Understanding “Beautiful” with Ruth Reichstein

Kristin Gecan:

Welcome to With Intent, a podcast from IIT Institute of Design about how design permeates our world, whether we call it design or not. I’m Kristin Gecan. This week I talk to Ruth Reichstein.

Ruth is part of the European commission’s presidential advisory board on the New European Bauhaus. The New European Bauhaus, or NEB, was developed to help the EU achieve the goals set forth in its Europe Green Deal. The NEB aims to make Europe the first climate neutral continent by 2050. We at IIT Institute of Design announced our partnership with the New European Bauhaus earlier this year. This partnership brings ID’s relationship with the Bauhaus full circle. ID was founded as the New Bauhaus in 1937 by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy on the recommendation of Walter Gropius, a founder of the original Bauhaus. Ruth opens our conversation up by illuminating the relationship between the historic Bauhaus and the New European Bauhaus of today.

Ruth Reichstein:

When we look at the historical Bauhaus, there are quite some elements that are also important for our New European Bauhaus. We don’t want to copy the historical Bauhaus, but they are important elements.

One of these elements is that the historical Bauhaus emerged also at a moment of deep transformation. And it was the beginning of the industrial era and there were a lot of challenges that society and economy and the industry faced back then and now it’s a bit the same with climate change and that we really have to transform our economy.

We also are in a moment of deep transformation.

And the historical Bauhaus answered in a way that is today very interesting. One of the things is that they had a very interdisciplinary approach that they brought together craft art, design, architecture, science, and they created this really very inclusive approach, which is also something that we would like to do with the New European Bauhaus.

And they explored a lot of new technologies and materials that were not used before. Like back then, it was basically cement and steel, which are now obviously materials that we are having a problem with because they produce so much CO2 in the production. Now again it’s the question of building material and what kind of materials can we either use that exist already, like for example wood, but also what kind of other materials might we need to develop or change that we can come to a more sustainably built environment.

And I could continue with other elements, don’t want to copy the historical Bauhaus at all. Gender is, for example, one of those. I mean, the historical Bauhaus was not great in how they treated women. And when you think about the president of the commission as the first female president, this is for sure not something that she would like to copy.

Kristin Gecan:

Yeah, certainly there are elements that are there to celebrate and then others that we can improve upon. The New European Bauhaus—I’ve seen it called both an initiative and a movement. And I wonder if you can reflect on that and tell me how you think of it.

Ruth Reichstein:

Well, I think it’s an initiative and we would wish that it will transform into a movement as a political institution. It’s a bit complicated to say that we found a movement. Is it something that is normally more done by, well, the society is such with certain actors within a society. But it’s really very interesting and nice to see is that only now, I mean, we really started in January, so it’s really not all time ago, and we see already that there is a movement that is built and that is growing and really all over the European Union, but also in other parts of the world. So it seems to work and I can give you more examples if you will wish for, but, well, in the beginning, it’s an initiative and it’s hope that it can really develop into a movement.

Kristin Gecan:

So two things, we’d love to hear some examples of how you’re seeing this manifest already, just especially in everyday things that you come across, and then the other thing that I wanted to point out is what you had just mentioned earlier.

One of the things that’s been recently in the news in the US is investments in infrastructures across the US with the Biden administration. And we talk a lot about infrastructures in design, and we’re not always talking about ones that you can see, like rail and highways and things like that. And often we’re talking about invisible infrastructures. And I just wondered if you had any comment there about the types of infrastructures that you’re looking at it in the EU, if you’re thinking about these as both the visible types of infrastructures that we often talk about colloquially, and/or if you’re also considering those invisible ones that I mentioned. And then what are the visible things that you see today coming out of the New European Bauhaus? So I guess this sort of question of like what’s visible, what’s underneath that maybe we’re not seeing too?

Ruth Reichstein:

Yeah, maybe I start with saying that the New European Bauhaus has for sure, two dimensions in a way. So one dimension is really the very clear transformation of the built environment and then we come to building materials and other stuff. The other dimension is more the reflection and maybe also the cultural dimension of the European Bauhaus and both are of course interlinked. So maybe I first go a bit into this question of the movement and I would just give you two examples. So one example is that we have invited all kinds of organizations to become official partners of the New European Bauhaus. So these are actually non-profit organizations, can be universities, can be NGOs, can be foundations and many others that actually would like to contribute to the New European Bauhaus.

And there you’ll see that there are already a lot of links that emerge between these organizations that did not really talk to each other before and suddenly you get new initiatives. For example, we have now an initiative that is called New European Bauhaus goes South, where you have a cooperation of several universities, so including Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, but now decided to have a kind of new program around the built environment and the question of innovation and to reflect together on it. And another example is the wood industry that is very [inaudible 00:06:31] genius. And now they came together with an alliance. They called that Wood4Bauhaus and they are now together looking at the challenges and what they can also do to make the transformation happening in the construction sector. And so these are just two examples. I could give many more, but that shows a bit that things are happening even without that we do any special political action or that we give funds whatsoever. It’s just happening because this idea of the New European Bauhaus is there.

And that then also relates to your question on the infrastructure, because for sure we are talking about buildings and also about the space that is around the building. So it’s not only about the walls and so on, but it’s also about squares and gardens or parks or whatsoever can be around the buildings. We are very clearly also saying that it’s not only a project of the cities, but it should also look at rural areas that have pretty much different challenges.

But then of course we are also looking at what is happening in the building. So the New European Bauhaus should not only be a building that is, let’s say, climate and energy neutral and has the highest standards when it comes to energy efficiency and stuff like this, but we would also see then that inside the building, there’s a space for conversations and reflections. And that can be workshops around sustainability, but that can also be a residence for artists, for example, that work on operas around sustainability or whatsoever else. You can really imagine a lot of different things, but there is for sure this idea to have both, to have very tangible projects of infrastructure, but also this much broader conversation and reflection of how we want to live tomorrow. And with this very clear art/culture contribution.

Kristin Gecan:

So the New European Bauhaus was developed to help the EU achieve the goals of the Green Deal, as you mentioned, and you seek to make Europe the first climate neutral continent by 2050. Do you think that’s a realistic goal? Do you think that will happen?

Ruth Reichstein:

Well, I mean, otherwise I think we would not have set this target or this goal. Of course, a lot of things still need to happen until then, and not only in the New European Bauhaus, but just in general. We will present in July a huge package of regulation and enabling framework things and stuff that will pave the way because there’s just then to get to our new climate target for 2030, which is minus 55% when it comes to CO2 emissions, but that will only be the beginning. And of course, it’s also not enough to just put regulations on the table, but you also need to take the whole society along and that there is really change in all the sectors and all areas of the economy and the society. So, yes, I think it’s a realistic goal, but a lot of work still has to get there.

Kristin Gecan:

I want to just move back and just think about, we at ID sort of reached out when Ursula von der Leyen made her State of the Union address and she said that she sees design playing a critical role in building the world we want to live in. And that’s a project that will require designers, architects, engineers, and others across borders to all work together like never before. So I just wonder if you could talk a little bit more about the role for design in the initiative.

Ruth Reichstein:

For me, it was personally also an interesting learning experience because I must admit as I’m really not coming from this architecture and design background, I will be very honest and say that for me, design was really about the design of nice and beautiful objects. And I really discovered how much design can contribute to a co-creation process, that was actually something that I learned and where I think that design in general can play a much bigger role that would be in this narrow things of creating beautiful objects have in mind of design. There are so many examples. Some of our designers, for example, go to a hospital and everybody thinks that they will just change the color of the walls and then suddenly they look into the medical side and come up with great solutions.

There is this one example of a service in a hospital that deals with sick children and to really know how to treat them they needed a lot of data from the children and the children always had to do all kinds of things during the day to get all this data to the doctors. And then designers just invented a video game where the children actually automatically provided all the data that was needed and then it was much more efficient and actually they could really decrease the mortality of these children that were treated in that hospital.

And I think these are the examples where you see that the role of design is so much bigger than what you might think. That is the potential in a way that we would also like to use for the New European Bauhaus. I mean, we have so many examples where design can actually really bring solutions for a more sustainable way of living. Also, circular design, for example, where you reuse materials to create new objects and products. It’s very impressive what exists already. The use of design is really very broad and that there’s a huge potential that we don’t use often enough in a way.

Kristin Gecan:

Your tagline for the New European Bauhaus initiative is: beautiful, sustainable, together. As you know, Institute of Design is your partner on this, one of your many partners on this. We think of ourselves as really contributing to the second two legs of that tagline, the sustainable and the together. This aligns with our focus areas at ID. I wonder if you could talk a little bit more actually by what you mean about beautiful in the context of the New European Bauhaus, because from what I can tell you are not defining it narrowly on aesthetics. As you mentioned, design is not just about another pretty vase, so to speak, it can offer much more. And so I just wonder what you mean by beautiful in this context.

Ruth Reichstein:

I think it’s a bit the other way around because I think for designers it might be obvious that something needs to be beautiful to be accepted, but what we see very often also in architecture in our cities is actually pretty much the opposite, especially when you go into areas that are not the fancy city centers, for example. But when you go into the areas where a lot of social housing is happening, very often, these are not beautiful buildings. Very often, the only thing that people have in mind is that it has to be functional and cheap. And you forget that the people who will live in these houses actually would feel much better if the whole surrounding would be a nicer and more friendly atmosphere. And that has actually in the end an impact on a lot of things.

And this is a bit what we have in mind when we talk about beautiful. You saw it with the Pritzker Prize this year, this architecture prize, where for the first time it was awarded to French architects who did actually refurbishment of social housing in Bourdeaux in the south of France, which was actually beautiful refurbishment and not only sustainable. It was not only about energy efficiency, it was always also to do it in a way that the living quality of these people was improved.

And I think this is very much what we are looking for to say okay, it’s also about quality of design and architecture. We cannot always only argue that we have to find the most cost efficient way of doing things. The word beautiful is also a word that is pretty much not existent in policymaking, let’s say. And so I think that is also quite an innovation for the European Commission to say, okay we want to achieve something that is not only having as a goal, for example, to reach our climate targets, but we also want to do something which is actually improving the quality of life and which makes the experience of the people better. So that is more or less what we think of when it’s about beautiful.

Kristin Gecan:

Thinking about the quality of life of the people—why do you think that systems design and participatory processes are important to this initiative?

Ruth Reichstein:

Normally, when the European Commission makes proposals, it’s actually the other way around. Of course we have consultation processes with stakeholders as we call them. So with people who are really like directly impacted by a proposal, and then we come with our proposal and then people can react to it and whatsoever. So it’s pretty much a top down approach, but this time we said, okay, with the New European Bauhaus we want to do it the other way around. And we first listened really to the people, what they think this New European Bauhaus should be about.

And why is that so important? It’s because it is a fact that the Green Deal for now, or the European Green Deal for now, is pretty much technical and economic driven project, which is normal because we have to transform our economy to reach our climate targets. But it’s not a project that is very emotional, or, and I always like to use the word, which is probably not a word, but a touchable experience. It’s very far away from people and the only thing that very often they think of is that they should drive less, they should eat less meat, they should find other ways not to overheat their houses. I mean, it’s very much about all these kind of forbidding things. And the New European Bauhaus really tries to have a different approach and bring about a more positive and hopeful narrative to the Green Deal that shows actually the opportunities of the transformation. And if you want to do that, you cannot just put that on the people. You have to do it together, and you have really to bring the people along. And that brings us back to this question of movement.

I mean, if we would have just said, okay [inaudible 00:16:45] here’s the New European Bauhaus, I don’t think that then so many initiatives would have emerged. Actually, we leave at the moment a huge freedom and that really every organization or every person who would like to contribute to this can do it in the way that it fits best. And I think that is really something that is very valuable to this project, to for now have this very broad approach and this participatory process, which in a way should also happen whenever there is a transformation happening in a city or in a village or wheresoever.

It’s not that the politicians or the promoters will decide how they will rebuild or build a new building or renovate or I don’t know what, but that there is really a consultation with the people who live there and who can actually also tell what their needs are and their wishes are and what they would like to see. So this is really the idea that it’s really at the heart of the European Bauhaus to try as much as possible. I mean, we are aware we are political institution in Brussels, which can sometimes be perceived to be very far away from the citizens in the different countries. We will not change from today to tomorrow with the New European Bauhaus, but at least we try to get as close as possible and to really listen to the needs and the challenges of the citizens.

Kristin Gecan:

Many people, when they think of the Bauhaus design and the Bauhaus legacy, they think of Mies van der Rohe, they think of Walter Gropius, they think of ID’s founder, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and they consider Bauhaus in the realm of art and making. We’ve talked a little bit about this already, but just wonder if we could explore a little bit more why it makes sense to invoke the Bauhaus in order to work toward this climate neutrality goal and other New European Bauhaus goals.

Ruth Reichstein:

Well, I really think that one key element is this interdisciplinarity because it is very clear that the Green Deal can only be a success if everybody contributes to it and also if we overcome some barriers and bring the potential of all the people together. I just had a call with a gallerist in London, and he suggested, for example, that in every urban planning team there should be one artist who could actually bring this perspective to the planning process and that is something that we really can learn from the historical Bauhaus.

Also, to not have this deep kind of separation between the craft people and the more university people, but also they have to come together and to work together. So I think that is really one of the most important elements. Of course, it’s also a fact that the historical Bauhaus very, very quickly became a global movement. Of course, we will be very happy that our New European Bauhaus would achieve to do the same. That would probably be, for me, the two main elements to mention there.

Kristin Gecan:

So thinking about the exciting potentiality of this becoming a global movement. Can you tell me why it might be important for you or why it makes sense to have a North American partner?

Ruth Reichstein:

I think in general, we look with a lot of expectation, of course, now to the US and to the new administration. Very glad that the US rejoined the Paris Agreement and I think this kind of translates then in all kinds of different sub-projects in a way, and the New European Bauhaus can be one of those. That is on the general level, but then of course, it’s also that you have a huge expertise in the area of the New European Bauhaus. I remember when we had one of our first meetings, you were showing so many different projects that you were having where we can actually get great inspiration from what you’re already doing and what might also be helpful in the New European Bauhaus. That is one thing that we just have to tap into the potentials wherever they are. It doesn’t matter so much if they are now in the south of Europe or in the north of America whatsoever.

And we see that already inside of Europe and then it’s of course even broader when you go global. The local situations are so different. So I give you an example from over here in Europe. We have in Portugal, for example, we have a huge interest for the New European Bauhaus and they developed a concept of the Bauhaus of the Seas, because obviously for them, the ocean is very, very important because they have this tiny stripe of land and the whole country is actually more or less living on the coast. When we have started to work on the Bauhaus, we have even not thought about oceans because here in Brussels, there is no ocean in any reachable distance.

So that shows that the local setting is so important when people think about how they want to live and how they want to create and shape the future. And this is also why it’s so important to have global partners from different parts in the world. And like you, we also have, for example, members in the high-level round table from Japan and from India, that of course bring also completely different perspectives to the project. And that is really very valuable because it avoids that we might have a very European centered approach that would not take into account that there are other realities in the world. So that’s why we are very happy to have you on board, but also others that will just remind us all the time that perspectives can be very different and that. We should take the different perspectives into account for the project.

Kristin Gecan:

So the design profession developed, as I think we talked about earlier, the design profession developed as a result of the industrial revolution. When the machine replaced the craftsman and mass produced goods replaced individually made artifacts. People worry then and now a lot about machines replacing humans and putting us out of jobs, but nevertheless, we’re all drawn to technology, the latest iPhone, what’s next, what’s happening. Could you talk a little bit about what you think technology’s role in the New European Bauhaus initiative is?

Ruth Reichstein:

Yeah. I think that we are still in thinking, but I would mention maybe two elements. The one element is, and they’re actually complimentary, one element is for sure that we have to look into future technologies and innovation and be it hydrogen, be it how we get our steel production less CO2 intensive, be it how we can use digital tools, like for example, the digital twin for buildings to already know beforehand how we can maximize energy efficiency, for example. So this is for sure part of the Bauhaus, the idea is really that we can help to bring innovative products to the market and how to support innovation.

At the same time, and this is also something that comes very much through the contributions that we get through of the design phase, a lot of people also say, let’s also not forget that there is so much knowledge already and especially also knowledge from the past, let’s say. That sometimes you had techniques or technologies that were used in the past, especially also in the building sector that have been forgotten or that have not been used anymore, because everybody is just going for the easy solution of cement, for example, or whatsoever.

And that these two should be combined so that you combined really innovative future technologies with the knowledge that you have and that can sometimes be very local. Because it might be that you have a great technology, but that it doesn’t work at all because in the local setting, it might be that because of strong winds or whatsoever else the technology will just not work out. There you really need to combine the knowledge from the people very locally, sometimes with these kinds of future technologies. And this is also something that we would like to explore in the framework of the New European Bauhaus.

Kristin Gecan:

Design often talks about the original triad of designing something. You want it to be desirable, viable, and feasible. And more recently we’ve extended that triad out to also include that you want whatever you’re designing to be just, equitable, and sustainable. I wonder if you could talk about any efforts or evidence or thinking surrounding the New European Bauhaus in making its efforts just or equitable. Obviously, sustainability is a big part of this, but maybe we could think or talk about a little bit about justice and equity’s role in these efforts.

Ruth Reichstein:

Well, I think part of it is really, we just don’t want to limit ourselves to fancy projects in places that are already fancy and cities that are already in the middle of the transformation and having all kinds of nice projects for a better city, but that we really want to look also where the ugly parts are of the cities and where actually people live who cannot afford renovation that makes the houses nicer looking, but also more energy efficient and will bring down the energy bill. And social housing and affordable housing will for sure be part of the New European Bauhaus so this is one way to address the justice or equity part.

Another thing is that we are also looking into the question of generations. Of course, the young generation, now where you can say, okay, we really have to change things now because we cannot leave all the burden on the future generations, but also the older generation. So we would really love to get also more conversations going between the 90 year old artist and the 20 year old tech freak that they can sit together and explore where there might be a common things and how they could imagine the future together.

What we get very much from the conversations that we are having and from the input is that there is already quite some work ongoing, for example, in architecture and design around sustainability. But that people feel that this whole social aspect, but also the social aspect in the sense of community building and how you can design also places and space in a way that it’s inclusive and that everybody can find room to develop and to grow. This is something that people are very much longing for and education in general as well, which very often is the kind of precondition to a more inclusive society where everybody has the same possibilities.

Kristin Gecan:

One question, which is simple, but if someone comes to you and they ask: what is design? Given all this that we’ve talked about, how do you define design?

Ruth Reichstein:

Oh my God. That’s a very philosophical question in a way, no? How do you define design? If I now take the really big picture, I would really say that it’s really the reflection, how to make the world better in a way. And yeah, I think that’s pretty much it and it can then be, of course, in different areas. You can make things more sustainable or more inclusive or more whatsoever. But I think it’s really, well, also more beautiful, but for me, it’s really very much at the core of design to try to bring things forward and to make things better and to improve certain situations. And this can be done via a process, this can be done via an object, it can be done via conversation, but in all these different kinds of types of tools, you can use design to make it happen.

Kristin Gecan:

Thank you to Ruth Reichstein for joining me today and to the New European Bauhaus for their partnership. Ruth is an advisor appointed to the European Commission’s Presidential Advisory Board on the New European Bauhaus. You can find show notes and a full transcript of this conversation on the IIT Institute of Design website, id.iit.edu/podcast. Please subscribe, rate, and review With Intent on your favorite service. This is a new show and we love your support. Our theme music comes from ID alum, Adithya Ravi. Until next time.