Upcycling

Exploitation and destruction of the environment call for an inevitable paradigm shift as regards our resource consumption: innovative building will have to break away from the dogma of new build. We need to reconsider the existing building stock as a wealth of resources and ideas, just as we should understand recycling and upcycling building stock as architectonic potential. New approaches in architecture reveal a trend towards concepts of the frequently used but theoretically and historically rarely defined term upcycling. In that context, one often forgets that the history of building has also always been a history of, firstly, recycled and upcycled building materials and components, and secondly, of building knowledge and building styles. Comprehending buildings as a part of a social change process poses a challenge to our current habits and modern concept of unambiguity, seclusion and authorship of architecture. This publication explores the potential of historical concepts of upcycling the qualitative recycling of buildings and building components and confronts them with new developments in architectural and building practice. Importantly, the authors look into the question of whether and how new solutions could be found for future architecture. Recycling and upcycling should not be a matter of idealism, but rather present an argument for economy and the quality of structure and design. With contributions by: Alberto Alessi, Barbara Buser, Jürg Conzett, Elisabeth Crettaz-Stürzel, Anja Diener, Philipp Entner, Hanna Kuzniatsova, Silke Langenberg, Hans Rudolf Meier, Lisa Ochsenbein, Johannes Rederer, Nicholas Ransome, Fetanete Rashiti and Daniel Stockhammer

Autorentext
Daniel Stockhammer, Dr. sc. ETH / Architekt ETH FH SIA, forscht seit 2018 am Institut fur Architektur und Raumentwicklung der Universität Liechtenstein zu Fragen der Wieder- und Weiterverwendung in der Architektur. Zuvor dozierte er an der Architekturschule St.Gallen. Zu den von ihm herausgegebenen Publikationen zählen u.a. Schweizer Holzbautradition (ETH Zurich, 2015) und Weiterbauen in Stahl (mit Astrid Staufer und Daniel Meyer, 2017). Er studierte und diplomierte an den Architekturschulen von Wien, Zurich und Winterthur. Nach dem Studium in den Meisterklassen von Wolf D. Prix und Zaha Hadid (Universität fur Angewandte Kunst Wien) arbeitete er bei Jacques Herzog und Pierre de Meuron in Basel. Von 2012 bis 2015 lehrte und promovierte er am ETH-Institut fur Denkmalpflege und Bauforschung bei Uta Hassler (ETH Zurich) und Manfred Schuller (TU Munchen).