Leaky Stuff


Design Studio - Postgraduate Master Students at SAC


‘Leaky stuff’ is an exploration into realism. It presupposes that architectural representation is rendered ambiguous through aesthetic leakages. A leak is defined as the slippage that happens when multiple realms of representation coexist in a single image or architectural space.



The design studio aims to introduce students to various design procedures and strategies that co-opt aesthetic leakages as part of their conceptual and strategic development. Moreover, the studio aims to generate a critical discussion on presumed standards and conventions of aesthetics in architecture.


Leakiness transgresses political and economic constructs by being inclusive. It embodies and delivers an aesthetic of fluidity and is specific to contemporary technology. Leakiness sees different regimes of aesthetics coexist and cancels out the previous binary opposition between different representational regimes that previously existed in sequential exclusiveness. 




The studio has engaged with a varied spectrum of design mediums, from Neural Style Transfer to Photogrammetry, to generate lush yet detailed design outcomes. These have been situated in the context of existing buildings in Frankfurt, seeing existing and new aesthetic expressions co-mingle, mix, and transform into something new.




Students work by Postgraduate Master students Yin Tse Tseng, Golnaz Khosrawani, Navid Hajialiakbar, Prashant Chavan, Jennifer Yu, Saakib Sait, Aniket Shah, Anmol Kumar, and Amr Abdellatif - SAC, 2019 - Frankfurt
Yara Feghali / 2024