Adapt Cube

The Adapt Cube is a para-architectural model made as an output of the Adapt workshop which aimed to construct an architectural installation to showcase the research projects of the ADAPT ¹ research group during the 5th Research Seminar of CIAUD. ² The concept of the Adapt Cube expresses the fundamentals of ADAPT group through the action of adapting elements and ideas from different contexts and domains of knowledge, art, materiality – composing new experimental paradigms in-between architecture, art and technology – with reuse of materials. Grounded on the idea of para-architecture the Adapt Cube is a meta-functional prototype, evoking the Kantian idea of “purposiveness without purpose”, transcending mere functional application. The Adapt Cube is the first built prototype based on a theoretical model that can be reapplied, extended, transformed and adapted into various forms, scales, and functional purposes. The abstractness of Adapt Cube as a model is complemented by the concreteness of its materiality. By using repurposed materials, such as existing recycled doors, the abstract Adapt Cube model is made actual, echoing Husserl's phenomenological principle: “back to the things themselves”. In this context, the use of reused materials and elements goes beyond the sustainability issues, as we explore how the loss of the primary context and utility of materials, unveils their potential to acquire a poetic added value, enabling their reapplication in diverse forms.