LABLAB

A research and design think tank dedicated to understanding the social, ecological and spatial transformations in the Nordic and Baltic Sea Region.
LABLAB explores the potential of linking theory and practice to identify and work within new classifications and configurations of the built and unbuilt environments.

By Martina Doehler-Behzadi, Director of IBA Thüringia.

This essay is based on the lecture given by Martina Doehler-Behzadi at Umeå Architecture School the 27th of  March 2019. The lecture is part of LABLAB:s public program Hinterlands +, funded by the Goethe institut.

LABLAB in cooperation with Goethe Institut.

Conditions of Swedish and German countryside(s).

LABLAB at Färgfabriken Contemporary Art Centre, Stockholm.

What is a landscape? By asking this question, we want to create the foundation for a language that reviews and explores our understanding of the term “landscape” – because it is a term in constant re:imagination and transformation.

While a radical urbanization proceeds in most places around the world, data shows an opposite but gradual development in Europe. However, it seems that people are not moving back to the countryside, but rather to an urbanized countryside.

How we will plan and design for the urbanized countryside[s] will obviously become a key question. In order to investigate this question LABLAB initiates a design research on the historical, contemporary and future conditions of the village.

 

The Nordic Hazardlands workshop invites participants to look beyond the well known factors of causality  in order to broaden the field of inquiry  to include archaic myths of origin, the tradition of native peoples and local customs, forms of internal colonisation and government programs for immigrant resettlements, as well as historic logging, mining and industrial practices. The Nordic regions have over the centuries cultivated strong independent survival practices, and these customs and updated practices may offer clues for improved and critical strategies for more sensitive development.

LABLAB initiates a cooperation with Frances Hsu at Texas University Architecture Department on the impact of food industry on rural and urban development.

Staging Countryside
Magazines still continues to be a relevant factor in countrysizing countryside.