At the end of last year, bachelor’s students enrolled in the civil engineering and architecture programme at Ghent University were assigned to the Studio Waarneming en Beeldende Media (Observation and Visual Media Studio). This studio allows students to rediscover traditional and new forms and techniques of presentation: sketches, models and plans, as well as collages, montages, photographs and films. Third-year bachelor’s students were given the assignment of designing a small nightclub, in which they not only had to ensure spatial quality, but also and above all had to research the specific subculture of nightlife.

The assignment did not require them to produce designs for a discotheque for mass entertainment and relaxation. Rather, it focused on the temporary, fleeting nature of a nightclub experience, with architecture that is perhaps at its best when it is least noticeable. Or at least takes the form of a suggestive dream world in which the freedom to be who you are is sacred.