This research aims to analyse the development of a multiculturalist discourse in European post-war architecture (1950s-1960s). It focuses on the work of the Dutch architect Aldo van Eyck (1918-1999), who built his theoretical framework by merging modern architecture, pre-war avant-garde and the artistic production of non-Western cultures. The Otterlo Circles, presented by Van Eyck during the last CIAM (1959), were an attempt to synthesize a complex design methodology based on a concept of time inherited from James Joyce. After introducing the post-war architectural context of his time, we take the writings of Carola Giedion-Welcker, Van Eyck’s mentor in Zurich, as a starting point for a conceptual analysis of his essays. The three official versions of the Otterlo Circles are then presented, suggesting an unofficial fourth version: Van Eyck’s house in Loenen aan de Vecht, which will be interpreted as a Collection of experiences-objects-memories. The house and its objects will be used as an initial step to unpack how global travel and art collecting sustained a non-universalist view which gave rise to a profound reconceptualization of architecture. By using the Otterlo Circles, Van Eyck’s work appears as the result of a reconciliation of many different cultures, discovered through travels and reading. The keys to understanding his designs are to be found in his house, in the multicultural Collection of objects and strategies he used to build his personal discourse. Following this research, Van Eyck’s own house stands out as a necessary place to start any analysis of his work. This research, for the first time, attempts a conceptual explanation of the Otterlo Circles, exploring its theoretical implications for architectural design. Moreover, it develops a novel analysis of his home in Loenen, not only as an architectural project, but as a device intersecting with objects, inhabitants and spatial concepts, a holistic approach to the analysis of domesticity.

New demands for school education, new ways of learning, and sustainability challenges, challenge conventional spatial solutions. In accordance with schools having faced considerable changes in their pedagogical principles in Europe, one can expect a justified change from a traditional school building to more flexible environment supporting varying needs and social learning. This paper explores the themes of networked services, service platforms, and resilience through a case study, School as a Service (SaaS), developed and implemented in the City of Espoo, Finland, in collaboration with Aalto University. It describes the concept, its design process and the evaluation of its users' experience at the current stage of the experiment in 2019. SaaS is designed as a platform for learning, which has the capacity to react to the changing needs of the schools, offers new kinds of social and interactive learning experiences and fosters learners to take active role in their education. Leaning on the engagement platform, this practice offers a user-based, cross-disciplinary approach to learning, supported by digital tools and framed within sustainable development. The concept is based on the optimization of the use of spaces and resilient solutions, by sharing the school facilities with Aalto University in its campus, integrating an upper secondary school with university premises and community.

The present article describes Finmere Primary School (1958-59), by the architects David and Mary Medd, which belongs to the Development Projects in Great Britain. The methodology of the article responds to Herbert Read´s theses in his book Education through Art (1943) and influential professionals, Christian Schiller and Robin Tanner, who together with the Medds, supported his theories about the importance of the Arts in the personal development of the individual. The article focuses on describing how the spaces of the school, and the school as a whole, lend themselves to the development of the theories raised by these thinkers, to analyze the validity of their approaches in the present. The description of the project strategies helps to understand the architectural space in relation to some theoretical concepts that understand the human being as creative in a community environment. In the first place, the school will be explained as a single learning space without classrooms, promoting learning that integrates several disciplines. Next, as a place that absorbs the simultaneity of activities, a built-in variety school designed for specific activities. Finally, the school will be interpreted as a workshop that facilitates learning through experimentation and forces students to participate actively, building their own working corners. The article is limited to the study of a school in the British territory, as a particular case that allows us to see, through its evolution, how the educational and architectural discipline could jointly make a significant advance in the post-war schools. Finmere Primary School´s project adapts to the pedagogical concepts still in force today, so we can learn from it fundamental strategies for the design of educational spaces.

This paper explores the act of drawing as a tool for analysis and cultural dissemination. It applies this idea to the house of Aldo van Eyck in Loenen aan de Vecht, in order to understand the building of which han-drawn sketches, blueprints and numerous pictures are conserved. The research explores five aspects of the house which have been represented in five drawings. "Superponer": the house as a node in a set of four houses inhabited by Van Eyck. "La casa, las cosas y los casos": as a gathering of elements in a network of reciprocal relations. "Todo cambia": as an overlap of different temporalities. "Entremuros": as a space fully charged of meaning. "Abrir horizontes": finally, the house as a place which tried to capture the world itself. The objective of this essay is not to deduce definite truth on the house and its contents, but to present a myriad of possible approaches to a singular piece of inhabited architecture.