Today’s episode considers a part of the built environment that’s often overlooked in architectural discourse, yet has become one of the most vibrant sites of experimentation in recent years: the nightclub.Since the post-COVID resurgence of nightlife, we’ve seen club spaces music festivals become laboratories again — places where architects, artists and designers, artists test how bodies move, gather, and connect. After years of enforced separation, there’s been a renewed appetite for intimacy, tactility, and collective presence. Nightclubs have stepped into that space, foregrounding not just sound and spectacle, but how architecture can invite touch, trust, and new forms of social closeness.There are few people exploring that frontier more boldly than today’s guests: Thea Arde and Joel Jjio, the duo behind playbody. Playbody is far more than a club night — it’s an ongoing design research project that treats the dancefloor as a site of architectural inquiry. Their events incorporate sculptural objects, spatial interventions, and choreographic prompts that encourage people to rediscover their own physicality in relation to others.In a time when digital life keeps pulling us apart, their work asks a simple but radical question: how can design rebuild social intimacy? Today we’ll talk about how playbody grew from a nightlife concept into a design studio, how they prototype through parties, and why they see the club as a critical testing ground for the future of spatial practice.Scaffold is an Architecture Foundation production. Support our work by becoming a member on Patreon. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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1:09:42
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1:09:42
OMA at 50
This special guest episode marks the launch of the podcast OMA at 50.Conceived and produced by architect Richard Hall, the series explores the Office for Metropolitan Architecture’s enduring influence on architectural culture, featuring conversations with an incredible roster of architects, academics, and historians.Marking OMA’s 50th anniversary, the podcast features some of the most authoritative voices on OMA — including Laura Schrijver, Pier Paolo Tamburelli, Sébastien Marot, Giovanna Borasi, and many others.New episodes are released every Thursday. Subscribe by searching OMA at 50 on Apple Podcasts, or by following this link. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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51:16
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51:16
Truwant + Rodet +
Truwant+Rodet+ is a Basel-based architecture firm founded in 2015 by Charlotte Truwant and Dries Rodet, which operates across the fields of architecture, landscape urbanism, exhibition making, installations, furniture design, research, and teaching.In 2017, they received the Swiss Art Award for their project A Pavilion. Since 2018, they have been developing the project, Fountain of Youth with Fabian Marti for the Campus Santé in Lausanne. In 2020, Truwant+Rodet+ won the renovation for the Centre Culturel Suisse in Paris with the Parisian firm ASBR. In 2022, they won the competition for the renovation of the Stadium of Bulle.This conversation was recorded remotely on 12 September in Basel and London. Special thanks this week to Bárbara Maçães Costa.The essay "Time as Material" referred to in the conversation can be accessed here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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1:24:50
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1:24:50
Why be an architect today?
Scaffold is back this week, with an episode that asks a simple question: why be an architect today?The Architecture Foundation is based inside the office of AHMM in Clerkenwell, which, back in July, hosted a summer school for teenagers just beginning to explore architecture.We decided to speak with some of them, to try and understand what draws young people to this profession today, what they think architecture is for, and how they imagine their futures in it.In these short conversations you get a strong impression of the perennial motivations that push people toward careers in shaping the built environment, despite the seemingly diminishing returns of practicing architecture today.Speaking with these students about their convictions give us a lot of hope: that the culture of architecture today, its perceived importance in society, and the esteem it’s held in, might still be elevated, and remain worthy of the ambition and altruism that is clearly in no short supply in this incoming generation.Special thanks this week to all the summer school students, and to Claire Pollock / AHMM Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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15:21
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15:21
Paul Shepheard
Paul Shepheard is a British architect and writer known for his philosophical and multidisciplinary approach to architecture. Shepheard was a student at the Architectural Association in the 1960’s, and has worked both in practice, for the likes of James Gowan, and in academia, teaching at institutions like the AA, the University of Texas at Austin, and the Kingston School of Art.As a writer, he is best known for books that explore architecture in relation to broader cultural, technological, and existential themes. His notable works include What is Architecture? (1994), The Cultivated Wilderness (1997), Artificial Love (2003), and How to Like Everything (2013). His most recent book, and the focus of our interview, is called Autobiography, which was published in 2024 by Canalside press. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Interviews with architects, artists and designers. Produced by the Architecture Foundation and hosted by Matthew Blunderfield. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
France