The Winter Garden-terrarium is a performative installation by Alejandro Haiek at the "Retake/Reuse: experiments to reactivate public space" public event, seminar coordinated by Maria-Luna Nobile and Marie Kraft from Circolo Scandinavo. The research proposal was granted as small visionary project by the Research Center for Architecture, Design and the Arts (UmArts) and presented at Umeå University Arts campus. The prototype was developed in collaboration with an interdisciplinary project team composed by Tomas Mena, Rebecca Rudolph, Raffaelle Errichiello and Alejandra Diaz, with student participation from Deniss Zeile and technical support by Håkan Hansson, Kent Brodin and Sven-Erik Hilberer from UMA school of Architecture; alongside Fatemeh Morandi from the UXlab, School of Informatics, with the students team: Hiran Herath, Kevin Charles Dalli, Parisima Alaie, Viktor Sjöström, William Sahlin, and advised by Gesche Blume-Werry from the Department of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Umeå University, Sweden.


The preliminary research on winter environments, supported by the Umeå Research Center for Architecture, Design and the Arts - UmArts, ended up in a winter garden eco-installation at the Arts-Campus of Umeå University in Sweden. In a transdisciplinary collaboration between Umeå School of Architecture, UXlab, the Department of Informatics, and the Department of Environmental Sciences, the public installation invites to debate about the dilemmas and paradoxes around sustainability today.

Umeå Arts-Campus 7 December 2022
Temperature -13,8, Wind: 3 m/s
Photo: Sven-Erik Hilberer
Historically, winter typologies are extense in the Nordic territory, ranging from Sámi cots to the modern Naturhus, from traditional food preservation earth cellar to the multispecies picturesque use of Varandas. The imaginary around how to live in these extreme land conditions opens up for a closer review of underground life, responsive enclosures and self-sufficient ecosystems.
Umeå Arts-Campus 7 December 2022
Temperature -13,8, Wind: 3 m/s
Photo: Rebecca Rudolph
The first prototype is a winter garden terrarium: a small-scale ecological, community based, deployable and self-sustainable public art device, inserted into critical areas in the city as part of a collective urban choreography, in collaboration with actors, cultural groups, institutions, and organizations.

The prototype aim to provoke public engagement by providing augmented ecological scenarios, working with seasonal phenomenas, meanwhile preserving life in northern territories. The transdiciplinary team hypothezised around public winter infrastructure and how it can performs as a social and ecological reponsive environment in the future.
Umeå Arts-Campus 3 December 2022
Temperature -5, Wind: 10 m/s
Photo: Alejandro Haiek
The winter garden-terrarium is realised as a living architectural installation. Based on bodies of soil it reflects about remediation, oxygen production, carbon sequestration, and biodiversity. Especially the installation exposes the hidden dimension contained within the ground-level of the Boreal biome, which constitutes an important part of the worlds terrestrial land mass, holding a significant carbon sink, with the majority residing in the soil environment.

Although a handcrafted object, the use of computational tools allowed form finding and accurate fabrication. Because of the digital dimension of the biodome the interactions between humans and invisible forms of lifes are amplified, creating augmented sensorial experiences. Inside this micro cosmos operates a network of 6 eco-chambers with soil samples and 3D printed synthetic bodies infused with biomaterial; each station monitors contained active samples constantly uploading data into an avatar-digital replica, from carbon, oxygen, humidity, temperature or voltage.The data is mapped onto the skin and the enclosures, re-interpretating values into colorful synthetic atmospheres, triggering ways of interaction and encouraging new forms of ecological interpretations. The soil's breathing pattern, purifying the air on a micro level, is amplified as same as other invisible natural phenomena and imperceptible sounds and frequencies.
Aniela Dąbrowska performing in the Winter Garden
Umeå Arts-Campus 7 December 2022
Temperature -13,8, Wind: 3 m/s
Photo: Alejandro Haiek
Umeå Arts-Campus 3 December 2022
Temperature -5, Wind: 10 m/s
Photo: Alejandro Haiek
The installation accelerate and distort the time dimension and seasonal change within a network of interactive eco-chambers. The structure, and the natural and synthetic embodiments invite to different modes of interaction developing digital and analog interfaces, to provide closed-loop experiences between the participants. The encounters and transactions, simultaneously, retrofit the performance of the biodome.
Umeå Arts-Campus 7 December 2022
Temperature -13,8, Wind: 3 m/s
Photo: Rebecca Rudolph
The Winter Garden Terrarium is one of the planned living environment-sculptures in the Winter Gardens series. This first living architectural installation, developed in an intersection between architecture, human interactions and environmental science, revolve around soil, overlaying cultural knowledge and science. The deployable micro-environment remains a provocation for discussion on today’s expanded green washing.

The research explore the idea of Gardens from a cultural, political, scientific, technological, economical and ecological perspective, addressing the need for nature and winter public spaces in Nordic climates. The project uses performative and artistic methods in response to the climate emergency, aiming to develop a series of public Winter Garden installations that amplify unperceptible form of ecology through iterative experiences and methods of translations. Upcoming/Planned versions of Winter Gardens includes winter pollinators, medicinal herbariums, as same as biodigestors and seed banks.
Umeå Arts-Campus 5 December 2022
Temperature -5, Wind: 15 m/s
Photo: Sven-Erik Hilberer
CONTACT
Alejandro Haiek Coll

MSc Architect // PhD. Candidate at Universitá di Genova.
Affiliate researcher at RISE - Research institute of Sweden.
MA Studio12 founder and leader at Umeå School of Architecture, Umeå University
Founder of Lab.Pro.Fab
SE-90187 Umeå, Sweden

Phone: +46 73 380 39 26
Email: alejandro.haiek@umu.se

www.labprofab.org
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