Tag: skateboarding

 
Everything around us is designed. Someone, some time figured out what it is going to look like, how it is going to work and where it is going to be put. Everything is there for a reason, everything has a purpose.
But what if we start reimagining the purpose of our surroundings? What is the role of the architect if we start using the objects around us differently than what was intended?

 

 
Budapest

As I make my way into the city from the airport, the rickety subway line I’ve been riding so far is replaced by one which reminds me more of a movie poster for Metropolis – huge caves of concrete and glass echoing the footsteps of hundreds of commuters as we collectively make our way up to street level.

Up here, the metropolis is mostly gone. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find a building in the inner city that reaches higher up than the caves of the subway reach down. Instead, the facades looking over the street tell of a kind of lost grandeur – beautiful old buildings worn down through the decades.

I came here with a group, and as always when we travel together, we came here to skate. But this time I am focusing as much on the city as I am on the board.

“Our everyday life in the built environment
is far more complex and intriguing in reality.”

I meet Gergő Hory at Studio Gallery – a small art gallery and studio space a few miles west of the city core. As we speak, Gergő is very thoughtful, it seems he does not want to rush into someone else’s point of view, but would rather consider his own. When I ask him about Budapest though, he smiles and gives me a reference.

“I heard someone describing Budapest as an old lady once – a bit dirty, she’s seen better times. She has a makeup on which is a bit old fashioned, trying to pretend that she has some kind of greatness and elegance but in reality, she is a little bit poor and not as elegant as she wants to be. Some kind of lady who pretends she is a bit younger. Well, if you really want to experience the atmosphere of Budapest you ought to listen to Tamás Cseh. He was like the Hungarian Bob Dylan you know, with one guitar and very very strong verses. The melodies are melancholic but very lively at the same time, listening to it I think you can grasp something of the essence of this city.”

Gergő moved to Budapest in 2007 to study architecture and is now doing a research project while working as an architect. Coming from outside and being a student of architecture, he has been able to see how the city has changed over the years.

“It was very different some five or six years ago, that time I think it was more inspiring than it is today. When I came here the now very famous ruin bars were not so famous. For example, you could walk into places like Szimpla and spend the whole day there brainstorming with your friends and working on projects. Today some of those places are either not existent anymore or they are full of people who go there to party. Tourism has really transformed some of these places.”

Going into it, Gergő knew very little about architecture. He had been interested in art and drawing before, but it was the multidisciplinary nature of architecture that attracted him. During his studies he was also active in a group that did different kinds of interventions in public space, aiming to provoke the city dwellers to take notice of their surroundings.

“When the new metro line was still under construction, the whole city was filled with barricades. It lasted for almost 10 years I think. It was a very haphazard and expensive project which created a very chaotic situation for people. We wanted to make it even more chaotic by building a fake construction site for a fake metro ventilation shaft on a very narrow street. To provoke, and to show people that it is insane what’s going on.”

“As a member of the group I experienced during the projects that the everyday life in the built environment is far more complex and intriguing in reality than in the abstract world of most university design courses.”

After a while, the local residents started protesting and demanded it would be taken down, which in this case was actually the success of the project – to raise awareness about our everyday physical environment.

Perhaps the way we relate to space and what demands we put on our surroundings is not very apparent to us until our surroundings get in our way. But thinking about the others out in the city looking for places to skate, I can see that skateboarding is an exception to this rule.

In skateboarding, the relationship to space changes dramatically; everything around you is either an opportunity or an obstacle, and this can be very different from the experience of a pedestrian or driver – an obstacle walking or driving is many times an opportunity for the skateboarder. This is my strongest relationship with architecture, a physical and experience driven one, one that leaves me with sore legs and hands so dirty it turns the tap water brown when I wash my hands in the evening.

bridge

Talking to Gergő I get another perspective. He is working on a research project about public spaces being used for something entirely different than what was intended. It is something which skaters are very good at.

In my research project, I deal with these types of uses of public spaces which are not intended but just happen informally. I think it’s a great thing. They are things that a designer can hardly cope with sometimes, but you can learn from it, of how people relate to space.

I think architecture is good if it serves many possibilities for different uses, and it is not over-determined, over controlled. However, people’s behaviors will find their way even in the most controlled area, if they want to use it differently they will use it differently. In many cases, it leads to very interesting situations. You know the classic example – there’s a park with designed pathways but users usually don’t use the designed pathway but the shortest path instead.

The phenomenon Gergő is talking about is called Desire Paths, and it is happening everywhere. It is of course often based on a need (“I need to catch the bus”), or maybe a disdain for the alternatives (“no way I am walking all around this thing!”), whereas in skateboarding it is more related to some kind of push and pull play with objects and spaces. What they have in common though is that they both stem from the question what if? What if I could just cut through here? And as with desire paths, once someone answers that question, a hundred others will follow. In a park, this creates a beaten path, in skateboarding, it is how new skate spots are born.

“It’s not about intentional design,
the people themselves design the city.”

Moving through Budapest, I notice one very public display of this behavior. The Freedom Bridge, one of the many bridges connecting the two sides of the city, Buda and Pest, is a massive steel construction used by cars, trams and pedestrians alike to cross the water each day. Except nowadays, not everyone who walks onto the bridge aim to cross it. The construction of the bridge mimics that of a suspension bridge, but in place of wires forming the classic arcs, the Freedom Bridge uses broad plates of steel “hanging” between the two towers. In the middle of the bridge, the structure reaches down low enough for a person to climb, and on warm evenings you’ll find people scattered all over this oversized bench enjoying the last of the sun reflecting off of the river.

“In the case of the Freedom Bridge, I wouldn’t say that it was designed badly just because the designers probably didn’t think about that people will sit on it. It’s not about intentional design, I mean the people themselves design the city.”

Occupants

It seems architecture is not just a building or a structure, it is the relationship between an object and its occupant. The architect and the user both produce architecture — the former by design, the latter by use. However, one object can have an infinite amount of different relationships with different individuals.

This begs the question of authorship. If the purpose of an object or a space is tied to use and not to form, then who really creates the city?

“Use is a challenge for design since the designer cannot have full control over it. No matter how controlled and deterministic a building or a space is, human behavior will find the loopholes and implement unexpected creative uses. This uncontrollable side of use fascinates me.
If a street or a bench is used by a skateboarder for skateboarding, then it is not a bench anymore. But only for that moment.”

I say goodbye to Gergő and head out on the street again. When I get back to the others, I notice something else – not only do they have their own relationship with the objects around them, but they are also actively questioning them, constantly changing them, twisting and turning them, both physically and mentally.

“I think a building is a manifestation of a social network,
a way of thinking and a way of living”

Of course, the most literal change is the marks left behind – chipped curbs and benches, dark marks on walls, ledges, and rails. This is one of the most common explanations as to why we should not skate somewhere – it is the reason we got kicked out from Fővám Tér by the Budapest river side for using the small plateau as a skate obstacle – and it is often put in terms of destruction. But I can’t help but think that it is only half of the explanation, because while the marks (and the sound) may be somewhat provoking, perhaps the bigger provocation is going around saying things are not what they are, that they are not what they should be, and in doing so claiming the space as your own.

“You can say a building is a piece of art, but I am not really interested in that. I think a building is a manifestation of a social network – a way of thinking and a way of living, these patterns of usage then creates then the physical form. To me, this point of view is more interesting. The buildings, they don’t change much, but the usage changes very rapidly.”

In this way of thinking architecture is not solid, as its concrete foundations might suggest, but instead incredibly fluid, existing only in a temporary space between the object, the user, and the way they use it at a specific time. And skateboarding might just be one of the most elaborate displays of it.

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Gergő Hory is an architect living in Budapest. He works at PRTZN – Partizan Architecture, a studio he established in 2013 together with friends Zoltán Major and Péter Müllner. The group that he was a part of during his studies was called Space Detournement Working Group. Gergő is currently doing a research project surrounding the unintended uses of public space.

Video edit, interview, and text by:
Paul Botwid

Illustrations by:
Tom Botwid

Links:
partizan architecture
Space detournement group

What is more important than your friends, even more importantly faraway friends? No a whole lot and that is what this edit delivers. Catching a glimpse of faraway friends slaying some hella cutty spots.

Glad to see Brian Delatorre back on those hills again!

Our very own dog Danny Sommerfeld just launched his website! On his piece of web space, you can take a virtual tour through his PLACE projects, his autonomous works and more. Basically, you will be able to sneak peek into his doggy brain.

To celebrate this event Danny delved into his archives and created something new out of something old, Upcycling his own work so to speak. All jokes aside though we have seen Danny learn a lot and transform his work into something worth looking at longer than your average picture

Click here to visit Danny’s website.

Click here for all the Kaffeezigarette posts.

Over here in our office we have been quietly following the rise of Yardsale and it certainly has been somewhat of a meteoric rise. From their early videos that were in a sense riding the Bronze 56k wave, up until this moment where both their newest collection of products and the video element have risen to a new level. We hope the brand will develop further and keeps surprising us like they did with this one.

Featuring skateboarding by: Curtis Pearl, Sam Sitayeb, Darius Trabalza, Kyle Wilson, Sam Robots and Julian Kimura.

 

Video by Daniel Kreitem.

Augustin Giovannoni back at it again with a new clip. Featuring some good skating by Pierre Subra, Franz Grimm, Joffrey Morel, Yoan Taillandier and more. What a great looking city Paris is.

Photo by Augustine Giovannoni

It is great when people manage to realize their dreams. We first heard about PACCBET (pronounced “rassvet”) when we were out in Moscow working on our “Project Russia” issue. While there we met both Gosha Rubchinskiy and Tolia, the latter told us about their idea to create a new brand next to the Gosha Rubchinskiy brand.

Now we all hear people talking about creating something of their own but not many manage to actually do it.  Especially in the way that PACCBET had its start with an event at Dover Street Market. If you are aware of Gosha’s work you probably know that it is important to him to observe and create his own moods, departing from this point he manages to develop his work. Because Tolia and Gosha have known each other for quite some time they also know how to create and work together, navigating between different moods and in the end creating PACCBET, a brand to watch.

Watch the PACCBET promo bellow and click here to read our “Project Russia” interviews with both Gosha and Tolia.

 

Today we are premiering “Welcome to Franki” a skateboard video by a young filmer out of Frankfurt named Paul Herrmann. The video was shot in Frankfurt, Berlin, Barcelona and the French capital of Paris. It gives you a good insight into what young German skaters are doing (mostly in Frankfurt and Berlin) but it also has some mainstay people like Kai Hillebrand, Valentin Cafuk, and Timo Meiselbach. All in all we back Paul in his efforts and are proud not only to host the online premiere of his new video but also to welcome him into the PLACE squad. From now on Paul will produce a monthly video column for all of you to enjoy but first things first, take a seat, make yourself comfortable, press play and welcome yourself to Franki.

Featuring:

Valentin Cafuk, Tim Griffel, Luis Waterkamp, Max Barthel, Philipp Weil, Lukas Bergener, Clemens Dembinski, Yunus Ergen, Louis Urban, Anton Jäger, Steffen Grap, Daniel Pannemann, Philipp Oehmige, Johannes Schirrmeister, Deniz Bul, Timo Meiselbach, Rahul Rahman, Nils Hansen, Sascha Scharf, Niklas Stube, Ollie Reinicke, Eric Erhardt, Max Obert, Timo Klein, Kai Hillebrandt, Tom Weimar, Martynas Katauskas, Andrius Kohrs, Tim Thomas, Matthias Ellinger, Kert Hollywood, Luis Kohl.

Photo by Max Barthel

As most of you might have noticed, skateboarding officially just turned an Olympic sport and is listed for the Olympic Games 2020 in Tokyo. Since, there are now to opposing camps intensively discussing whether this development is good or bad and the skateboard scene is threatened to break apart, Jenkem Mag trys to bring about peace with a really funny short article about what kind of skateboarding events they can imagine to be part of the Olympic Games.

Click here for the article.

For those of you that are lucky enough to live near some mountains, you might have heard some of your snowboarding homies talk about Antix headwear. Some of you might feel that sometimes when skateboarding and snowboarding come together it did not always have the right result but remember Rick Mccrank, John Cardiel and more recently a great snowboarder/skater by the name of Jed Anderson landed himself a spot on Alex Olson’s Call me 917, so it is possible. Antix seems to be heading in the right direction as well, the Sony VX1000 hat is something that we could envision GX1000 doing as well and it doesn’t get rawer than those hill bombing freaks.

Lucas Puig is known to many of us as one of the best to ever do it, Quartersnacks named him the skater of the decade, Dill said his tricks are like bullets, so Adidas decided to mix his best footage from the last five years seems like a great idea! Even if it is just to refresh your memory, or to find out why those people said what they said about Mr. Puig. As for us, we feel like this redux only solidifies why Lucas is deserving of all that he’s got.

https://youtu.be/Y3u7ZoD0bMQ

After countless votes, a final draft and, Go Skateboarding Day, it was finally time for the new and improved DSS to be opened for the public. To celebrate this event, Nike SB invited everybody to destroy the park (not literally of course). People from all over came to a spot that is named after poop only to find out that the end result was the shit! In the end, your votes ended up creating a real nice location for us all to skate and that is what we did skate!
Hit play and see the lovely mayhem that was the Project DSS opening session.

Next week there will be another event at the DSS, this one will be in connection with the Berlin open so if you enjoy the park had fun at the last event and are down to earn some cash reserve a spot (no registration needed)

Click here.

For those of you who haven’t heard, coming Monday the 27th at 7PM, the new and improved Project DSS will be opened. This event will be celebrated with some great skating by the Civilist, Nike SB, and Skate Mental teams… but at the same time, the event will be a Pizza party! The last couple of weeks the people of Yamato Living Ramps and their volunteers have been working around the clock and in all sorts of weather conditions to present you with a new and updated version of the DSS.
So if you are coming to Berlin for the Bright, are on a summer trip to Berlin or you just want to eat some pizza, come to the DSS next Monday.

Join us, head over to the Facebook event to find out the exact details.

Nike-sb-dss-flyer

Yesterday Nike SB invited the winners of each Project DSS event plus the Nike SB team riders to an exclusive session at Nike Town Berlin. There they had the unique possibility to skate through the huge Nike shopping mall. After closing time, everyone could enjoy dinner while Jan Kliewer from Yamato Living Ramps revealed the outcome of the votings and the construction plans for the expansion of the Dog Shit Spot at Warschauer Straße. The final outcome of your votes and thus the plans for the park will be presented on Go Skateboarding Day next week. So make sure to join the upcoming Nike GSD event! For more information click here.

Photos by Danny Sommerfeld

In cooperation with

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Yesterday the final voting event for Project DSS went down at Ringpark. It was a great success. Once again many locals gathered together to have a say in the construction plan for the expansion of Berlin’s famous DIY spot. While everybody was served cold drinks and grilled food, the session gained momentum and many tricks went down the bigger obstacles of the park. At the end, local hero Max Obert well-deserved could take home the 500€ voucher for Titus Zoopreme, also for the pleasure of his crew mates.

Photos by Danny Sommerfeld

In cooperation with

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Join us in celebrating the #PROJECTDSS and get involved in the expansion of Berlin’s most famous DIY spot.

The session final session will be hosted by Titus Zoopreme at the Ringpark Skatepark, in Berlin the session starts at 6PM. Look forward to an open session with prizes for the best tricks – but most importantly a ballot box where YOU will be able to ultimately decide about the construction of a brand new DSS feature.

Register now to partake in the final session and have a good time with some free BBQ & cold drinks.

Click here to register!

This time it’ll be about the right side of the corner. It’s your last chance. All results and final drafts of PROJECT DSS will be presented at upcoming Go Skateboarding Day, June 21. Use your chance: Get involved in changing YOUR city’s main DIY-spot.

Click here to to our Facebook event.

Head over to the #ProjectDSS site to find out more about the project or to keep updated on all things DSS

#projectdss

Yesterday the third and second last event of Project DSS took place at the outdoor area of the Nike SB Shelter. While eating Berliner Currywurst and enjoying a cold drink everybody was discussing about the selectable obstacles for the expansion of the Dog Shit Spot, which is already under construction. Moreover, some brave ones joint the wild Fox track Race. After partly very close and exciting head to head runs Roland Hirsch could take home the victory plus the 500€ voucher.

For more information about the project, the voting and upcoming events click here.

Photos by Danny Sommerfeld

In cooperation with

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During the last 6 months David Lindberg has been working on this new skateboard / art project with Icelandic skater Sigurdur Páll Pálsson. David informed us that Siggi is newly on flow for Poetic Collective and after seeing this very very nice section it might even be time for a bump up.

https://vimeo.com/168599212

The third event in the #ProjectDSS series will take place on the May the 31st (starting at 6PM) at the Nike SB Shelter.

At this event you will be able to partake in an open race through the Foxtrack while simultaneously enjoying a beer, some barbecued meat and most importantly participate in the next round of voting for a new DSS obstacle.

Register by clicking here.

Head over to the #ProjectDSS site to find out more about the project or to keep updated on all things DSS

#projectdss

Yesterday everybody gathered at the Titus Berlin Bowl for the second Project DSS event. Locals and visitors skated the bowl together during the open session, the crowd seemed to constantly switch between the session, the BBQ, the bar and not least to participate in the second vote -it was a hard one because basically everything looked great-.

The bowl got shredded both with flow and aggressive moves by people like Joscha Aicher, Farid Ulrich and Patrick Rogalski. In the end, Thomas Schielke flew the highest and took home the 500€ MVP voucher.

For more information about the project, the voting and upcoming events click here.

 

#projectdss

 

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After this weeks launch event at Pappelplatz more and more things are happening. Yesterday we announced the second event at the Titus Bowl and today it is time to ask you to get involved even more. Voting for your favorite obstacle is something you can do when you are at these events but what if you can’t make it? We have thought of that and made it possible for those of you that can make it to vote online. So head over to the online voting page and cast your vote for your favorite Project Dss obstacle.

Go cast your vote!

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#projectdss

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