forty five degrees is a collaborative studio of architects and designers. In our practice, space-making is about resources, not only material or financial but the intangible resources of human and non-human knowledge.
In forty five degrees our work aims at investigating the built environment through research, design, and artistic experimentation, across multiple scales, analyzing its physical, social, and economic entanglements. We are interested in gathering protocols and collective approaches, exploring alternative living and city-making models and new paradigms of urban development by engaging with communities and local agents. We strive to create inclusive and accessible spaces through careful use of scale, material, and design language and are committed to rethinking education through academia and practice, placing design at the intersection of arts and sciences.
We work with cultural institutions and creative agencies in Germany and abroad. The studio’s projects have been supported by international institutions such as the Allianz Foundation, Goethe Institute Bucharest, PERSPEKTIVE- Fund for Contemporary Art and Architecture, and Akademie Schloss Solitude. Furthermore, we have collaborated with KW Institute of Contemporary Art, Department of Art and Design at the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Floating University, and the European Project Erasmus+ Youth in Action. For our work, we have been awarded by ArchDaily as Best Practices 2023 and by the Inspire Future Generations Award from Thornton Education Trust in London.
Our team takes different forms when engaging in collaborations with other experts, adapting to each project’s scope. forty five degrees was founded in November 2019, but took its official legal form in January 2021. forty five degrees is GbR, a partnership under the Civil Code.
team
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Alkistis Thomidou
+alkistis@forty-five-degrees.com
Alkistis is an architect, researcher and educator. She trusts in the temporal and speculative power of architecture to set directions and goals and navigate possible futures, and is always fascinated by the inventiveness of everyday life. Until recently, she was teaching and researching at the Institute for City and Space Development at Leibniz University, Hannover. Prior to that, she was a research and teaching associate at the Institute for Sustainable Urbanism at the TU Braunschweig. She is currently collaborating with KW e.V. Berlin on youth education and mediation programs. She has been design critic and lecturer at several institutions, and her work has been exhibited in numerous exhibitions. Alkistis holds a Master’s in Advanced Studies in Urban Design in developing territories at the ETH in Zurich and a diploma in Architecture from Aristotle University, Thessaloniki. She has been a fellow in Architecture at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart under the mentorship of Rahul Mehrotra, and a grantee at the Institut for Space Experiments at the Berlin University of Arts directed by Olafur Eliasson.
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Berta Gutiérrez Casaos
+Berta is an accomplished architect, researcher, and curator. Her professional journey has involved design, art, pedagogy, and philosophy. Her multifaceted role as a curator, researcher, and project leader has left a mark on institutions including TBA21 Thyssen Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Guggenheim Bilbao, the Ministry of Education of Argentina, CCCB, Medialab-Prado, Matadero Madrid, and the Polytechnic University of Madrid.
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Giulia Domeniconi
+Giulia is an architect and designer. Her practice that spans from spatial temporary models and pavilions, to furniture design, stage design, and sculpture. She is very engaged in contemporary art conception and production, an interest reflected in her 5-year collaboration with Julian Charrière in his Berlin studio. Giulia is interested in pushing the boundaries of her practice in search of ways to translate visions into compelling spaces and objects. Working across multiple scales, she aims to blur the boundary between architecture, design, art, and landscape.
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Lea Hobson
+Lea Hobson is a french and british freelance architect, set designer and activist based in Briançon. She graduated as an architect from ENSAPB (2011, Paris) and as a scenographer from the Royal School of Speech and Drama (2013, London). Over the years she has collaborated with architecture collectives: LYN Atelier (London), Encore Heureux Architects (Paris) as project manager in particular for the renovation of the Hôtel Pasteur in Rennes and works as a freelance architect for many clients and NGOs (Les Terrasses Solidaires, La Passa, La Fabrique des Impossibles…). She designed the scenography of theatre and opera productions with NOF Fribourg (Snow White, Teenage Bodies, Acis and Galatea, Moscou Paradis), dance productions with Antipode Danse Tanz, of exhibitions (Mucem) and installations (Southbank Centre). Simultaneaously, she is an environmental and climate activist involved in many activist mouvements.
