When we use the word "architect" or "designer," what we usually mean is a professional, someone who gets paid, and we tend to assume that it's those professionals who are going to be the ones to help us solve the really big, systemic design challenges that we face like climate change, urbanization and social inequality. That's our kind of working presumption. And I think it's wrong, actually.
當我們說「建築師」 或是「設計師」時, 我們通常指的是一位專業人士, 一位收取報酬的人士, 我們也假設這些專業人士 能幫助我們解決 我們所面對的非常重要 與系統設計上的挑戰 例如氣候變遷、都市化、 社會不公平等等。 這是對我們工作的推測。 事實上,我覺得這是錯的。
In 2008, I was just about to graduate from architecture school after several years, and go out and get a job, and this happened. The economy ran out of jobs. And a couple of things struck me about this. One, don't listen to career advisers. And two, actually this is a fascinating paradox for architecture, which is that, as a society, we've never needed design thinking more, and yet architecture was literally becoming unemployed. It strikes me that we talk very deeply about design, but actually there's an economics behind architecture that we don't talk about, and I think we need to.
2008 年時,我正要從建築學院畢業 幾年以後、出社會、找工作, 而這件事情發生了。 景氣不好,找不到工作。 有些事情對我產生了衝擊。 一,別相信就業指導員。 二,對建築業來說,這是件矛盾的事, 這個社會從來不需要貼心的設計, 於是建築師們就這樣失業了。 讓我驚訝的是我們深入地討論設計, 但事實上,建築學的背後是經濟學, 我們卻不討論,我認為我們應該來談談它。
And a good place to start is your own paycheck. So, as a bottom-of-the-rung architecture graduate, I might expect to earn about 24,000 pounds. That's about 36,000, 37,000 dollars. Now in terms of the whole world's population, that already puts me in the top 1.95 richest people, which raises the question of, who is it I'm working for? The uncomfortable fact is that actually almost everything that we call architecture today is actually the business of designing for about the richest one percent of the world's population, and it always has been. The reason why we forgot that is because the times in history when architecture did the most to transform society were those times when, actually, the one percent would build on behalf of the 99 percent, for various different reasons, whether that was through philanthropy in the 19th century, communism in the early 20th, the welfare state, and most recently, of course, through this inflated real estate bubble. And all of those booms, in their own various ways, have now kicked the bucket, and we're back in this situation where the smartest designers and architects in the world are only really able to work for one percent of the population.
用你的薪水條出發是個不錯的選擇。 身為一個最底層的建築系畢業生, 我大概可以賺 24,000 英鎊, 大約就是 36,000、37,000 美金。 以全世界的人口來看, 這已經足以讓我成為最富有的前 1.95%, 這引出了另外一個問題, 我究竟為誰工作? 不堪的事實是 實際上我們現今所謂的建築 都是一門為全球人口中 最富有的 1% 做設計的生意, 一直以來都是如此。 我們忽略這一點的原因是因為, 歷史上建築使社會轉型,事實上 以不同理由,在那 1% 的人 為其他 99% 的人 建造建築物的時候, 不論是透過 19 世紀時的慈善事業、 20 世紀初的共產主義、 福利國、以及現在的 誇張的不動產泡沫, 而這些不同面相的景氣繁榮, 現在都已經不存在了, 我們也回到了這情況, 就是這世上最聰明的設計師以及建築師 能夠為那 1% 的人口工作。
Now it's not just that that's bad for democracy, though I think it probably is, it's actually not a very clever business strategy, actually. I think the challenge facing the next generation of architects is, how are we going to turn our client from the one percent to the 100 percent? And I want to offer three slightly counterintuitive ideas for how it might be done.
這不僅僅是對民主制度有害, 緃使我認為會有這樣的情形, 事實上這也不是 非常明智的商業策略。 我認為下一代建築師面對的挑戰是 怎樣使客戶的數量 從那 1% 變成 100%, 我想分享三個有點違反直覺的方法 來做到這一點。
The first is, I think we need to question this idea that architecture is about making buildings. Actually, a building is about the most expensive solution you can think of to almost any given problem. And fundamentally, design should be much, much more interested in solving problems and creating new conditions. So here's a story. The office was working with a school, and they had an old Victorian school building.
首先,我們應該要質疑建築 就是蓋房子這個論點。 實際上,一棟建築物是對幾乎所有問題 你所能想到的最昂貴的解決方法 基本上,設計應該要更致力於解決問題 及開創新的格局。 有個故事是這麼說的。 有間公司和一所學校合作, 這所學校有幢維多利亞式的古舊建築。
And they said to the architects, "Look, our corridors are an absolute nightmare. They're far too small. They get congested between classes. There's bullying. We can't control them. So what we want you to do is re-plan our entire building, and we know it's going to cost several million pounds, but we're reconciled to the fact."
他們告訴建築師們: 「瞧,我們的走廊真是個噩夢。 它們太小了。課堂之間 上下課時都會大塞車。 時常上演全武行。我們沒辦法控制。 所以我們希望你們 能重新規劃整個建築, 我們也知道這會花數百萬英鎊, 但是我們已經達成協議了。」
And the team thought about this, and they went away, and they said, "Actually, don't do that. Instead, get rid of the school bell. And instead of having one school bell that goes off once, have several smaller school bells that go off in different places and different times, distribute the traffic through the corridors." It solves the same problem, but instead of spending several million pounds, you spend several hundred pounds. Now, it looks like you're doing yourself out of a job, but you're not. You're actually making yourself more useful. Architects are actually really, really good at this kind of resourceful, strategic thinking. And the problem is that, like a lot of design professions, we got fixated on the idea of providing a particular kind of consumer product, and I don't think that needs to be the case anymore.
建築團隊想了想,然後離開了。 他們說:「其實不須要這麼做。 別用原來的鐘聲了。 不應該使用那隻響一次鐘聲的鐘, 以數隻較細的鐘代替那隻大鐘, 在不同時間不同地點響, 就可以把人流分配。」 這樣就解決了同一個問題, 但是卻只花了數百英鎊, 而非數百萬英鎊。 看起來你失去了一筆生意, 但是你沒有,事實上你 讓自己變得更有用了。 建築師們其實非常非常擅長 做這種資源性、策略性的思考。 問題出在於,如同許多設計師, 我們被定型在 提供特定的產品給顧客, 而我不認為應該要繼續這樣下去了。
The second idea worth questioning is this 20th-century thing that mass architecture is about big -- big buildings and big finance. Actually, we've got ourselves locked into this Industrial Era mindset which says that the only people who can make cities are large organizations or corporations who build on our behalf, procuring whole neighborhoods in single, monolithic projects, and of course, form follows finance. So what you end up with are single, monolithic neighborhoods based on this kind of one-size-fits-all model. And a lot of people can't even afford them. But what if, actually, it's possible now for cities to be made not just by the few with a lot but also by the many with a bit? And when they do, they bring with them a completely different set of values about the place that they want to live. And it raises really interesting questions about, how will we plan cities? How will finance development? How will we sell design services? What would it mean for democratic societies to offer their citizens a right to build? And in a way it should be kind of obvious, right, that in the 21st century, maybe cities can be developed by citizens.
第二個值得質疑的點子 就是這個 20 世紀的問題, 大規模的建築物 是奠基於巨大的建築物以及經濟體。 事實上,我們把自己限制 在這個工業時代的心態裡面了, 認為只有為了我們而設立的大型組織 或公司才能建造城市, 促使整個鄰近地區 成為一個獨立個體, 當然也造就了接下來的經濟發展, 結果就是變成以這種 一成不變的模型為藍本 所形成的獨立個體, 而許多人根本無法負擔它們。 但是如果城市不單只是 由富有的少數人形成的, 同時也是由 不富有的多數人形成的呢? 當他們能做到這點的時候, 對所想要居住的環境 就會有完全不同的價值觀。 這就牽涉到一些很有趣的問題了, 我們要如何規劃城市?如何資助發展? 我們要如何銷售設計服務? 民主社會給予人民 建造權利的涵義為何? 就某方面而言,在 21 世紀, 城市應該由人民來建造, 這應該是顯而易見的。
And thirdly, we need to remember that, from a strictly economic point of view, design shares a category with sex and care of the elderly -- mostly it's done by amateurs. And that's a good thing. Most of the work takes place outside of the monetary economy in what's called the social economy or the core economy, which is people doing it for themselves. And the problem is that, up until now, it was the monetary economy which had all the infrastructure and all the tools.
第三,我們要記住, 單以經濟的觀點來看, 設計就像性以及老人照護一樣-- 大部分都是由外行人完成的, 這是件好事。 大部分的工作是在稱為社會經濟 或核心經濟的貨幣經濟之外完成的, 人們是為了自己而工作的。 問題在於,截至目前為止, 所有公共建設以及工具 都掌握在貨幣經濟手裡。
So the challenge we face is, how are we going to build the tools, the infrastructure and the institutions for architecture's social economy? And that began with open-source software. And over the last few years, it's been moving into the physical world with open-source hardware, which are freely shared blueprints that anyone can download and make for themselves. And that's where 3D printing gets really, really interesting. Right? When suddenly you had a 3D printer that was open-source, the parts for which could be made on another 3D printer. Or the same idea here, which is for a CNC machine, which is like a large printer that can cut sheets of plywood. What these technologies are doing is radically lowering the thresholds of time and cost and skill. They're challenging the idea that if you want something to be affordable it's got to be one-size-fits-all. And they're distributing massively really complex manufacturing capabilities. We're moving into this future where the factory is everywhere, and increasingly that means that the design team is everyone. That really is an industrial revolution. And when we think that the major ideological conflicts that we inherited were all based around this question of who should control the means of production, and these technologies are coming back with a solution: actually, maybe no one. All of us.
所以我們面臨的挑戰是 我們要如何為建築的社會經濟 建造工具、公共建設、機構? 這就要從開放原始碼的軟體說起了。 在過去幾年當中, 它漸漸轉移到了開放原始碼的硬體, 也就是任何人都能夠下載 重製的免費分享藍圖。 3D 列印也因此變得非常非常有趣。 對嗎?當你突然有了一部 3D 印表機, 其原始碼是開放的, 你就可以用另外一部 3D 印表機來製作零件。 對一部能夠裁切木夾板 的 CNC 也是同樣的道理。 這些技術從根本上降低了 時間、花費、技術的門檻, 它們挑戰了便宜貨必定 一成不變這個道理。 它們正在讓十分複雜的技術 大規模普及化。 在未來,任何地方 都可以是一間工廠, 也意味著每個人都可以是設計團隊。 這簡直就是一場工業革命。 思想上主要的衝突, 我們繼承的,在於誰應該 要控制生產的方法, 而這些科技回答了解決方法: 事實上,也許沒有人。我們全都一樣。
And we were fascinated by what that might mean for architecture. So about a year and a half ago, we started working on a project called WikiHouse, and WikiHouse is an open-source construction system. And the idea is to make it possible for anyone to go online, access a freely shared library of 3D models which they can download and adapt in, at the moment, SketchUp, because it's free, and it's easy to use, and almost at the click of a switch they can generate a set of cutting files which allow them, in effect, to print out the parts from a house using a CNC machine and a standard sheet material like plywood. And the parts are all numbered, and basically what you end up with is a really big IKEA kit. (Laughter) And it goes together without any bolts. It uses wedge and peg connections. And even the mallets to make it can be provided on the cutting sheets as well. And a team of about two or three people, working together, can build this. They don't need any traditional construction skills. They don't need a huge array of power tools or anything like that, and they can build a small house of about this size in about a day.
這些建築到底有何意義, 我們對此相當著迷。 因此大約一年半以前, 我們著手進行一項 名為 WikiHouse 的計畫, WikiHouse 是一個開放式 的建造系統, 它的理念就是任何人也可上網, 進入免費分享的 3D 模型資料庫, 並下載使用。 現階段是 SketchUp,因為它是 免費,而且易於使用, 幾乎只要按一下, 它們就能產生切割檔案, 讓它們可以使用 CNC 機 印出一棟房子的零件, 以及標準板材,例如夾板, 所有的零件都會編號, 而基本上你最後得到的就是一組 超大的 IKEA 套件。 (笑聲) 你不需要螺栓就能夠組裝它們, 它們利用楔形頭以及木釘來連接, 即使是用來建造的木槌, 也可以用切割檔案印出來。 一個兩到三個人的小組 合作就可以完成。 他們不需要任何傳統的建造技術, 他們不需要一系列重機械等的工具, 就大約一天內
(Applause)
建造一棟像這樣大小的房子。 (掌聲)
And what you end up with is just the basic chassis of a house onto which you can then apply systems like windows and cladding and insulation and services based on what's cheap and what's available. Of course, the house is never finished. We're shifting our heads here, so the house is not a finished product. With the CNC machine, you can make new parts for it over its life or even use it to make the house next door. So we can begin to see the seed of a completely open-source, citizen-led urban development model, potentially.
你最後得到的會是房子的骨架, 之後你可以裝上窗戶、 外壁、絕緣材料、用具等等 都根據成本和有什麼可用來決定。 當然,這棟房子還沒有完成。 我們才剛開始轉變,所以這棟房子 還不是一件完成品。 有了 CNC,你就可以幫它製作新零件 或甚至用它來建造隔壁的房子。 我們可以預見一個完整的開放來源系統, 市民引領的潛在城市發展模型。
And we and others have built a few prototypes around the world now, and some really interesting lessons here. One of them is that it's always incredibly sociable. People get confused between construction work and having fun. But the principles of openness go right down into the really mundane, physical details. Like, never designing a piece that can't be lifted up. Or, when you're designing a piece, make sure you either can't put it in the wrong way round, or, if you do, it doesn't matter, because it's symmetrical. Probably the principal which runs deepest with us is the principal set out by Linus Torvalds, the open-source pioneer, which was that idea of, "Be lazy like a fox." Don't reinvent the wheel every time. Take what already works, and adapt it for your own needs. Contrary to almost everything that you might get taught at an architecture school, copying is good.
我們和其他人已經在世界各地 建立了一些雛形, 也有了一些有趣的教訓。 其中一個總是善於交際,使人難以置信的。 人們在建造工程和 娛樂之間常感到迷惑。 但是開放式的原則就能夠 從實際的世俗的角度切入。 例如,絕對不要設計一個抬不起來的零件。 或是當你在設計零件的時候, 確保你之後不會把它裝反, 或是即使裝反了也無所謂, 因為它是對稱的。 或許我們執行得最為徹底的原則, 就是 Linus Torvalds 所提出的, 他是開放式資源的領航者, 「要像狐狸一樣懶」也是他的主意, 不必每次都重新發明輪子。 根據你的需求,拿現有的東西來用。 和幾乎所有你從建築系 學到的東西相反, 抄襲是件好事,
Which is appropriate, because actually, this approach is not innovative. It's actually how we built buildings for hundreds of years before the Industrial Revolution in these sorts of community barn-raisings. The only difference between traditional vernacular architecture and open-source architecture might be a web connection, but it's a really, really big difference. We shared the whole of WikiHouse under a Creative Commons license, and now what's just beginning to happen is that groups around the world are beginning to take it and use it and hack it and tinker with it, and it's amazing. There's a cool group over in Christchurch in New Zealand looking at post-earthquake development housing, and thanks to the TED city Prize, we're working with an awesome group in one of Rio's favelas to set up a kind of community factory and micro-university. These are very, very small beginnings, and actually there's more people in the last week who have got in touch and they're not even on this map. I hope next time you see it, you won't even be able to see the map.
這是適當的,因為事實上 這並不是創新, 這只是我們 在工業革命之前數百年來 眾人合力蓋穀倉的方法而已。 鄉土式建築和開放資源式建築 兩者的差異 或許只在於網路連接, 但真的是一個很大很大的差異。 我們在創作共用授權 (Creative Commons License) 下 分享整個 WikiHouse, 現在才剛剛開始發生, 世界各地的團體開始 接受它、使用它、恣意地運用它, 這是驚人的。 在紐西蘭基督城 (Christchurch) 有個 很酷的團體, 正在研究地震災後重建, 透過 TED city Prize, 我們正和一個團體合作, 他們位於里約熱內盧的 其中一個貧民區內,建立社區工廠 及小型大學,他們真棒。 這些都是很小很小的開始, 事實上前一個禮拜有更多人聯絡上了 而他們還不在這張地圖上, 我希望你們下次看到時, 根本就看不到地圖了。
We're aware that WikiHouse is a very, very small answer, but it's a small answer to a really, really big question, which is that globally, right now, the fastest-growing cities are not skyscraper cities. They're self-made cities in one form or another. If we're talking about the 21st-century city, these are the guys who are going to be making it. You know, like it or not, welcome to the world's biggest design team.
我們發現 WikiHouse 是 一個很小很小的答案, 但是它卻足以解釋 一個很大很大的問題, 也就是現在全球發展最快的城市, 並不是充滿了高樓大廈的城市。 它們是某種形式的自製城市。 如果我們談論到 21 世紀的城市, 他們就是將建造它們的人。 這麼說吧,不論你喜不喜歡, 迎接世界上最大的設計團隊吧。
So if we're serious about problems like climate change, urbanization and health, actually, our existing development models aren't going to do it. As I think Robert Neuwirth said, there isn't a bank or a corporation or a government or an NGO who's going to be able to do it if we treat citizens only as consumers. How extraordinary would it be, though, if collectively we were to develop solutions not just to the problem of structure that we've been working on, but to infrastructure problems like solar-powered air conditioning, off-grid energy, off-grid sanitation -- low-cost, open-source, high-performance solutions that anyone can very, very easily make, and to put them all into a commons where they're owned by everyone and they're accessible by everyone? A kind of Wikipedia for stuff? And once something's in the commons, it will always be there. How much would that change the rules? And I think the technology's on our side.
所以如果我們很認真地看待 如氣候變遷、都市化、健康之類的問題, 我們現存的發展模型根本 不足以解決它們, 正如 Robert Neuwirth 說: 如果我們只把市民當作 消費者來看待的話, 沒有任何一家銀行、政府、 非政府組織能夠做得到。 希望我們能共同想出解決的方法, 而不僅是解決當前的結構問題, 這可是非凡成就, 同時能夠解決一些基礎建設問題 像太陽能空調、 獨立能源、獨立衛生系統 - 價格低廉、開放式資源、 高效能的解決方案, 讓每個人都能輕易製作, 並讓它們公有化, 使每個人擁有並使用, 就像一種實體的 Wikipedia 嗎? 一旦有東西出現在公有範圍內, 它就會永遠在那裏。 這將會改變多少的既有定律? 我認為科技站在我們這邊的,
If design's great project in the 20th century was the democratization of consumption -- that was Henry Ford, Levittown, Coca-Cola, IKEA — I think design's great project in the 21st century is the democratization of production. And when it comes to architecture in cities, that really matters. Thank you very much. (Applause)
如果在 20 世紀,設計的偉大工程 是消費民主化 - 像是 Henry Ford、Levittown、 Coca-cola、IKEA - 我認為 21 世紀的偉大工程設計 就是生產的民主化, 對於城市裡面的建築來說, 這真的很重要。 謝謝。 (掌聲)