temporary construction projects play an active role in the testing of invisible architecture. the projects shown here were designed and built by students from oxford brookes, greenwich, and london metropolitan universities. they allow students to test architectural propositions in a physical and social context. they are set up as an event in the public realm. public participation is always a starting point, and leads to predictable and unpredictable consequences.
all the construction work is carried out by a group of students who have no budget and need to seek materials donated by manufacturers for their research. in some cases they are sponsored and in other cases they reuse discarded materials. the students work collaboratively through discussion, negotiation, exploration and testing. this challenges the notion of the architect as an individual author, which is felt to be an outdated approach to even the most modest project. group commitment, mutual respect and reliability became essential.
the constructions generally lasted only for a few days or even hours in the public realm and were subsequently dismantled, often rebuilt elsewhere for another purpose, a disappearing archive of architectural speculations.