Karl W. Grosse

As an architect and designer Karl W. Grosse is interested in mobile and immobile architecture. In his Master’s thesis, he analysed the different ways in which basic human needs are satisfied in both nomadic and settled peoples. He researched the importance of ties and access to transportation, supply, disposal and social systems; his means was self-experimentation, in mobile housing.

As a subsection of the project »The Anthropocene Kitchen«, he plans to study the »kitchen of the future«. On one hand, this involves examining how the kitchen of the future was envisioned in the past: what were the driving forces and general principles which led to radical, reforming changes in kitchen architecture and design in the 19th and 20th centuries? On the other, this research question is directed from the present day towards the kitchen of the future:

• as a construction/spatial unit in homes
  
• as an economic, social, and cultural centre in individual and collective households
  
• as an ensemble of technical appliances, equipment, installations and their use
  
• as a node in supply and disposal networks
  
• as a site of action and experience: learning to cook and eat, acquiring a taste for ..., developing a sense of enjoyment, etc., regaining self-control

Ultimately, he is seeking to answer this question: what practical starting points does thinking about the kitchen of the future provide so as to direct one’s own everyday actions towards the problems of the Anthropocene and to explore the freedom for manoeuvre oneself?