The Topological Stoa was designed to be included in a larger urban planning project designed by Michael Bell, Lars Lerup, Antonio Lao, William Green, Michael
Project
Palmore and Timothy Rempel. The Topological Stoa was one of six buildings designed to occupy what was formerly known as No Man’s Land. Produced in
Client
1988, the work was a proposal to reuse and transform a segment of Berlin’s No Man’s Land. The AEDES Gallery in Berlin funded the proposal as part of a
Program
citywide set of exhibitions funded under the Berlin, Cultural City of Europe program. At the time it was fantastic in scope but in light of what happened in
Site
Germany in 1991 it no longer seems so. We saw in the unusual situation along the Berlin wall the opportunity to create meaning primarily through difference, but
Date of Design
maybe more importantly through the radical transformation of existing types placed in a newly created urban context. We saw the inevitability of the city grid, the
Current State of Project
perimeter block and its associated planning logic as a threat to the rejuvenation of the city and instead proposed a continuos park and a new habitable
Budget
boulevard, almost accidentally strewn with new building types. Here was an opportunity to return to the city as a street. Vehicular flow patterns were sabotaged in favor of the pedestrian and the block was atomized into a collection of buildings — an implosion of new plaza inside a giant street. On the urban level the project is a team effort and as such it may not appear quite complete. It was not really supposed to. Each building was carefully and independently designed, but the possibility of chance was given free reign in the urban design. The Topological Stoa, like the Blue House and the Double Dihedral House was in effect a continuos surface that folded in on itself to form an ambiguous interior and exterior space. This work is explicated in the essay Having Heard Mathematics.
Berlin Stoa
Name AEDES Gallery, Berlin Stoa, Theory Project
No Man’s Land, Berlin 1988
$1,500,000
Designed
above
Berlin Figure Ground Map
The Berlin (Topological) Stoa
This project was created in response to an invitation to participate in an exhibition in 1998 concerning the future of Berlin. A team of six architects collaborated to form the complete proposal, but each architect was responsible for the design of a component building. Each building was situated according to a collaborative urban planning goal. The project became a group testing ground for ideas concerning architecture and the city.
Juried Awards
Exhibitions and Installations
Publications: Books
Citations
1999 The Architectural League of New York, Emerging Voices Award
1995 University Art Museum, Berkeley, California.
2003 Having Heard Mathematics, by Michael Bell; New York: The Monacelli Press. In Press
1991 San Francisco Chronicle, “Number Crunch”, May 16.
Essays by Michael Bell
San Francisco Chronicle, “Young Architects Win Competition,” April 14, p. 39.
1990 Architecture California, AIA Journal, Ca., “Space Replaces Us”, Volume 15, Number 2, Fall. p. 39 – 47.
San Francisco American Institute of Architects News (SF, AIA) April, “3x3+9=5?” Review. P. 6.
1989 Steelcase Showroom, New York,
Publications in Journals
1992 AES Gallery Cafe Talks, 1992. Unpaginated.
30 Under 30, group show includes: The Blue House, the Topological Stoa.
1992 2AES Gallery Cafe Talks, 1992. Unpaginated.
1991 Concrete, The University of California at Berkeley, “The Frame Labors Indeed: 3 Footnotes on the Collapse of Plastic Space,” p. 2 - 3.
LEF Foundation, St. Helena, California.
Endspace: Michael Bell and Hans Hofmann. Installation.
Award for essay published in Architecture California, A.I.A. Journal.
1993 The Contract SF Design Center 3x3+9, installation, group show includes:
1990 3x3+9. Competition for installation sponsored by the San Francisco/Los Angeles Chapters of the American Institute of Architects and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Topological Stoa, the Blue House, David Lyman House and Gallery.
30 Under 30. Interiors Magazine & Steelcase Design Partnership, NY. Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA). Architectural Design Award for The Berlin Wall Project, with L. Lerup, A. Lao, M. Palmore, T. Rempel.
1993 The San Francisco Contract Design Center 3x3+9, installation, group show includes: Topological Stoa, the Blue House, David Lyman House and Gallery. 1988 Newman’s Land, AEDES Gallery, Berlin: Denkmal—oder—Denkmodell? Berlin. Group show with Lars Lerup, Michael Palmore, Antonio Lao. Tim Rempel,
1991 Concrete, “The Framze Labors Indeed: 3 Footnotes on the Collapse of Plastic Space,” p. 2 - 3.
Metropolis, May. “3x3+9=5” Review.
The Berlin (Topological) Stoa
above
Perspective drawing: New Man’s Land.
left
Site Two: Checkpoint Charlie
center right
Site Two: The Brandenburger Tor
No Man’s Land
The Berlin (Topological) Stoa
Dimensions and proportions for the Berlin Stoa were transcribe from the Stoa of Attalos; column proportions, height and length were maintained in the design of the Berlin Stoa. “The long, shed-like building which the Greeks called a “stoa” and the Romans a “porticus” consisted in its simplest form of a roof supported by solid walls at the back and ends and by a row of columns in front. Such a structure, involving a minimum of outlay, provided shelter against rain and sun while permitting the movement of air so welcome in summer...the primary function of the stoa was to provide shelter for large numbers of people. Stoas were commonly found in sanctuaries and market places...from “The Stoa of Attalos II in Athens,” The American School of Classical Studies at Athens. The stoa plan depicted here is that of the Stoa at Attalos; it takes its name from the King of Pergamon, Attalos II. It stood from approximately 150 B.C. till 267 A.D..
above, left The Stoa of Attalos II as rebuilt, the Acropolis is in the background (1959) ...from “The Stoa of Attalos II in Athens,” The American School of Classical Studies at Athens. above, right Reference image: Paul Klee, “rhythmic line”: a precursor to the Berlin Stoa plan.
Menger Sponge: The Topological Stoa is a continuous surface—folding into itself as a continous membrane.
right
above Model View from Front: Seeing Through: Stoa Room/Oculus
The Berlin (Topological) Stoa
left above
Plan Drawings: ground level.
left below
Elevation Drawing.
above
Model View from Front: Entry Platform at lower center.
right above
Section Drawings through oculus
right below
Section Drawings through elevator
Model View from back: Detail of model depicts stair-tower and elevator. above
plan drawing, second level
The Berlin (Topological) Stoa
What was once a single city with a center is now two cities divided by a wall. Where historically city walls are protective, the Berlin Wall severs rather than surrounds. In this urban design project the wall with its barbed wire cornice is transformed: it is divided down its center then dragged across “No Man’s Land,” like a rake erasing the past. A neutral zone is established; a plan degree zero. By this act two Berlin walls are created and a new city center...a new site for new architecture. Building types are scattered throughout the new belt like courtyard that traces its way through the Berlin. Topological buildings such as the new Stoa and typological buildings transformed by the new space are placed opposite each other. the buildings stand like citizens. They comprehend themselves in their relation to the others. The building and their subject gaze across the distance to each other. Berlin is a city divided. What was once a single city with a center is now two cities divided by a wall. Where historically city walls are protective, the Berlin Wall severs rather than surrounds. In this urban design project the wall with its barbed wire cornice is transformed: it is divided down its center then dragged across “No Man’s Land,” like a rake erasing the past. A neutral zone is established; a plan degree zero. By this act 2 Berlin walls are created and a new city center...a new site for new architecture. Building types are scattered throughout the new belt like courtyard that traces its way through the Berlin. Topological buildings such as the new Stoa and typological buildings transformed by the new space are placed opposite each other. the buildings stand like citizens. They comprehend themselves in their relation to the others. The building and their subject gaze across the distance to each other.
(text by Michael Bell, Lars Lerup, Antonio Lao, Bill Green, Tim Rempel and Michael Palmore.
Context Axonometric drawing: Detail of site axonometric depicts Stoa in context of other building proposed for No-Man’s Land. Platforms: A. Lao, Iron Duck Chair: Lerup, Bell, Lao, Green, Love Housing: L. Lerup, Berlin Stoa: M. Bell, Machina Combinatoria: M. Palmore.
right
above
Group Installation AEDES Gallery, West Berlin