Rethinking Follies — Design Anthology

As part of the 2020 Anthology Festival in Manila, some of the country’s foremost architecture and design firms conceived a series of pavilions under the programme title Follies

Image courtesy of WTA Architecture and Design Studio

Landscape architect and urban planner Paulo Alcazaren of PGAA Creative Design questioned the term event organisers used to describe the pavilions at the 2020 edition of Anthology Festival at Fort Santiago, Intramuros, Manila. In architecture literature, follies are described as whimsical, decorative and sometimes temporary, as opposed to the intentional, purposeful and permanent nature of other architecture. In an open forum, however, Alcazaren backtracked, ‘It’s not that follies don’t have meanings, they do. They often get a message across.’ Asked to design and build their own follies around the venue, a centuries-old fortress, Alcazaren's design firm and six others came up with various commentaries.

With their project, WTA Architecture and Design Studio argued that architecture is more than the sum of its materials. Titled No Virgin, the studio’s pavilion was made of non-virgin materials — timber frames came from old wooden electric posts and the floors from shipping pallets, while recycled plastic sheets made up the walls. Recycled materials likewise made up Visionarch’s Cloudscape. Balls constructed from recycled plastic cups hung over an undulating base made of the same material. The inclusion of a slide and swing meant visitors could engage with the structure up close, while at night the constellation of balls was illuminated and visitors could control the lights via an app. In contrast, Jagnus Design Studio’s We All Shine was meant to be admired from a distance. It was an ironic twist that the aluminium cube, perched on stilts in the middle of the moat, was intended to communicate diversity, inclusivity and the designers’ message that ‘architecture thrives in collaboration, not isolation.’

Where other pavilions recycled materials, PGAA Creative Design recycled a concept. The firm’s Kaway-An pavilion was a scaled down realisation of their competition proposal for a memorial for victims of martial law in the Philippines. At one-sixth the size of the original proposal, the pavilion took the form of a swirling staircase that meandered around landscaped mounds and up to a viewing deck. Indigenous bamboo, the quintessential symbol of resilience, was used in an attempt to prove the material’s usefulness in modern contexts. A few steps away was Buensalido Architects’ Multiplicity, a multifaceted landscape feature, civic space and sculptural art installation intended to impart the designers’ belief that architecture can have multiple personalities, and that a building can be beautiful and useful or private and public at the same time. This idea was also central to Joson Design’s Hulma, an installation intended to challenge the dualities within architecture. Visitors were invited to create their own anamorphic projections by arranging and rearranging stacks of laser-cut plywood around a cylindrical mirror. Jonathan O. Gan + Associates’ The New Plug City comprised modular units that each represented an urban feature such as commercial spaces, industrial zones and urban parks. Their project aimed to democratise urban design by allowing visitors to assemble the units in numerous combinations to create versions of an organic city.

While many visitors may have skimmed over the concept notes presented beside each pavilion, festival director William Ti Jr. believes that if the follies made people stop and think, then they’ve achieved their purpose under the festivals overarching theme of ‘Think Architecture’.

Text / Adrian Tumang