Lazarus, the walls are speaking

Moving forward to this year’s show, we carry the same general theme, reduce waste, upcycle, and reduce carbon emissions, but in a different way.

The city of Athens is transforming, it is emerging from the events that have shaped us all into something new, a place to be, to live, to work and to play. Hollow buildings and fractured skeletons are breathing new life, the sounds in the streets are multinational, neighborhoods are thriving and construction activity is elevated. What Greece will be as we enter the second half of the century is being defined, negotiated and built now, it is a unique moment in the story of Athens.

Part of this story is the increasing use of existing building infrastructure. Many projects are using existing concrete structures of building to reduce cost, and accelerate construction, reusing materials from the previous construction and finding inventive ways to reduce carbon, maximizing the value of the existing used building materials.

We want to celebrate this.

• We have identified and have the cooperation of the owner of a high-end 1950’s building scheduled for renovation in central
• We plan by May 2023 to have in agreement up to 3 building sites in Athens for our
• The Architect Show team will coordinate the removal of large areas of material and store it for our
• We propose paring the material with our fabricators and together we propose a new life for that material
• Not to be reused in the building – but total

The History:

The material we are using now has history, it is different from production waste, whatever carbon path it took to get installed many years ago. It has reached the end of its programmed use.

So many conversations, so many shoes, hands, faces reflected, echoed voices thoughts and ideas where witnessed by this space, so many have held the handrail, turned the door knobs, spoken to their own

reflections.

In …if the walls could speak , the Architect Show 2023 we will be exploring the experiential aspect of material, the space it captures and the events it contains.

The Visitors will experience the show in a more interactive way, encouraged to touch, sit, smell, listen, make noise and FEEL the show as much as seeing it.

We will explore the sounds of materials, the coolness and warmth, the reflections and refractions, the illusions of space and comfort.

We hope to resurrect the urban waste and let it tell us a story, let us know, feel its history, and celebratethe new stories to come from the materials’ rebirth.