00133

In a short video of unknown source, describing the janitor duties, we can read the following subtitles:

"JANUS WAS THE ROMAN GOD WHO GUARDED GATES AND DOORS, SO IT’S NOT SURPRISING THAT THE FIRST “JANITORS” WERE DOORKEEPERS. GRADUALLY THE JOB RESPONSIBILITIES EXPANDED TO INCLUDE CLEANING, SWEEPING, AND OTHERWISE CARING FOR A BUILDING. THAT’S WHY JANITORS ARE SOMETIMES ALSO KNOWN AS “BUILDING CUSTODIANS” OR “MAINTENANCE WORKERS.” JUST ABOUT EVERY PLACE PEOPLE GATHER, RELY ON JANITORS TO KEEP THEM NEAT AND CLEAN. BUT CLEANING AND TRASH COLLECTION ARE OFTEN ONLY PART OF THE JOB.JANITORS MAY ALSO PERFORM SIMPLE ELECTRICAL AND PLUMBING WORK. THEY MAY RESPONSABLE FOR MAKING REPAIRS, REPLACING LIGHTS BULBS, AND EVEN FIXING OR REPLACING DOOR LOCKS. THEY MAY ALSO TEST AND SERVICE A BUILDING’S HEATING AND AIR CONDITIONING SYSTEMS. AT SOME LOCATIONS, JANITORS KEEP SIDEWALKS CLEAN OF SNOW IN THE WINTER AND TEND A BUILDING’S LAWNS AND SHRUBS IN THE SUMMER. SOME JANITORIAL DUTIES CAN BE UNPLEASANT. BUT BUILDING OWNERS AND SUPERVISORS DEPEND ON HAVING A CLEAN, PLEASANT ENVIRONMENT FOR THEIR TENANTS AND VISITORS. KNOWING THAT YOU ARE CONTRIBUTING TO THE MAINTENANCE OF SUCH AN ENVIRONMENT CAN BE VERY SATISFYING."

illustration inspired from:

Artist Duane Hanson (American, 1925-1996), Janitor, 1973. Polyester, fiberglass, and mixed media, life size.

18.12.2019

00132

" GUIDE DU DÉPANNAGE et des RÉPARATIONS DOMESTIQUES de sélection du Reader's Digest " third edition, published in 1977. It is an illustrated book, that covers a large number of home reparations. For example, it explains how to change a window, repairing a pipe, remove damage carpet or wood floor or how to fix the washing machine.

In the chapter: Plumbing - central heating - the radiators, page 250. The publication explains how to remove air from the radiators, fix a join, repair a radiator handle and how to install a radiator shelf ( represented in the illustration).

In relation to radiator shelf, we can read:

"Les tablettes protègent vos murs contre les traces noirâtres qui apparaissent autour des radiateurs"

The shelfs protect your walls against the darkening that appears around radiators.

16.12.2019

00131

At the entrance of this Brussels apartment we found a "recessed frame" or "mat well" that could be use to accommodate a mat. In this case, the mat was missing.

Mat wells help the mat to remain in a specific position as well as to level the upper suface of the mat with the floor, creating a homogenous ground level.

You can find them in a great varaety of materials as well as forms. Today it is very common to find messages witten on the mats, such as: wellcome, wipe your paws, oh no not you again, oh shit you again, nice underwear, no shoes, the neighbours have better stuff, etc.

Door mat works as a barrier, it helps to keep dirt and humidity outside the living area. It hotels, offices, hospital, housing blocks, etc, the mats can be several square meters.

13.12.2019

00115

Gordon Bunshaft for Skidmore Owings and Merrill, Lever House, 1951-52 (390 Park Avenue, NYC), American headquarters of the British soap company Lever Brothers. One of the first examples of curtain wall and the first gondola.

Curtain wall system blocks the access to the external surfaces from the inside of the building, giving a great control over the conditions of the air. ( you can not open a window )

Gondolas are mechanical platforms that allow window cleaners to reach external surfaces of buildings. Gondolas are todays extremely common.

In the original picture from which this illustration was produced, both operators seems to have been black out.

00118

We needed an extra tap at the kitchen, so I decided to do some DIY plumbing. Unfortunately it turned out to be much more complicated than expected as I encountered plastic pipes.

PEX or CPVC are a revolutionary systems for the hydraulics installation of any project. There are light, malleable and easy to assemble. Unfortunately for me, specific joints and tools have been designed for these systems.

As I am not a professional, I do not have the needed tools. As a consecuence, I had to break apart the previous installation and star from 0.

00116

Renzo Piano during a conference, presenting the Shard,in the Shard. In a video, of limited quality Renzo says:

“This .. in a great day you have this view … this transparency this luminosity, when the sun shows up … of course this also makes sense because the shard are multiples and the sun never touch all the shard together, only touch one. I mean, one of the reasons why we in T ( this?) city condensation and intensification is because …..(unintelligible) intense of energy. .(unintelligible)”

At this point all the attention of the public focus on a group of window cleaners situated at the exterior of the building. They are climbing down doing their duties. At first, they stop at the conference level, but understanding that everyone is looking at them, they move down to the next level.

“London we have more than 300.000 people everyday passing by, so this is very … one of the few places in London where you can do something like that (unintelligible), so energy …energy .. consuming energy on expressing energy somewhere in this building are coming together”

00058

Printed on a fabric covering the Concord temple in Sicily a representation of how the building could have looked like originally. Printing historic buildings on fabrics that cover construction works is a common practice. From the eye of a spectator, scaffolding systems and workers seem to disturb the volume, the beauty, the essence of the building.

Ironically, these works can greatly influence the longevity of the building. From our perspective, to hide these conservative processes is a counterproductive measure. It does not lead to a better understanding of the life cycle of the building neither the different practices that maintain it.

00060

Window cleaners dress up as superheroes to cheer up hospitalized kids.

00053

Fix windows are a recurrent feature in architecture. The only way to access the exterior surface is from the outside and this can be problematic / dangerous / expensive if you do not have the right tool.

00056

In this occasion the avalanche control system strategy, involve an expert mountaineer trained in explosives.

00057

The consumption of wet wipes has increased greatly in the last decades. As have increased the presence of fatbergs blocking the sewer system.

In the subtittle of an article in a spanish newspaper descriving the consecuences of: “Wet wipes are the worst enemy of sewer systems in cities “ Manuel Planelles, El monstruo que atasca las cloacas, ElPais, h ttps://elpais.com/politica/2015/03/28/actualidad/1427559908_539511.html

00000

The artillery control programme put on place by Canadian troops aims to reduce the risk of uncontrolled avalanches by shooting the mountains.

00125

In a diagram from How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They’re Built is a book a tv series written by Stewart Brand, we see how often/easily components needs/can to be replace.

In the case of producing a drawing representing the maintenance cycles, it would likely look very similar.

00123

"A piece of property is abandoned, weeds grow up, a window is smashed. Adults stop scolding rowdy children; the children, emboldened, become more rowdy. Families move out, unattached adults move in. Teenagers gather in front of the corner store. The merchant asks them to move; they refuse. Fights occur. Litter accumulates. People start drinking in front of the grocery; in time, an inebriate slumps to the sidewalk and is allowed to sleep it off. Pedestrians are approached by panhandlers."

Extract coming from the original article written in 1982 by social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling.

The "Broken Window Theory" has been mostly interpreted to reduce crime through police presence focusing on small crimes and has been contested for targeting low income communities therefore.

But based on the book Palaces for the People: How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization, and the Decline of Civic Life, Eric Kbinenberg points in The New Yorker with The Other Side of Broken Windows (August 23, 2018) what would happen if vacant property received the attention that, for decades, has been given to fight petty crime?

Police strategies based on the "Broken Window Theory" seem to have been successful but leave many questions open on how the society does or can develop around these authority representatives.

What if this theory is not used as a police strategy but rather as a city vacancy policy? What if we support low incomes to care about their housing through financial and educational support, or by increasing the number of maintainers (gardeners, plumbers, painters, etc.) Who support these communities rather than police officers?

The drawing of this entry represents a broken window in Brussels. The cracks have been hidden by painting branches, leaves and flowers of diferent kinds.

00075

In Nyborg Denmark, 6 family houses / prototypes were built within the MiniCO2 project. Each of them approaching a different way of reducing CO2 emissions. Two of these projects targeted a free maintenance home, there names are Traditional Maintenance-Free House and Innovative Maintenance-Free House ( by LETH & GORI and ARKITEMA ARCHITECTS respectively ). Both seeking not to have any maintenance needs during 50 years.

The drawing has been created from the plan of Traditional Maintenance-Free House.

00124

Oil paintings are more valuable than acrylic ones. The price difference between both techniques has many reasons.

One of the most obvious is that oil paintings have been there for longer and have already proofed there capacity to last through time. We know how they age and how to look after them.

Can you imagine how this could be translated into the architectural field: that the techniques and materials most valued would be those we understand the best, those we can take care of?

00084

A pattern design can be very useful to hide signs of wear.

00064

California suffers from severe droughts from time to time, but the one recorded between 2011 and 2015 has been the worst ever known.

Authorities put in place water restrictions to ensure this valuable resource. Because of these restrictions, lawns could no longer be water and gardens rapidly turned into browny colours.

Creative entrepreneurs proposed painting services to counteract the effects of the drought. With a fresh layer every 3 months you could have a green lawn even in the driest conditions.

"…and you do not even need to worry about cutting it ! ! "

00091

At the entrance of a building there is an elegant cactus garden. It has been strategically positioned to be seen by all the neighbours, visitors as well as to avoid undesired presence. Covered spaces such as building entrances, bridges, playgrounds, metro stations, etc, offer shelter to those sleeping or hanging around in the streets. The techniques used to control such behavior are very diverse and often less elegand than this garden.

00098

Fatberg Autopsy is a UK TV programme that try to unveil the reasons, the tratements, the composition, the danger ... behind fatbergs. Fatbergs are a mix of organic and non organic material ( such as fat or wep wipers ) that blocks the sewers.

00072

A short teaser presenting a window cleaning robot with an inspiring and powerful background music. The short video shows how the HOBOT works. How you can control it remotely, how it goes autonomously all around.

In other videos created by users, it is possible to listen to the loud noise produced by the robot that needs to produce a vacuum in order not to fall.

00079

The inhouse painter of the University of St Louis at Brussels, holds in his hand a large set of keys. These keys give him privilege and almost exclusively access to all the university ( private, public and technical areas ).

“ Not even the director can get where I can go “.

00090

Man kills his wife and then kills himself in the UK. Aparently he was extremly distress by the propagation of knotweed in his property. This plan can grow very agresively and it is dificult to eradicate.

Knotweed is aplan originally from Japon. Here in europe is consider today a invasive species.

00096

At a young age, trees are likely to be damaged in an urban environment. In order to give a better chance, a metallic structure has been set up around it.

000100

In 2018 Monsanto asked by a California court to pay $289 m to a school gardener with a terminal illness after using roundup, one of Monsanto most sold products around the globe.

00073

To shaking hands in order to get them dry is a common, intuitive and effective gesture. Unfortunately for the cleaner, water drops will land all over the place and once are dry . . . spots will appear.

00080

A sofa's protective cover can be an economic and efficient way of ensuring the longevity of your furniture.

00097

When planting trees is common to install one or several perforated tubes that go several meters into the ground and around the tree roots. These tubes are used to water the tree during dry seasons.