Project documentation : here

TN max. 20 

In April 2018 the Floating University Berlin will appear on a magical location next to the Tempelhofer Feld, hidden behind Columbiadamm, sport grounds, graveyards and allotment gardens in the rainwater retention pool of the former airport field. Together with the faculty members of the new university and with students from over 20 universities from Europe, USA and South America we build and research not only the physical structure of the emerging institution but also its social architecture. In this offshore laboratory we research and learn together about visions in urban practice and create an unique experiment in order to re-imagine new ways of living together in urban space. 

Next to the floating assembly hall and a cascade of water filtration, near the bar, the university kitchen will be the main common space of hospitality, production, careful housekeeping and collective knowledge production. Within the space production studio 15-20 students from the UdK build, run, flood and fill with life the kitchen of the Floating University Berlin. During the design-build the students will build and re-shape the kitchen, building, testing and improving it. The 1:1 design process becomes a constant experiment and a hands-on laboratory. 

During the summer term, the UdK space production studio moves from Hardenbergstraße to the Floating University Berlin. The kitchen will not only be a place of cooking but the core element shaping a social practice, it will turn into a place to reflect while building sinks and wastewater infrastructures, a space to question the system behind the production of food, a situation to produce and share knowledge in public. In this context, every Tuesday the kitchen will host a thematic dinner where participants are invited to share and co-produce a moment of hospitality, where UdK students as residents of the floating university act as welcoming hosts to the visiting student groups from many international schools and universities. These moments of exchange allow to mix ideas and start collective imagination processes. 

We will use the kitchen also as a working place. It will be a place for conversations, lectures, discussions, common cookings, but also for analysing and drawing. We will start a thematic survey into the surrounding urban areas through the lens of the kitchen to understand forms of living (and cooking) together and their spatial frameworks. We will work on a design for a better city from the kitchen table.