new Ground @ the Tempelhofer Co-operative
Working together, connecting with people, and dealing with different scenarios has always been a part of my life. After my graduation from India with a Bachelor’s in Architecture in 2020, I have been keen on exploring various dimensions in the field of design, in the built as well as the natural environment.
I am passionate about urbanism for its widespread impact on people`s everyday lives. The studio brief explores the theme of ‘edge city’ through an investigation of the German city of Berlin, zooming in to a large green space located on the southern edge of the inner city, the Tempelhofer Feld. Berlin might not strike one as an Edge city in the traditional sense—it does not boast a shoreline, straddle a national border, or colonise the outskirts of a conurbation. Its ‘edginess’ lies much deeper, inscribed in the urban imaginary as a city once divided by the Berlin Wall, the boundary between East and West, a place where two ideologies meet and where countercultures thrive.
The lab seeks to learn from Tempelhoferfeld, about the role of the commons in a late capitalist world and about participatory processes and collective city-making. The masterplan tries to create a permanent development that wouldn’t stand in opposition to the urban ecosystem that exists here, but build a kind of community and architecture that would enhance rather than damage this unique place.
The New Ground at the Tempelhofer Feld is a typology of an edge neighbourhood that blurs the lines between indoors and outdoors and creates an interesting play of spaces between and below the built forms.
