Intersections is an experimental studio in the Master’s program at the Department of Architecture in Delft University of Technology. Questioning the temporal and physical limitation of the object-oriented approaches, the studio focuses on the speculative design practices. In Spring 2020, we focused on the Biennial’s theme, “What do we have in common?” Run under the limitations imposed by the global pandemic, we also questioned the modes of cultural production and consumption within the discipline of architecture. In this respect, the 17 projects presented here explored not only the Academy City and Tbilisi but also the different modalities of biennial and the architectural project as spatio-temporal constructs.

The city of Tbilisi is a display of the palimpsestic accumulation of heritage, social practices, geopolitics imprinted in its architecture. It provides many thresholds, boundaries, and opposing and divergent conceptions. The Academy City also reflects that in its topography, fragmented urban structure, patterns of Soviet planning period, with a plethora of styles and scales, which was taken onto a new level by the recent sporadic building and development boom.

By the notions of indeterminacy and change inherent in the rapid urban transformations in Tbilisi, we considered the site not as given but as an (im)material composite in a force field where human and non-human actors meet. Thus, the inquiries in the studio also reached beyond the Academy City. From socio-spatial activations to territorial or temporal interventions, the projects in the studio shared the agenda that the everyday practices in and around the city not only form our very common ground but also anchors us in time. In this regard, the projects are formulations of new platforms, generators, activators, or connectors to be de-signed, moved, dis-placed, and unfolded in time.