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Practical Matter

Waste No Food: Circular Food Systems

Words by Jana Perković

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Practical Matter

Global Garbage:
Where Does Our Recycling Go?

Words by Michele Acuto

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Living Not Decorating

Hiroshi, Haruna, Yuri & Noriko: A
Dreamy Space for Weary Heads

Words by Emily Hutchinson
Photos by Masao Nishikawa

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Practical Matter

Circular Thinking: Zero-Waste Buildings

Words by Jeff McAllister and Keith Little

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Eyes

Russia: The
Long Way Back

Words and photos by Vlad Doudakliev

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Latest Articles

Practical Matter

Global Garbage: Where Does Our Recycling Go?

In our latest instalment of the ‘Circular Thinking’ series, we are going global. Where does our waste go? Does our recycling even get recycled? And what has China got to do with it? Professor of international urban politics at University of Melbourne, Michele Acuto, is here to help. The travels of trash are far from a […]

Practical Matter

Circular Thinking: Zero-Waste Buildings

‘Circular economy’ is a fancy term for an industry that produces no waste. In practice, it means making products and materials more efficiently, and reusing them for as long as possible. This week we begin our series on Circular Thinking, looking at what circular economy might mean in practice. First off: buildings. No other human activity creates as much waste as construction – but what can architects and builders do about it? Our friends from Arup – the engineering masterminds – guide us through their research into zero-waste buildings.

Living not Decorating

Hiroshi, Haruna, Yuri & Noriko: A Dreamy Space for Weary Heads

Art curator Hiroshi and food designer Haruna Ito live with their baby Yuri and friend Noriko in a magical share house near Shinjuku, where one bedroom has been turned into an art installation for visitors to stay in. In our special two-part 'shared living' series, Emily Hutchinson looks around the world for some of the most inventive ways of living closer together. This story is one of many collected in Emily's new book Shared Living: Interior Design for Rented and Shared Spaces.

Eyes

Russia: The Long Way Back

This summer, architect Vlad Doudakliev shipped his car to Vladivostok, from where he travelled overland across Russia with his dad, all the way to his native Bulgaria. In this special two-part travelogue for Assemble Papers, Vlad takes us through the vast, diverse landscapes of the largest country in the world.

Eyes

Brooke Holm: Sand Sea

Photographer Brooke Holm shot her new series of works in the Namib Sand Sea, the oldest desert in the world. Seemingly never-ending sand dunes stretch for over 3 million hectares in this UNESCO World Heritage Site, a unique ecosystem that survives mostly on condensation from the fog that rolls in off the coastline every morning. Namibia is one of the countries most vulnerable to climate change, and the first write climate change policies into their constitution.

Stories

Latest Happenings

Happenings

Art + Climate = Change 2019

When: 23 April - 2 June 2019
Where: Around Melbourne and regional Victoria
How much: See website for details
More info: Art + Climate = Change

Happenings

Fashion Revolution Week

When: 22 - 28 April
Where: Locations across Melbourne & Sydney
How much: See website for details
More info: Fashion Revolution

Discover ways to minimise the human and environmental cost associated with fashion

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Happenings

Because home ownership should be more than just a dream

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Issue 10 — Out Now

Launch party

In Print

#10: Housing

In partnership with MPavilion, issue #10 addresses one of the most pressing global concerns. From ‘housing first’ approaches in Finland, to housing associations in the Netherlands and innovative financing in Melbourne, we look at how humans will live in the future, and how we can ensure that all citizens are provided for.

Editorial

AP#10: Housing

Who gets to decide how we all reside? Jana Perković and Eugenia Lim introduce the tenth print issue of Assemble Papers, dedicated to housing for all, and published in partnership with MPavilion.

Assemblage

Carme Pinós: A Social Constellation

For Catalan architect Carme Pinós, form follows social responsibility – beauty is a by-product of an architecture that places people, memory, context and physics first. Pinós's Mediterranean sensibility unfolds in her 2018 MPavilion commission here in Melbourne. She speaks to our editor Jana Perković about how buildings express their structure and architecture as an act of humanity.

Eyes

Real Estate Boom House

Some years during the Spanish real estate boom, which began in the mid-1980s and ended abruptly in 2008, more than 500,000 houses were being constructed annually all over Spain. In the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis, a photography and design project by Lluís Alexandre Casanovas Blanco, architect, curator and scholar at Princeton University, examines what is left.

Assemblage

Jack Self: Scepticism & Imagination

It is late 2018, and we're so embedded in a system of global capitalism that at times it seems inevitable. But like any human construct, it is not. Jack Self is an architect, editor and the director of the Real Foundation, a cultural institute that explores alternative models of housing ownership and design of project finance. His mission? To end capitalism.

Blueprint City

The Great Disruption: Proptech & ‘Generation Rent’

Move over, Airbnb: here comes 'proptech'. The new generation of apps goes beyond the dubiously-named 'sharing economy' to affect real estate in far more complex ways, from virtual bond deposits to micro-investing. Alexis Kalagas reports from London, where proptech is booming - together with the property market.

Blueprint City

Saskia Sassen: The Limits of the Material

Prof Saskia Sassen spent her career researching the processes underpinning globalisation. Her early work described the rise of the new class of high-paid consultants, concentrating in a few 'global cities' and displacing ordinary families. Lately, she has turned her attention to the global housing boom. How have buildings become a speculative asset class? In conversation with Jana Perković, she explains what has happened since the Global Financial Crisis.

Perspectives

Robin Hood Gardens

One of the more controversial displays at the 2018 Venice Biennale of Architecture was V&A Museum's decision to display a salvaged piece of the facade of the Robin Hood Gardens estate, rescued from demolition that started earlier in the year. UK-based architecture writer Owen Hatherley recounts the history of the building and the battle for its preservation. Is there a better way to engage with the historical legacy of public housing?

This Vertical Life

Unfolding Pavilion

Many people don't know that there is social housing throughout Venice: in the 1970s, the city embarked on an ambitious process of commissioning architecturally significant public housing projects that artfully blend into the city's medieval urban fabric. Possibly the best of them is Gino Valle's project in Giudecca, which featured in Unfolding Pavilion at the 2018 Venice Biennale of Architecture. Jana Perković spoke to the curators about why social housing still matters.

Blueprint City

Amsterdam Social Housing: A Primer

The residential variety across Amsterdam city is stunning. Some rents are high, but many more are controlled, kept affordable by non-profit associations that deliver the bulk of housing in the Netherlands. From the expressive brickwork of early 20th-century workers’ dwellings to a new generation of refugee-inclusive youth housing, Amelyn Ng explores the system of affordable housing allocation in Amsterdam.

Eyes

The Architecture of Least Resistance

Photographer Tom Ross has a keen eye for capturing architecture and its atmospheres. He's noticed Geelong, his former stomping ground, transform into Australia’s fastest-growing regional centre. Urbanisation has hit the Surf Coast, bringing a property and population boom and growing inequity. He reflects on the changing corridor between Melbourne and Geelong: the urban, suburban and peri-urban.

Blueprint City

How Finland is Ending Homelessness: Juha Kaakinen

In the 1980s, Finland's homeless rates were equivalent to Australia's today: 0.4%. Today, homelessness is all but eradicated, thanks to an innovative approach called 'Housing First'. Juha Kaakinen, CEO of Y-Foundation, Finland's largest non-profit housing provider, explains to Cat McGauran how the Finnish approach arose from the belief that 'everybody should be cared for'.

Assemblage

Assemble: A Contradictory Space

The British architectural collective Assemble (no relation) was founded in 2010, at the height of the Global Financial Crisis, to explore other ways of doing architecture. Today, they are a force to be reckoned with, reforming both the built environment and the art world. Cat McGauran caught up with Jane Hall and Audrey Thomas-Hayes from the Turner Prize-winning collective.

Practical Matter

Redesigning the Housing Market

Is housing really best left to market alone? Turns out there are many models for financing housing. Urban designer Andy Fergus shares his research into alternative housing models, from for-profit to non-profit. Choose your own adventure!

Assemblage

Ryue Nishizawa / SANAA: The Artificial Belongs to Nature

Based in Tokyo, SAANA is a multi award-winning architecture practice, renowned for designs that are simple, yet exude a profound sense of purpose. In 2010, architect Keith Little took a highly coveted intern position at SAANA, where he learnt about the philosophy that shapes Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa's practice. Now, he returns to a dialogue with his former mentor.

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