Delirious COOL-haas

Personifying projective, cool architecture, Rem Koolhaas easily negotiates with the allocated programs within his structures. In his book, Delirious New York, Koolhaas analyzes the concentrated population of the city and the consequences of its density on the culture of the people and the space they inhabit. His work celebrates a culture of congestion, and the creativity born from unusual spatial patterns both in plan and in section. Manhattan’s skyscrapers, the result of geographic need, intensify human interaction.

In Life in the Metropolis, Koolhaas elaborates on his view of urban expansion, stating “Manhattan represents the apotheosis of the ideal of density per se, both of population and of infrastructures; its architecture promotes a state of congestion on all possible levels, and exploits this congestion to inspire and support particular forms of social intercourse that together form a unique culture of congestion”.

This idealism of congestion can be seen best in the Downtown Athletic Club. An experiment in juxtaposition, Koolhaas intentionally creates unexpected friction between programs i.e. locating an oyster bar within a men’s locker room. Koolhaas’ work is a reimagination of context, given the relatively small portion of program that touches the ground and aligns at street level in relation to the overall program. Whether or not this experimentation was successful is measured best in the dialogue it facilitates rather than the architecture it creates.