The Academy for Architectural Culture aac in Hamburg was launched by gmp founders Meinhard von Gerkan and Volkwin Marg. Supported by the gmp foundation, the aac offers highly talented young architects worldwide an additional qualification. In 2008, 32 students and graduates from Germany and East Asia took part in the course.

The 116-page book documents the teaching and the accompanying inter-disciplinary cultural program of the Academy for Architectural Culture, with the aim of making the substance of the aac’s work available to a broad public. In 2008, the aac took East Asia as its geographical focus. On the intensive course, a total of three design tasks were set, each task being related to an overarching theme.

The first course was done as teamwork, on the theme of “sustainability”. In order to highlight the pre-eminent importance of climatic conditions for sustainable building, one class designed a building for northern China, the other a building for South China, where the climate is completely different.
 

The second course was an impromptu design on the subject of “Transforming Tradition into Modernity.” The design took a project of the firm of Gerkan, Marg und Partner (gmp) – the planned parliament in Hanoi – as a basis, the task being to design a façade taking Vietnamese tradition into account.

The third course was entitled Icon – Metaphor – Identity, and was intended to show the inherent connection between the emblematic nature of architecture and its local identity. For this, a site in Hamburg’s Port City was chosen, for which an East-West Trading Center had to be designed.

The documentation includes students’ designs and sketches, plus accompanying texts and background material relating to the three tasks and the themes associated with them. The documentation is available for order through the aac:
contact@aac-hamburg.de
Prof. Meinhard von Gerkan (ed.)
aac Academy for Architectural Culture
Documentation 2008
Published by Callwey Verlag
Hardback
116 pages, 120 illustrations
With many drawings and plans
German / English
Format 33 x 20.5 cm
EUR 29.95 / SFr 49.50
ISBN 978-3-7667-1815-0