Space Black

“Here today, all of you are celebrating the paths you are carving despite a world that has blunted your tools. You are disregarding this world that was imagined without you but built because of you and imagining, and building, a new." Last week's SOLD OUT [space]_shift exhibition launch was a huge success!! We were joined by the project's contributors and several peers from across the design industry/ Akil Scafe-Smith of RESOLVE Collective also gave a beautiful speech on the challenges and fulfilment of forging alternative career paths within the built environment. He spoke about how these practices emerge from marginalisation, but have led to powerful bodies of work with the potential to transform our collective journey toward social and ecological justice in the profession. Founded in 2016, RESOLVE is an interdisciplinary design collective that combines architecture, engineering, technology and art to address social challenges. Many of those we interviewed for the research mentioned RESOLVE, and through the Collective's success, their continued advoacy for others within the alternative space. We're really looking forward to the launch of the full directory in the coming days!

We’re thrilled to launch [space]_𝓈𝒽𝒾𝒻𝓉, a research initiative exploring emerging alternative modes of practice in the built environment. Commissioned by re:arc institute the project delves into the work of 17 significant practitioners from diverse disciplines within the built-environment profession. By examining their roles as architects, engineers, artists, set designers, writers, and activists, we aim to reveal how they are driving the urgent need for our profession to evolve. Their interdisciplinary approaches challenge long-standing ideals that have often underserved individuals from underrepresented backgrounds. Projects including 🪩 Disability design beyond access, such as club spaces focusing on pleasure and rest with Jordan Whitewood-Neal and James Zatka-Haas of Dis Collective ✨ Shirin Naveed co-designing GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL EVENTS LIMITED’s first South Asian-inspired stage with Dialled In & Daytimers . 🇵🇸 zain al sharaf wahbeh 's visual reconstruction of the destroyed Palestinian town Al-Mansheya, through archival and primary research 🎥  Lucia Barsegian undertaking set design as architectural spaces to test and speculate 🤝🏾 Nabiha Qadir designing culturally and gender-sensitive models of community engagement with the communities of Bangladown to infrom her design are concepts which stem from powerful critiques of the industry, creating space to imagine a more just and inclusive profession that lives up to its social and ecological responsibility. To celebrate the launch, we're hosting an exhibition showcasing the participants whose insights helped shape this project, ahead of the full directory going live soon. Join us at our studios in SET Ealing on Thursday, 10th October. Follow the link to register and grab one of the final tickets!

A few weeks ago, Space Black was invited to Monocle Radio’s On Design show to talk about our Open House Guest Curation program! It was a great opportunity to talk about sites in our curation which feature beautiful architecture and vibrant ecosystems, yet are often under-celebrated in the built environment. Spaces such as Shepards Bush Market, which lies at the heart of the West London diasporic community. It has long been more than just a retail space – it has nurtured a strong sense of community among both vendors and customers. Traders serve and respond to the diverse needs of their communities with specialty goods, fabrics, tailoring services, and spaces for social exchange and gathering. The market is incredibly varied in the types of spaces it offers, including cafés, shops, workshops, and more, making it a truly unique part of London. A big thank you to Open City for the platform and to Mae-Li Evans for facilitating a fantastic, short but great conversation.

With Open City's Open House Festival kicking off this weekend, we're thrilled to share our list of buildings as this year's guest curators! As two Sudanese women we really wanted to spotlight third spaces significant to the African and SWANA community nestled within London's urban landscape. These curated spaces span a diverse range of architectures, each uniquely adopted and adapted to foster communal gathering and cultural exchange. The curation seeks to unveil the interconnectedness of communities, often closely knit in proximity yet rich in cultural diversity. These architectures, encompassing cultural institutions, culinary spots, and places of worship, serve as vital sanctuaries for immigrants navigating the bustling metropolis and significantly contributed to London's diverse social and urban fabric. A lot of the spaces we are including we consider to be hidden gems, largely uncelebrated but well-loved spaces within our communities, we saw this curation as an opportunity to finally celebrate and spotlight these special places, and allow the Open House audience to learn and appreciate spaces that exhibit resourcefulness and adaptability, and aesthetics. All of which challenge that traditional idea of beauty in architecture. HUGE thank you to Hafsa Adan for her incredible advocacy and support in bringing these alternate yet critical spaces to the festival, and helping us challenging the types of architectures that we celebrate in these curations.

✨Creating Utopias✨ Last week, Space Black was invited by Emily Grassi and Mavreen Arhin to the Victoria and Albert Museum Kensington, to deliver a series of workshops as part of their summer Drop-in Design sessions for young people & their families. These workshops were part of the Public Programme for the museum’s exhibition, Tropical Modernism: Architecture and Independence. We were asked to help partipants draw inspiration from the exhibition and explore architectural practices beyond Eurocentric and modernist ideals, envisioning and speculating about the cities and buildings of the future. Science fiction and fantasy are often referenced when designing the cities and spaces of tomorrow. Historically, these visions have been shaped by designers. The workshop tiled 'Future Cities: Creating Utopias' used paintings, digital art, and film as references beyond Eurocentric modernism. We asked families and young people: “What would a utopian city look like for young people? What do you dream of for your friends and family in the buildings you use every day?” We were blown away by the workshop outcomes. The level of thought and detail that young people put into their designs was phenomenal—a testament to how many ideas communities can generate about their spaces when intentionally facilitated, and when built environment concepts are made accessible. We reached full capacity multiple times, with queues to take part! A huge thank you to Emily, Mavreen, and the V&A learning staff for their advocacy, enthusiasm, and support throughout the conceptualisation, planning, and delivery of these workshops.

We’re honoured to be nominated by Creative Producer Avni Patel for the Design Museum annual collaboration with the London Festival of Architecture- Manifestos: Architecture for a New Generation. The event at the museum is an opportunity for radical manifestos to be presented by emerging practitioners who are ‘expanding the parameters of what architecture can be, who London is for and what its future holds’. Returning for its 6th year the event will be facilitated by Curatorial Director of STIR, Samta Nadeem We’ll be on the panel along the following amazing practitioners who have each been nominated by key voices in architecture and design Chris Laing by Sabine Zetteler Martha Summers by Dr Lo Marshall Sebastian Mortimer by Lara Kinnear Follow the link below to grab tickets to the event! https://lnkd.in/eBPr7m4H

"Who has a seat at the table to speculate the alternative?" Urgent Pedagogies is an project by The International Artists Studio Program in Stockholm (IASPIS). It is a project for inquiry, sharing knowledge and experience on how socially engaged critical spatial practice may act in relation and response to the urgencies of social justice and equality, contested territories and conditions of conflict. We've been invited by Magnus Erikson Head of the IASPIS Applied Arts programme to contribute to the archive by sharing the theory behind our practice at Space Black. Founded in 2021, our studio is an evolving critique of the profession. The model is an ongoing response to our lived experience combined with time spent in traditional practice. Speculative design and the unbuilt stemming from research have, time and time again, been seen to define our futures. Theory leads to practise and creates cultures. As cracks deepen in modernism’s failure to communities and our climate, we have to rethink who has a seat at the table to speculate the alternative. Read the full piece below

We're delighted to announce that Space Black: Heba Tabidi and Rayan E. have been invited to be guest curators for this years Open House Festival! Running from 14 - 22 September, the festival is London’s biggest celebration of local community and the city’s architecture. Alongside Christopher Laing , Founder of Deaf Architecture Front; Riya Patel London-based writer and curator and Oliver Wainwright, Architecture and design critic of the Guardian-each guest curator will select ten buildings, spaces and events spotlighting a distinct theme within the city of their choosing. This looks to introduce the 2024 festival to new audiences, and to bring fresh perspectives to the programme. A huge thank you to Hafsa Adan and Open City for inviting us to take part this year-we're looking forward to sharing a selection which celebrates a very special part of London.

A few weeks ago Space Black was invited alongside Akil Scafe-Smith of Resolve Collective, Antoinette Yetunde Oni and Nabil Al-Kinani by the students of the Central Saint Martins, University of The Arts London: MArchitecture course for their panel Sounding The Climate: Unveiling Voices in Climate Justice The event was an exciting discussion that revolved around the panelists chosen sounds. Our selections were samples which best represented our relationship with climate justice. We discussed the historic role the built environment and its global systems have played in the degeneration of our climate. We shared how we believe the industry needs spaces where we can openly critique these historic and existing systems, and challenge a culture which has been upheld for decades. The relationship between displacement and climate, and how this impacts marginalised groups first in the north, and global south. How our response to the climate and ecological crisis must also have a human-centred approach which is intersectional, that we could see within the communities we have grown up and operate in today. The role that design, policy and education play. Untraditional designers, researchers, and engineers imagining radical alternative futures and models of practice are instrumental in helping generate climate solutions that are rooted in climate justice. A huge thank you to Sarah Osei and her peers for inviting us to the discussion.

Last Wednesday, we were invited to host Nottingham Contemporary’s Wednesday Walkthrough – “a gallery tour where artists, experts, researchers and academics give short talks in their field of expertise relating to the concepts explored in their exhibitions” We discussed Again - the first institutional exhibition in the UK by the New York-based Croatian-born artist, Dora Budor. The amazing exhibition features a series of newly commissioned works concerned with techniques of the built environment and the various forms of psychosocial control induced by it. Using our practice as a backdrop, we referenced Dora’s work in the exhibition to facilitate a discussion on: Hostile architecture and how it contributes to the exclusion of marginalised groups 'Starchitecture' culture's impact on local culture, community, and ecology. Can we imagine an alternative models to practice, and what that would look like to us Thank you Canan Batur for inviting us to facilitate this 🫶🏾