Ruin Academy_Drawings

Site Plan

Ruin Academy / Jong-Hua Road "Urban Core" Block (JUT Foundation), Taipei, Taiwan

1st Floor - "Archive"

Blown off basement with olive trees, pile of top-soil with taro, fire-place, 6 inch holes through wall, public walkway, archive.

2nd Floor - "Dormitory"

Sleeping - Working units for 4 students, kitchen, vegetable garden, bamboo, 6 inch holes through ceiling and floor.

3rd Floor - "Professor's Deck"

- Bed on wheels, kitchen, bamboo, 6 inch holes through ceiling and floor

4th Floor - "Lounge"

- Fire-place, stage, bamboo, 6 inch holes through floor.

5th Floor - "Sauna"

- Public sauna, chill-out room, showers with taro+bamboo, white gravel, wild tree, 6 inch hole in the floor.

Section

Cross-section

Drawings Marco Casagrande

Ruin Academy: Cello

About this ruin. WE made the ruin. It did not happen due to some escape, giving up or forgetting. Or did it? Maybe we forgot the forgetting. Maybe we gave up “architectonic control” and let nature in. Maybe we ruined the house in order to escape to the jungle.

Ruin Academy:
- Is it a He or a She?
- What kind of animal?
- What instrument?

A. Not sure about the sex yet, but the ruin is sexy. Sexier than a house.
B. More like some mind than an animal. Or if an animal and a vegetable could make babies, so maybe one of those.
C. Cello


It feels like we are writing new memories to the city - new stories. Ruin Academy is an architectonic sketch-book already impregnated by subconscious sweat of the surrounding Taipei. This is more a void than a volume. An open corner in the city…and the corners are windy.


How to escape academic control? How to get over disciplines? How to find the Local Knowledge Professors? How to high-light the hidden orders of the city…the urban acupuncture? How to determine the energies that the composting processes of Taipei are producing; and how to use these energies? How to make the city and the river meet?


The anarchist grandmothers, the anarchist gardeners who are cultivating the forgotten corners of the city: they are holding some keys. We have a sauna in the Ruin Academy. Soon we are ready to start operating with the granny-power - sauna fresh.


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Ruin Academy: Casagrande Laboratory with JUT Foundation for Arts and Architecture
Cello: Emily Chang 張立青
Photos: AdDa