Architecture as Bricolage and The Aesthetics of Reassembly
Antonia Auer
Supervisor: Univ.Prof. Günther H. Filz
ongoing
Abstract. Against the backdrop of increasing resource scarcity, this thesis investigates the reuse of building components as a design principle in architecture. The built city is understood as an anthropogenic material reservoir, in which existing buildings, vacancies, and demolition structures are regarded not as end states, but as temporary material configurations within continuous material cycles. This perspective fundamentally challenges the linear model of production, use, and disposal. Drawing on Claude Lévi-Strauss’s concept of the bricoleur, the role of the architect is redefined: design no longer proceeds from freely available, project-specifically selected materials, but instead emerges from conditions of limited and heterogeneous material availability. Central to the inquiry is how reclaimed building components can be not only technically reactivated, but also productively deployed as generators of architectural form and expression. Strategies such as collage, stylistic hybridity, additive construction, reversible joining techniques, and material-efficient systems are analyzed as manifestations of a transformed architectural language—one that conceives design as a processual engagement with existing resources and understands reuse as an integral component of architectural practice.