaluated, adapted.Housing is their main field of experimentation. Project after project, typologies multiply rather than stabilise. What some might call constraints become productive triggers: “we try to take the full potential out of these limitations.” Multiplicity is not a weakness but a strategy. “We always fail to choose one image that transports the whole project, there is too much multiplicity.” Columns, windows, colours, plans: differentiation allows architecture to absorb contradictions instead of resolving them too quickly.They speak of naivety as a tool, of identity elements as ways to compensate for what housing often lacks, and of Zurich as a place that appears progressive yet remains deeply conservative.“We don’t have a language yet,” they admit. “Sometimes I wish we had.”Perhaps the work lives precisely in that unresolved space.Guests: Pablo Donet, DOSCRE (Zurich, Switzerland)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comSpotify: Arquitetura Entre VistasInstagram: @arquiteturaentrevistas

Today, we travel to Rotterdam to meet Fokke Moerel, partner at MVRDV, a practice known for questioning limits, expanding what architecture can be, and asking, relentlessly: “why not?”.In their work, boundaries never arrive pre-set. “This kind of pre-set boundaries or rules is something that we don’t have.” Every project begins with orientation: “Where are we? First you have to understand where you are to know what you are going to react to.” And with awareness comes responsibility: “you are using a part of the planet, so you better use it well.”Themes in the office evolve constantly, “sometimes they age, but they never stay the same”.From rooftop landscapes to mirrored buildings that invite you to take a picture of the world rather than a selfie of yourself, MVRDV stretch the idea of what a building can host and who it can belong to.“When should you stop pushing?” they ask. “Where can we go even further?” The Depot in Rotterdam answers this directly: an archive once thought to be only 20% accessible is now 95% open to the public; a building unafraid of its own “objectness” and iconicity.After all, using Fokke words, architecture is about “celebrating every piece of life.”Cheers to that.Guest: Fokke Moerel, MVRDV (Rotterdam, Netherlands)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)This episode is sponsored by J&J Teixeira. Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comSpotify: Arquitetura Entre VistasInstagram: @arquiteturaentrevistas

This week, we travel to Neuchâtel, Zurich and Lausanne to meet Anna MacIver-ek and Axel Chevroulet, the duo behind MacIver-ek Chevroulet. Their practice seeks “precision as a tool to achieve an architecture sensitive to its context and generous to its users” - yet for them, precision is inseparable from freedom.Where lies the balance between control and release? “Sometimes you go to the toilet and when you come back, things have been decided.” Architecture, after all, is a shared process - unpredictable, collective, and alive.“We started to learn to love this idea of constraints.” Limits, they say, are fertile ground - shaping creativity rather than restricting it. That is how breaking down, reassembling, and connecting become part of their design language, almost “like a motor, you can tear the buildings apart and reuse certain elements.”They are fascinated by connections, both literal and conceptual. “The connections used to be in the center of architecture but disappeared with the use of concrete that is able to hide all the connections.” What was once visible became hidden, and they seek to bring that clarity back: “Screwing, nailing, or simply placing one thing on top of another. (…) Making knots is insanely efficient. (…) We’re hoping to use magnets soon.”“You need to have freedom in every scale of representation… everything works in a sketch and nothing works in a sketch.” Between drawings, models, and images, they navigate multiple kinds of precision. “No medium is less precise than another; it is just another type of precision.”“It’s part of the job to be lost,” they say.But fear not, “if you have the right process, somehow, you will find a way through.”Guests: Anna MacIver-ek + Axel Chevroulet (Neuchâtel + Zurich + Lausanne, Switzerland)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)

This week, we travel to Aachen and Stuttgart to meet AMUNT, founded in 2009 by Björn Martenson, Sonja Nageland Jan Theissen.AMUNT reinvent the existing. They pay attention to the quirky, the overlooked, the oddly specific. “There are ideas in these quirky things, that’s why we collect them.” But collecting is only the beginning. For AMUNT, these observations become operative: “to transfer means the possibility to bring something new to the vocabulary of architecture”. I agree.Each project begins with context - not as something given, but as something constructed. “Everybody can create their own context… you design what you think is your context.” This openness also allows for letting go: “at some point, it becomes the client’s project on the inside, and we let go”. Wise.Constraints play a central role. “We like to take benefits out of constraints… these constraints form a kind of character”. Within limits, they find freedom. “It helps you to find, in the sea of possibilities, a solution that is not just based on taste (…) If we have at least 2 reasons for something, then it’s really good”.In the end, everything has a character: imperfect, specific, quietly alive…waiting to be found.Guests: Björn Martenson + Sonja Nagel + Jan Theissen (Aachen + Stuttgart, Germany)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comSpotify: Arquitetura Entre VistasInstagram: @arquiteturaentrevistas#ArquiteturaEntreVistasABROAD #ArquiteturaEntreVistas #AMUNT #ArchitecturePodcast #ContemporaryArchitecture #GermanArchitecture #DesignProcess #ArchitecturalThinking #ReinventingTheExisting #ArchitecturalContext #ArchitectureLovers

This week, let’s travel to Rotterdam, Paris and Zurich to meet André Kempe and Oliver Thill, two German architects who founded Atelier Kempe Thill in 2000.Talking about simplicity can be a complex task — but today, we take on that challenge. For Kempe and Thill, architecture is “the creation of order in the world of chaos.” “The world is already too complex,” they say, “and a piece of architecture can create a moment of order.” Yet simplicity, for them, is not effortless — “it takes a lot of effort to do something that at the end looks rather simple.”Typology stands at the core of their thinking — “in typology there is a lot of collective knowledge.” The plan, followed by the section, becomes a tool for clarity. Their architecture resists spectacle: facades are rigorous, interiors quiet, and repetition reveals rather than hides logic.Ultimately, “there is an order — but one that can always be a little bit stretched.” Between reason and softness, their work searches for balance — between the ideal and the real.Guests: André Kempe + Oliver Thill (Rotterdam, Paris, Zurich)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comSpotify: Arquitetura Entre VistasInstagram: @arquiteturaentrevistas

Let’s travel to Zurich to meet Maria Conen and Raoul Sigl, working together since 2011 under the name Conen Sigl Architekten. Their practice is rooted in curiosity, precision, and a constant questioning of how architecture belongs - to its place, to its people, and to its stories.“How is this building grounded in the neighbourhood?” they ask. Every project begins with observation - reading the place carefully, understanding “what do I look at in this project?” and leaving space for multiple answers. “Maybe there is not one answer, maybe there are a lot of answers.”Drawing plays a special role - not as documentation, but as reflection. “Drawing as a synthesis is more to keep in mind our thoughts for the project.” These synthesis drawings are not about technical detail, but about memory and pleasure - “the things you are most interested in.”Architecture, they say, should be precise yet open, allowing life to unfold in unexpected ways. “Not always the best materialisation or the best concept of colours makes a good space. Sometimes it’s the people.” Beauty, after all, is “so multilayered” - it shifts, resonates, and tells a different story each time you look.Guests: Maria Conen + Raoul Sigl (Zurich, Switzerland)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram @arquiteturaentrevistas

Let’s travel to Venice and Arzignano to meet Marcello Galiotto and Alessandra Rampasso, founding partners of AMAA, a “Collaborative Architecture Office For Research and Development” as they call it. They have recently stated working form New York, as they thought that would be a good pretext to be closer to Donald Judd’s aura. “Instagram fully fills our mind, so it’s not easy to select”. Therefore, they’ve developed their own toolbox, the "AMAA box” - which they progressively disclosure on throughout the episode. “To have a proper selection is important, so we do our selection of a lot of things”. At the end, “all these influences create a language.” There are 3 main pieces: a site, an architect and a client. “All these 3 things need to work together”. “To be trustable with a client you need to be a storyteller, thats the first thing. But you also need to be humble and practical. (…) The client needs to be with us for the research, for the process, for the after”. The process is good, but the after is the best part, they claim. Let’s not for get about the site, as that is the place where they best express their way of thinking. “We really love to dirty up the situation”. On one hand, “we need to be thinkers but at the same time we need to be builders”. On the other hand, “from a functional problem you can find a way to be also aesthetic”. What goes around comes back around. “The reference is giving to you the power of detail, the power of keeping up your way of thinking and your intuition.”Guest: Marcello Galiotto + Alessandra Rampazzo (Venice + Arzignano, Italy)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram @arquiteturaentrevistasFollow for more thoughts on architecture.

Let’s travel to Dublin, Ireland, where Ryan W Kennihan - originally from Chicago - has established his practice in 2007. Ryan is much more interested in an architecture of resonance then in one that is completely self-involved. “Whatever “non-referencial architecture” means, it is the complete opposite of this”. An architecture of resonance is a certain sense that arises from using forms that exist all over the world. Their practice is about a constant meaning giving. “We want as many as possible, a proliferation of references”. At a certain point we might find ourselves questioning if we are taking part in the evolution or just continuously extending a mistake. One cannot be sorry, “its very much about looking forward and looking back, trying to be old and be new; to be refined and be awkward.” “What’s interesting to me is not the framework itself but actually the variations within the framework.Guest: Ryan W Kennihan, Ryan W. Kennihan Architects (IE)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram @arquiteturaentrevistasFollow for more thoughts on architecture.

Let’s travel to germany to meet the architectural practice Heide von Beckerath, today represented by Verena von Beckerath. Housing has been a never-ending topic in their practice. “When we started working with collective housing projects it was something new. (…) lately,I found out, collective housing is something that everyone is talking about”.They are not claiming to be the pioneers of the attention now being given to the housing issue. However, they have long been aware that certain aspects have either never been applied to housing or have been forgotten in the discussion. Using their words: “Its not something that we have invented, its something that is there but maybe has never been applied to housing in that way.”Sometimes “a single word can change the acceptance of an architecture approach.”Sometimes, its not very clear who has to water the plants.Every time, “as architects, we always have to be a little ahead of things.”“Housing…I mean…this is probably what we have to do in the next years.But this does not mean that there is change in what we see that is built.That is the next step.”Guest: Verena von Beckerath + Tim Heide, Heide von Beckerath (DE)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram@arquiteturaentrevistasFollow for more thoughts on architecture.CREDITSTwo Houses2019, 38 minDirector: Verena von BeckerathAssistant directors: Niklas Fanelsa, Momoko Yasaka, Maximilian von ZepelinCamera, Sound, Editing: Jens FrankeProduced by: Bauhaus-Universität WeimarVerena von Beckerath (ed.), A Room with a View, Monroe Books, Berlin 2023with contributions by Andrew Alberts, Ludovico Centis, Lawrence Hoque, Albrecht Kastein, Oda Pälmke and Yvonne Matijas Seguso

Next stop: Portugal, to meet Maria Rebelo and João Paupério, whom together in 2019, have founded Atelier Local. Have you ever though about gosht writing applied to architecture? Maybe its more common than we think. What is style? Maybe, “style is what allows you to go further (…) if you repeat a same way of addressing an issue, your mind gets liberated to address other issues. “Your own limitations travel with you wherever you go. Maybe that is what style is. (…) that’s the only way you know how to solve a problem.” “Style is a limitation”. Maybe. “Once you start to reflect upon that, you start to use it more properly.” For sure. “We know a little bit about Palladio but we also know a little bit about ugly kitchens from our grandmothers.” The real question here is: how local is Leroy Merlin?Guest: Maria Rebelo + João Paupério , Atelier Local (Valongo, PT)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram@arquiteturaentrevistasFollow for more thoughts on architecture.

Next stop, Zurich (CH) alongside Piet Eckert, whom together with Wim Eckert founded E2A. Can a building ever be abstract? Can an idea ever be concrete? What about a model, how abstract can a model be? “The abstraction of a thought leads to an architectural strategy, we can produce a model that keeps this abstraction.” With such a wide range of thoughts…how to keep our focus? Piet says he as “found a way to deal with many conditions and not have the obligation to always think everything through.” He explains it further: “for example, a plan, is more abou how a space is organised; a model is about how a structure is creating synthesis; an image, for example, can accentuate our attention a space.” It’s about method and about methodically taking the best out of it. Nevertheless, for E2A, it’s important to emphasise that "the built work is always the synthesis, otherwise we have done something really wrong”. “Its about definition and tolerance. It’s about defining the world but making it free to be discovered.” “I am not trying to limit things. I am trying to enable.” “Liberty itself is not a quality.”Guest: Piet Eckert, E2A (CH)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram@arquiteturaentrevistasFollow for more thoughts on architecture.

Next stop, Zurich (CH) alongside Ron Edelaar, Elli Mosayebi, Christian Inderbitzin. You might better know them for the short-form EMI Architekten. The conversation starts on a high, discussing the difference between “concept” and “narrative”. Were you aware that there was a difference between one and the other? On one hand, “the concept, goes back to a very heroic era of architecture”. On the other hand, “the narrative, allows for richness and multi-diversity (…) it Its more about diversity, richness, heterogeneity, tentacular, contradictions”. Therefore, “the narrative is also a critic towards the concept. But if you don’t know the concept anymore… it is difficult to recognise the narrative. (…) I think. In a way, it would be good to have a consciousness for both”. “Do we cover the project with the story or do we develop the project in the story?”, they wonder. “With our floor plans, we are trying to overcome preconceptions in housing.” Successfully, I think. We talk about mirrors that are moon eclipses. We confess our obsession for doors. “Its all about doors.” “Architecture is always very serious.” “Architecture can be quite humorous.”, it is like a joke that can be told serval times, not a one-liner.Guest: Ron Edelaar + Elli Mosayebi + Christian Inderbitzin (CH)Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal)Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.comInstagram@arquiteturaentrevistasFollow for more thoughts on architecture.

In our 32nd episode, we travel to Hamburg (Germany) and Tokyo (Japan) to meet Kawahara Tatsuya and a Ellen Kristina Krause, the minds behind Kawahara Krause Architects. Kawahara Krause Architects explores the subtle ways architecture can bring people together without rigid boundaries. “We are living together, and this togetherness should be architecturally staged.” “If things are separated from each other there is still a way to think about how they direct to each other.” For Kawahara and Krause, each project is an invitation to endless “ways of reading.” Spaces should offer “stimuli without defining too strictly”. “We wanted to show people how enjoyable architecture can be” "The more experience you have, the richer your intuition gets” and their rich intuition makes them wonder “what really needs to be defined”, after all? Guest: Kawahara Tatsuya + Ellen Kristina Krause (Tokyo, Japan + Hamburg, Germany) Host: Ana Catarina Silva (Porto, Portugal) Upload your references to: arquiteturaentrevistas.com Instagram @arquiteturaentrevistas Follow for more thoughts on architecture.