Hi. I´m Andi Schmied. I was born in Budapest, Hungary.
I graduated in design (specialized in spatial design) in June 2011.
I studied 4 years, 2007-2011 in ELISAVA School of Design, Pompeu Fabra University, where i recieved my Bachelor Degree in Design. Barcelona, Spain.
I studied half year, 2010 spring semester, in Colman Academic Studies, Interior Design Faculty, Rishon Le Tsyon, Tel Aviv, Israel.
Currently I am at the Bartlett school of architecture, University College London, undergoing a MArch in Urban Design,
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GAME OVER
A 7 minutes movie explaining the nature of Votanikos, my site in Athens 02.
PACE OF TIME
Getting to my final concept of my site my main element is time, and things that can be changed during those periods 03.
WWW.NEWBABYLON.COM
An essay, comparing the logic of virtuality and the Urban Utopia of Constant 04.
PATCHWORK CITY
Conceptual design of a fragment of a city 05.
HONG KONG SCHIZOPHRENIA
My first approach to Hong Kong, as a mixed, schizophrenic place in terms of it’s identity 06.
OCEAN PARK - WHERE HAPPINESS LIVES
A photo serial portraying the special state of mind one gets in, in Ocean Park 07.
(ALMOST) 24/7
A photo serial exploring the spaces of the porters in Wong Chuk Hang’s industrial road 08.
CONSTURCT HONG KONG SOFTWARE®
Videogame based movie of the external forces that have shaped Hong Kong’s society 09.
SPACE SYNTAX
A design proposal and its Space Syntax analysis for Battersea, London after a 3 days workshop 10.
THE CITY OF LONDON
a 5 minutes movie after a 5 days workshop with David Graham Shane of The City Of London, an International financial center 11.
IT’S ALL ABOUT TIME
it’s all about time is a TV-show hosted by the London Bridge that presents the important characters of London’s history, important friends of the Bridge
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http://cargocollective. com/urbanschizophrenia/Game-Over
Game Over
A 7 minutes movie explaining the nature of Votanikos, my site in Athens
Votanikosness explores the very bizarre nature of one of Athens’s most central, oldest and poorest neighborhoods and tries to exaggerate the acting forces of its inner logic until a point of creating a different way of interaction with the environment. Votanikosness presents a world of constant and dynamic movement and changes where the ruins become elements of possible spaces and instead of a steady death, spaces would appear and disappear, be constructed and deconstructed in a constant loop. The project opposes itself to a static understanding of life where history is lived as a pure imaginary without the possibility of its modification and -thus always leaving traces of them- would play with the destruction of such. In this section I made a small catalogue of the changes that happens in Votanikos, related to it’s time factor and change provocator.
“Beautiful as the encounter of a toilet paper factory with a bunch of dogs in an army base.”
Pace of time
Getting to my final concept of my site my main element is time, and things that can be changed during those periods
After getting deeper in knowing my site I identified 4 elements, forces of powers that helped me in getting to my final concept. On one hand I got back to my starting point, to the analysis of mental states and to state the fact that aw city is what the minds in it are. As a conclusion public space is where these ideas clash. In Votanikos the feeling of hopelessness is really strong and a real change could be jsut made if the motivations, wills of people would be changed. As an urban designer I analyzed the four forces of power I have found most important, and analyzed the paces of time they make changes in their inner logic. First I analyzed the movement of dogs, that led me to the pace of time being a second or seconds. The pace of time as a second. The second force of power are the factories, that changes their environment in terms of a day. In the morning they start to work emit steam that covers all the neighbourhood and changes it and at night the “fall asleep” and let the sky be clean. The third elements are the private-public spaces that appear and disappear along the days-weeks, such as a loundry drying on the street, a barbecue that is set for three days, or an arrangment of a collection of sofas where people interact. The last element from the site that I wanted to take in account is the huge leftover of the construction of the stadium and the shopping-mall-they have stopped the construction, but have left the cranes as a symbolical act expression of territory posession. It is just a huge space without any considerable changes except the one of the plants growing all over the site. I related this pace of change to year - years as the dynamic of a growing plant can not even be percieved by a human eye. After this analysis I related all of these paces of time to a certain change in the human mental process, reflecting on the kind of changes and interventions I want to make in Votanikos. Dogs- Seconds- Mood. Within few second by an unexpected act or environmental change the mood of people can be changed. Factory - Day- Will, Motivation. A day is the pace of time within what one can get motivated, excited about something. And it is also the pace of time within which this will and motivation can die. Public-Private spaces -Days/Weeks - Habits. In terms of weeks a habit of one can be changed and changed back. Construction site - Year/Years - In year-years the way of thinking and acting of a person can be changed. In this pace of time you can not
Matter of seconds
In Votanikos dogs on the street are as usual elements as people. On the other hand street dogs usually represent chaos, disorganization and bad economic situation. For someone who is coming from another place dogs on the street are an element of fear because of their unpredictableness. A dog -or a bunch of dogs- can appear and disappear in matter of seconds and change their environment completely. In this .gif I wanted to present the “random� and fast pace of appearance and disappearance of dogs, as a force of power.
MATTER OF A DAY
Since the site is partly an industrial site but the factories that are still in use - many of them are abandoned - are really outdated in terms of technology. They work in an unsustainable and pollutive way. Every morning when the sun comes up they start to emit steam which covers all the sourrounding creating a virtual layer of clouds in the air. When the day finishes and the factories close the steam dissappears as if it would have never been there. This dynamic shows how time could be understood as a day, and how changes and loops are happening during a day.
One of the first very striking symptoms of the blurred boundries in Votanikos were the arrangments of public spaces I have found. They both looked like and the way people socialized in it would be what consider private spaces, living rooms, kitchens, laundries. These spaces were constituted by some abandoned sofas, chairs, that even though their state is bad, people would use it, have their lunch on it, socialize in it. This fact made me think that exagerating this affect, and playing with these elements new spaces could be created but purely according to the logic of the existing space, according to “Votanikosness�.
MATTER OF DAYS -WEEKS Votanikos has a really strong sense of community - both on the residential site, and what the factory workers represent. Sometimes a small restaurant appears for an hour, or a public living room of coexisting for several weeks. After an analysis of real existing spaces that are in constant dynamism and changes I started to play with the elements that exists on these sites. A “public living rrom�, a pop up restaurant, two neighbors houses where the common walls had a hole in between, etc. These movements and changes represent the days to weeks as a pace of change. What happens if I exchange these elements? What happens if I make the changes faster or slower? Would it create new kind of spaces for the public environments?
On the site you also can find a construction site where they were supposed to build the new stadium for a Greek football team and a shopping mall. On this place nothing is happening. Next to the movementless cranes the only movement is the slow growth of grass and plants on the soil that was meant to have another function. This movement represents changes throughout years.
MATTER OF A YEAR - YEARS
www.newbabylon.com An essay, comparing the logic of virtuality and the Urban Utopia of Constant
My essay is about the new paradigms of the 21st century and especially about how the logic of virtuality affects our lives and how at the same time it should shape our physical space. I compare this world with Constant Nieuwenhuys’s utopian city proposal first exhibited in 1974, the New Babylon, because of the similarities in the way they work and the way they makes us function. At the same time the virtual world does not yet exists on a material level, and New Babylon does not exist on a virtual space.
http://cargocollective.com/urbanschizophrenia/new-babylon
Patchwork city
A conceptual proposal for a fragment of an ideal city - A Manifesto as an urban designer
Our relation with virtuality have radically changed in the past decades. Virtuality have always existed -dreaming, reading a book- but with internet we took it to a material level. Technological invents of previous periods of the history of humanity were always an extension of our physical being -to hit harder, to get farther, etc. - but the ones of the late 20th and of the 21st Century are an extension of our mind. Leaving aside our physical reality we are no longer living in a world ruled by geopolitics, and we are not that attached to the ground in our function, therefore we have passed our physical boundaries and living more on an intellectual level, being able to be anywhere, anytime – virtually. This fact questions the definition of being. Are our physical boundaries real boundaries? Cities have been shaped throughout all the history and do not reflect on this detachment of our geographical location; in my project I want to reflect on how a city can be a part of our intellectual reality, and at the same time of our physical container.
CITY IS WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU WHILE YOU’RE BUSY GOING FROM ONE PLACE TO THE OTHER.
In my ideal city we all should constantly feel intellectual challenges and inspiration as if we would be tourists all the time, but being physically a part of it while being a part of a global world. I focus on three main concepts; freedom (freedom of movement, constant change and accessibility that the virtual era suppose), diversity (that is a logical output of freedom) and organic, natural chaos (that is the logical output of diversity).
IN THE CITIES WE SHOULD ALL HAVE AN INDIVIDUAL SPACE , A “BUBBLE” WHERE WE CAN DEVELOP OUR OWN INDIVIDUAL THINKING AND FROM WHERE WE CAN TAKE THESE IDEAS TO THE PUBLIC SPACE.
THE PUBLIC SPACE IS THE PLATFORM WHERE OUR INDIVIDUAL IDEAS CAN INTERACT CLASH SHAPING THE CITY AS A REPRESENTATION OF THESE “CONVERSATIONS”.
Hong Kong schizophrenia my first approach to Hong Kong, as a mixed, schizophrenic place in terms of it’s identity
For our first tutorial we had to realize what aspect of Hong Kong interest us the most. I started to investigate about migration flows and the legislation system. First of all I have found very interesting that Hong Kong have been the American dream for many Asian nations, such as the Philippines, many Chinese provinces and other more poor countries that have caused massive migration inflows in the country. On one of my model I wanted to represent the network that work in between these different nationalities on the physical level in Hong Kong.
ON THIS MODEL I TRIED TO PLAY WITH DIFFERENT, CONTRADICTIVE TIPOLOGIES TO GIVE THE FEELING OF SCHIZOPHRENIA
“ONE COUNTRY, TWO SYSTEMS”·
ON THIS MODEL I TRIED TO EXPERIENCE PHISICLY HOW THE NEW IMMIGRANTS OF HONG KONG RELATE TO EACH OTHER
GLOBAL POWER SOURROUNDING HONG KONG
LOCAL POWER WITH A STRONG IDENTITY AND HONGKONG BEING DETACHED FROM IT
On this model I wanted to experiment and show how Hong Kong is in between in a very stable and strong local identity which is the Chinese identity it has, (95% of the population of Hong Kong is originally Chinese people) but how at the same time due to their history are already detached from their roots. As another force that they are in contact with they are surrounded by a really strong global, more neutral power that has no own cultural identity, but still it shapes Hong Kong, and exactly this is the power that is responsible for this detachment of the ground Hong Kong experiences.
WONG CHUK HANG Analysis of South Hong Kong Islands areas mental states out of “reality’
Ocean Park where happiness lives A photo serial portraying the special state of mind one gets in, in Ocean Park
Ocean Park (香港海洋公園) is Hong Kongs biggest and most popular amusement park - more than Disenyland - since 1977. It is very diconnected from the city center, located in South Hong Kong Island and all the visitors are coming to this area just for this attraction. I went to Ocean Park to discover and portray the special state of mind it gets people into. Amusement parks are about a very restricted form of fun, where you are told so how exactly are you supposed to enjoy yourself, how exactly are you supposed to take the pictures of yourself, which are the interesting spots, what you should laugh about and what kind of experiences you should take home with you. It is somehow a collective form of state of mind with the lack of any individualization. These spaces raise questions of how much activities in spaces should be restricted and how much you should be just let free and find your own ways to discover what is memorable for you, what is worthy to photograph, which already involves a process of digestion and emotional interaction between the individual and the space.
BLUE PINK RED GREEN YELLOW PURPLE RED YELLOW ORANGE
(almost) 24/7
A photo serial exploring the spaces of the porters in Wong Chuk Hang’s industrial road
(almost) 24/7 is a project that portrays the spaces where the porters of Wong Chuk Hang (黃竹坑), one of Hong Kong’s industrial and residential towns, are spending most of their time. Wong Chuk Hang is a disconnected area from central Hong Kong, due to the lack of an efficient public transport system and lack of development. Wong Chuk Hang grew steadily until World war II and just after in the 50’s and 60’s, when industry and commerce developed thanks to the low elevation and broad space. For the same reason, in 1977, the only attraction for visitors of the area, Hong Kong’s most popular amusement park that is totally detached from it’s physical context, Ocean Park (香港海洋公園), opened to give a different, fake reality to the neighbourhood and fill it with people putting themsleves in an altered mental state for an afternoon and then leave. On the other hand there are the real inhabitants of the area; Wong Chuk Hang road is the main road where all the industrial buildings stand. All of these buildings have a special small place at the entrance where its guard sits, “lives” from Monday to Saturday, 6 AM to 9 PM. Most of the porters have been guarding the very same building for more than 25 or 30 years; they’ve lived most of their lives in the same square metres or in some cases just on a chair. (almost) 24/7 explores these spaces and shows the loneliness and the individuality of their inhabitants. All the collection represents 35 different spaces.
After a while I became especially interested in Hong Kong, as an artificial landscape, and I made investigation of it’s reasons and of spaces that physically you can experience this phenomena. Hong Kong had been shaped as it is thanks to the British and Chinese influences, and as being Britain’s colony in the south of China for Britain it became really important as a platform of power demonstration, a platform where they can show to China and to the rest of the world how their system works better, and how a Chinese city became so different because of their presence. On the other hand since it became part of China again it is also important for China to keep it’s economical power and influence.
“CONGRATULATIONS. YOU GET 75 POINTS AND YOU CAN CONSTRUCT A NEW LAKE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ISLAND.”
construct Hong Kong softwareÂŽ
A videogame that represents how Hong Kong’s cultural landscape has been shaped
“CONGRATULATIONS. YOU SAVED YOUR SLICED PEACHES. YOU CAN HANG CHRISTMAS LIGHT ON A CANTONESE RESTAURANTS SHOPWINDOW.”
In Construct Hong Kong software®, a 5 minutes movie I wanted to present how Hong Kong was a toy of these two big powers and how many of the physical influences on the ground itself came thanks to these continuous both ideological and physical fights. I gave a video game-structure to the movie, where the players are China and Britain and the base –that they constantly ignore – is Hong Kong. I used both small effects that happened in the city (ex. When Britain gets points it can put Christmas light on a Cantonese restaurants shop window, when China gets points it can hang cabbage lamps, etc.), carefully taking in account which power have built the mentioned buildings, lakes, etc.
http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=2xZd3jtjzOw
“NOW BRITAIN HAS TO LEAVE THE ISLAND”
SUICIDE SPOT DIRECTLY CONNECTED TO THE SOCIAL HOUSING
FLOATING MOSQUE ISLAND
THE WORLDS BIGGEST MC’DONALDS
A MIDGET VILLAGE / SAFARI
A 7320 METERS HIGH VULCANO
OFFICE SPACES
SOCIAL HOUSING MIXED WITH LUXURY HOUSING MARKET - EXISTING ON THE SITE ORIGINALLY
FLOWER MARKET - EXISTS ORIGINALLY ON THE SITE
A RESIDENTIAL VILLAGE
Space Syntax
A design proposal and its Space Syntax analysis for Battersea, London after a 3 days workshop
Space syntax is a software developed at UCL. The general idea is that spaces can be broken down into components, analyzed as networks of choices, then represented as maps and graphs that describe the relative connectivity and integration of those spaces. After understanding how the software works we had to redesign Battersea, and the area around the powerstation to one that would integrate it more to the flwo of London. We had to check it in the software and affirm its feasability.
the city of London
a 5 minutes movie after a 5 days workshop with David Graham Shane of The City Of London, an International financial center
‘City of London’ is a 5 minutes movie representing the existing contrasts and contradictions of one of the world’s famous financial hubs and symbol of capitalism, the district of The City Of London. David Graham Shane taught us about the theories of enclaves and heterotopias that exist in cities and we were to discover them. Enclaves are the dominant models or structures of a city, of a neighbourhood and heterotopias are the differences of it. The city of London, as said before, is the symbol and representation of the capitalist system, a district with a really high density in terms of people working there, and moving around during the day(both tourists and people working there), but with a really low density of people actually living there. Just now, the movement of occupy London are trying to change what The City represents. They are against its paradigms. They are against capitalism, against high-priced land, and they decided to move there, make it lively during the night, contradict its principles, and try to destruct it as an ideology. In our movie we wanted to represent the tensions in between the very fabric of The City and it’s contraposition. As a tool we went to the site, made interviews from both side, tried to find capitalistic elements on the occupy London site (media shootings), anticapitalist elements on the business site (interviews with business people against the way they live) and tried to figure out what’s next.
“WE ARE OUT TO WORK. WE ARE CONTRIBUTING TO THE TAXES. THEY ARE NOT.”
“A LOT OF PEOPLE COME TO LONDON TO SEE SAINT PAULS, NOT TO SEE THAT MESS.”
“THE CITY OF LONDON REPRESENTS AN ANXIOUS ANOMALY WITHIN BRITIAN. IT IS AN AREA OF A COUNTRY NOT OWNED BY THE CITIZENS OF THAT COUNTRY BUT BY COORPORATIONS.”
http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=a8miSy-LdZU&conte xt=C3b8bc63ADOEgsToPDskK Xwg02-BdQiLxH8l-rxy6f
“SOMETIMES WE DO GO OUT AFTER WORK FOR DRINKS. BUT ONLY UNTIL NINE OR SOMETHING.”
it’s all about time it’s all about time is a TV-show hosted by the London Bridge that presents the important characters of London’s history, important friends of the Bridge
A NIGHT TALKS SHOW
It’s all about time is a night talk show where the host, the London Bridge invites as many characters of his own life as he can do, to explain and give a proper impression about how London’s history was shaped. However he planned everything and the TV-set is done properly, there are many unexpected guests interrupting the show. All the guests have prepared a video, that during the conversations goes in the background to explain also visually the discussed period of time. At the end of the show the future comes in and kicks us the Bridge saying that he has no more place in the world.
ROMAN SOLDIER This Itallian creature gets offended by the bridge claiming he is his mother. He tells us about how in roman times people lived in London, repeating Mamma Mia.
PERSONALITIES OF THE PLAY
LONDON BRIDGE
JAMES WORKER ON THE OLYMPIC SITE GEORGE, WORKER OF THE OLYMPIC SITE A worker of the 2012’s Olympics come to the TV-show to explain us about the expectations and the possible impacts the Olympics are going to have on London.
PROFESSOR ABERCROMBIE
THE FUTURE
THE FIRE
CHARLOTTE BRONTE
HANS
Portfolio of Andi Schmied _ March _ 2012