Memory Re-Configured: Working with Fragments as Catalyst for Imagination

Abstract

This contribution elaborates on how the reuse of architectural fragments in secondary contexts can generate associative, memorial, or intense sensorial experiences of interiors in an increasingly standardised and homogeneous interior world. Integrating these second-hand fragments can elevate interiors beyond anonymity, particularly when composed of high-quality materials or intricate craftsmanship. Their haptic qualities provide more grounded interior experiences, evoking associations with time and place that are connected to local identity and zeitgeist. The fragments function as first-hand liaisons between past and present, and additionally, between observer and maker. In this paper, the well-known paths on Philopappos Hill by Dimitris Pikionis will be discussed as an imagined interior, configured as a sensitive landscape that reassembles a time and place never truly existed, merged from the haptic qualities of reused fragments of local debris. The imperfect fragments guide the observer on a sensorial journey embedded with associations and historical references, demonstrating their capacity to attract and evoke contact with the past while shaping a reality that the observer imagines. In this way, the fragments act as catalysts for imagination and as generators of sensorial experiences. Memory Re-Configured reflects on the significance of the fragment’s materiality, while also reconsidering the contemporary designer’s methodology: the designer shifts from being a consumer of raw and processed materials to a collector and configurator of existing fragments. In doing so, the contemporary interior may re-valuate the power of imagination, re-present memory, and evoke sensitive interpretations and associations through the reuse of second-hand fragments.