Manuel Schupp divided his lecture into five topics - steps leading to understanding and solving the problem of the relationship between the historical and the new in a modern city: these are romantic ideas about life in an old European city, fear of the architecture of the future, the possibility of living in a historical city, the necessary technical things for a modern and examples of renovation projects combining old and new.
Each of us at least once in his life dreamed of living in a picturesque old town, of which there are so many in Europe. But behind romantic performances, few people see the modern realities of such cities - crowds of tourists, small living spaces and an almost complete inadequacy of modern life requirements. The romantic vision of the old town is opposed by the fear of cities of the future, fantastic and huge, where you can get lost. Examples of this fear of new architecture can be found in cinematography. So in the movie "Time for Fun" by Jacques Tati, the main character does not feel very comfortable in a huge office building, and in the movie "Metropolis" by Fritz Lang, people are generally afraid of the city so much that they refuse to go out.
But, according to Manuel Schupp, people need both cities, both historical and modern. After all, life in the old town is often something like life in a museum. But what about the infrastructure, without which a modern man cannot do? Thus, the only chance for a city to grow is a combination of the old and the new. The same goes for a single building. Historic buildings that are often reconstructed are simply preserved facades, behind which there is no historical function. They become as artificial as decorations in amusement parks.
However, says Manuel Schupp, we cannot fully reconstruct history, but we can learn from history. Learn, not make scenery. This is the motto of the ENA organization - the European Architectural Network, which includes six architecture offices in Stuttgart and Baden-Baden. ENA architects believe that some buildings simply need to be rebuilt to meet modern residential or office space requirements. Some buildings are very small and unsuitable in size for habitation, they can be enlarged with extensions. Basically, dilapidated buildings that no longer carry any function are subjected to restoration and alteration - they are given a modern look and a new function, as was the case with the stock exchange building in Stuttgart.
Works by the Schuppa workshop, which is part of the ENA, also illustrated the architect's main idea of the continuity of history. Thus, the experience of the three-tiered Italian palazzo was transferred to the projects for the restoration of facades on William Strass in Berlin. The same technique was used in the reconstruction of the building of the British Embassy in Berlin. At the end of his lecture, Manuel Schupp repeated the words of the famous song - “Moscow was not built at once,” and Rome was not built immediately, and not a single European city is being built at once. Old and new are always intertwined in a European city, it is multi-layered.
