Vol. 09 Repair

Repair is a loaded word. On the surface it is seemingly benevolent and optimistic. Indeed, to repair is to acknowledge that something broken requires fixing. However, its application is subjective. To some, repairing suggests a return to halcyon days of a former time, a retroactive process of “making [something] great again." To others, repair is antiutopian, a rejection of tabula rasa principles, a challenge to accept the damage of our time and create something new with the broken pieces.

The Abbotsford convent, this volume’s cover image, is no less charged. Founded by The Sisters of the Good Shepherd in 1863 and repurposed as an artist retreat at the forefront of Melbourne’s creative scene, the precinct grapples with traumatic history as the former site of a women’s asylum and Magdalene laundry – a site characterised by abandonment, exploitation and brutality. In light of this, Kerstin Thompson Architects’ renovation of the convent’s Sacred Heart Building makes a poignant statement by embracing its old, stripped and flaking walls. This approach reveals important questions: How do we heal our environment while acknowledging the scars of the past? And, to what extent should we repair?

Founded in 2013, Inflection is a student-run journal based at the Melbourne School of Design, University of Melbourne. Born from a desire to stimulate debate and generate ideas, it advocates the discursive voice of students, academics and multi-disciplinary practitioners. This volume includes contributions from Adrian Fernandez, Andrew MacKinnon, Ayomi Olasoji, Charlie Qiuli Xue, Chris Parkinson, Clare Dieckmann, Dan Cruddace, Daniel Huppatz, Daniel de Oliveira Vasconcelos, David Mah, Evan Pavka, Guanghui Ding, Io Carydi, Jeremy Bonwick, Joan C. Tronto, Kengo Kuma, Kirsten Day, Kristen Wang, Leire Asensio-Villoria, Malkit Shoshan, Orkun Kasap, Silke Langenberg, Yingting Chen, and Yutaka Terasaki.

Featured Contributors

Dan Cruddace on behalf of BVN Architecture

Cruddace is a senior practice director of BVN Architecture in Sydney, a collaborative firm engaging with civic, institutional and development projects in Australia and internationally. Previously a partner at Sheppard Robson in London, he has worked on a number of high profile schemes in Europe, the Middle East and Australia. Cruddace has particular expertise in the design and delivery of complex residential-led developments, commercial office HQs and high-rise towers. He currently leads BVN's Quay Quarter Tower project.

Io Carydi

Carydi is a registered architect and urban designer. With studies in Architecture (NTUA) and Landscape Urbanism (the Architectural Association) and previous working experience with Hargreaves Associates in London, Carydi developed an interest in landscape and environmental systems and their integration with the morphology of urban environments. She has taught as an Adjunct Lecturer in landscape and urban design courses at various universities in Greece and Cyprus and holds her architectural design firm in Athens.

Orkun Kasap
Kasap is a senior assistant at Construction Heritage and Preservation at ETH Zurich. He studied architecture and urban planning in Turkey, Denmark and Switzerland. After receiving his Master of Architecture from ETH Zurich in 2014, he worked at Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich and at the National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR) Digital Fabrication as a project coordinator until June 2019. He has also worked in various architectural offices and participated in architectural competitions in Turkey and Switzerland.

Silke Langenberg
Langenberg is Full Professor for Construction Heritage and Preservation at ETH Zurich. Her chair is in the Institute for Preservation and Construction History as well as the Institute for Technology in Architecture. From 2014 until 2020, she was Professor for Design in Existing Contexts, Preservation, and Building Research at the Munich University of Applied Sciences. She studied architecture and holds a PhD in engineering sciences. Her research focuses on the rationalization of building processes as well as the development, repair, and long-term conservation of serially, industrially, and digitally manufactured constructions.

Kengo Kuma

Kuma established his award-winning practice, Kengo Kuma & Associates (KKAA), in 1990. He is currently a Professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Tokyo. He holds a PhD from Keio University and is an international and honory fellow of multiple national architectural institutes. Kuma proposes architecture that opens up new relationships between nature, technology and human beings. His major publications include Makeru Kenchiku [Architecture of Defeat] (Iwanami Shoten, 2004) and Shizen na Kenchiku [Natural Architecture] (Iwanami Shinsho, 2008), among others.

Evan Pavka

Pavka is a writer and editor whose work explores the intersections of power, memory, gender, sexuality and the built environment. He previously held editorial positions at Azure Magazine, Inuit Art Quarterly and Canadian Art and has presented work at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art and the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. In addition, his writings have appeared in Article, ArchDaily, ANInterior, Lunch, On Site Review, Pidgin, The Architect's Newspaper and Field Journal. Pavka is an Assistant Professor at the Wayne University James Pearson Duffy Department of Art and Art History.

Malkit Shoshan

Shoshan is the founder and director of FAST: Foundation for Achieving Seamless Territory, an architectural think tank that uses research, advocacy and design to investigate the relationship between architecture, urban planning and human rights in conflict and post-conflict areas. Born in Israel and based in the US, Shoshan is an award-winning author and map maker of several books, including Atlas of Conflict: Israel-Palestine (Uitgeverij 010, 2010) and the new book, BLUE: Architecture of UN Peacekeeping Missions (Actar, 2022). She lectures in urban planning and design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.