KLUTZ @ Architekturwoche Basel 2022
At around 74 million tons per year, construction waste is the largest waste stream in Switzerland. As mixed construction waste, concrete, brick, tile and asphalt are not used to construct new buildings, but are used as secondary materials to fill depleted quarries and other landscape and infrastructure work. Thus, a material that was originally mined from the natural landscape as a valuable raw material flows back into a man-made landscape as a worthless waste material. How can worthless waste become a valuable resource? This is the question posed by KLUTZ, an urban furniture made of textile and building rubble.
KLUTZ is on show for the first time as part of the Basel Pavillon at Dreispitz, during Architekturwoche Basel from 09–15 May, 2022.
KLUTZ is an urban seating furniture made of textile. But it is only by filling it with construction waste that KLUTZ becomes a seat. As a bag module, KLUTZ is easy to transport, empty and refill. This is how KLUTZ travels through different urban contexts. “What’s in the bag?” is a recurring question. In a variety of spatial configurations and mixtures of filling materials, KLUTZ becomes a performative tool to engage with the interplay of value and valuelessness in urban space.
KLUTZ is built by hand in a performative build-up the start of the architecture week.
As a cluster of bag-modules, KLUTZ will provide the context for panel discussions, interviews and lectures at the Basel Pavillon, the main location of the Architekturewoche Basel 2022.
As a bag-module, KLUTZ will provide the context for panel discussions, interviews and lectures at the Basel Pavillon, the main location of the Architekturewoche Basel 2022.
KLUTZ is part of the object family Soft Rubble, a series of spatial constructs in which building rubble and textile take the spatial form of wall segment or urban furnitures contextual to their immediate surroundings and material supply. In the project Soft Rubble, which Charly Blödel started during her master studies at the Design Academy Eindhoven (2020), she focuses on the social and ecological implications of spatial design and production systems with a special focus on waste and material culture in the context of the climate crisis.
KLUTZ will be on show for the first time at the Architekturwoche Basel 2022 from 09–15 May, 2022 as part of the Basel Pavillon, the main location of the event, hosting panel discussions, interviews and lectures during AWB 2022 and throughout the summer programme of 2022.
For more information on KLUTZ at Architekturwoche Basel 2022 and the programme from 09–15 May, 2022, please visit architekturwochebasel.ch
KLUTZ will be introduced at the (ZOOM) LECTURE: KLUTZ — What’s in the bag? (in German) on 21 April, 2022 at FHNW Basel. Sign up here.
The guided tour around KLUTZ (in German & English) during AWB 2022 will take place on Tuesday, 10 May, 2022 at 14:00–15:00 and 16:00–17:00. Sign up for the tour here.
Basel is recognized as Switzerland’s architectural capital. Hardly any other region is home to so many internationally active architectural offices. In order to showcase the highly diverse potential of building culture, expertise and enthusiasm in the city and surrounding area, Architektur Dialoge has initiated a new biennial platform for architecture and urban development: the Architekturwoche Basel (AWB). The first edition will be held from 9–15 May 2022.
Soft Rubble, wall segment with window and seat, built by Team KLUTZ (2020). Photo: Viktor Hübner
© Charly Blödel, 2022. For more Imprint.