Mark #55

Mark #55 goes off the radar, featuring a handful of lengthy, painstaking efforts to restore remote, abandoned villages in Southern Europe. Anti-digital hermits and opportunistic estate agencies alike unite in an organic, archaeological process that has come to be known as 'slow architecture'. Through this lens, Sanderyn Amsberg and Daniel Jauslin explore secluded residences in Spain and Portugal, then lavish hideouts in Italy.

Just as they find beauty in age, our cover subject finds beauty in the beast. Rogue concept architect Didier Faustino speaks with Ana Martins about the necessity of bad architecture, expounding on the development of his unorthodox principles through an assorted portfolio. From a comic-book explosion in a quiet suburb, to a human cargo case for an airplane – functionality mingles inextricably with aesthetic statement to disrupt symbolic power constructs.

Faustino pioneers the new bad, while Arno Brandlhuber restores the old – showing tough love to a few 'exceptionally ugly' chunks of concrete on the outskirts of his native Berlin. Claus Van Wageningen's Dutch military museum in Soesterberg pays close tribute to Mies van der Rohe, while Coop Himmelb(l)au's new exhibition complex in Lyon forges a brave new world just as multifaceted in subject and structure.

Brooklyn-based Marc Fornes explores the physical frontiers of computer modelling through his workshop Theverymany. Just before a closing book exchange with Norwegian architect Kjetil Trædal Thorsen, the newfound luxury of the ancient remnants from which we emerged in Europe comes full circle with an altogether new type of ruin in a Tokyo apartment complex.