raumlaborberlin: Water Works - in the Flow of Making

raumlabor, or “space laboratory” in German, has continued to create flexible, open-ended spaces for interaction in highly constrained modern cities through participatory, hands-on approaches such as building communal baths from makeshift materials for everyone to enjoy and setting up community kitchens where people can cook and engage in conversation. Their activities have been highly acclaimed, particularly in Europe, earning numerous awards in architecture, design, and theater, including the Golden Lion at the 2021 International Architecture Exhibition—La Biennale di Venezia — for their representative work ”Floating University”.

In their first exhibition in Tokyo, they will explore the potential of “water”— a theme they have been working on for many years. Ahead of the exhibition, they held a workshop with students from the Shibaura Institute of Technology School of Architecture. The workshop involved combining inflatable dunnage bags (transportation cushioning material) with bamboo they encountered in Japan, untangling and navigating various regulations governing maritime use, and staging a performance on the deck of a barge—an unprecedented form of intervention in Tokyo Bay. By intentionally avoiding architectural frameworks and directly connecting the body to the city, this initiative not only fosters dialogue among people but also creates ripples that unlock new possibilities for maritime use, projecting alternative visions for cities. Furthermore, as indicated by the exhibition’s subtitle, “in the Flow of Making”, the materials used in the workshops are repurposed in new forms.