Speed Date / SPOLKA
Where are you from?
From Central Europe.
Where did you study?
We studied everywhere here: Košice, Brno, Bratislava, Budapest, Liberec, Prague, Wismar, Berlin, Edinburgh, Kyoto, Ahmedabad.
Who was your best teacher?
We have learned the most from our friends.
Who were/ are your parents?
Currently in particular Spolka+.
What don’t you enjoy in design?
Capitalism.
And on the contrary, what do you?
Caring, situatedness, engagedness.
What do you listen to?
Girlfriends, our bodies, and Kate Bush.
Your favourite film or cartoon?
Spirited Away, Star Trek, The Wire.
Who do you respect as an authority in and out of your field?
We don’t recognize questions about authorities in the field, but we do like the Matrix collective, for example.
What thing did you last buy?
Kitten post-it papers.
Do you buy professional literature? What was the latest book?
We buy for the common library. Our latest Berlin purchase is A Feminist Reading of Debt by Lucía Cavallero and Verónica Gago.
Do you vote?
Yes!
Who throws the best parties?
DJ Džbán in the East.
Your favourite dome?
Moka pot by Aldo Rossi.
Party dress. Made by…?
By our Kata @very_slowfashion.
Your hero from the past?
Heroines!
Best/nicest house?
The one who preferred not to stand up.
Do you have any stereotypes when you work? How do they show?
Turn a single footbridge proposal into a project for a regional strategy.
What’s on your desktop?
Black.
Best exhibition, work of art?
Recently we visited the Oslo Architecture Triennale with the whole collective. We were struck by the exhibition Coming into Community.
What do you respect both from the local and foreign design scene? And why?
We like everyone who works sensitively. For example Livia Gažová!
Ethics or money?
Ethics.
Extraordinary book?
There are many, but e.g. Critical Care: Architecture and Urbanism for a Broken Planet, Everyday Matters: Contemporary Approaches to Architecture.
Optimist, pessimist, nihilist?
Naive optimists.
Do you have any hobby?
We have a garden on the balcony.
Solo or in a collective?
Mdaa… We live by example.
Slovakia as the Promised Land?
Try to employ a student from Ukraine…