J. MAYER H. startet in Berlin about seven years ago. The office spans from very small interventions and objects all the way to urban design. It always tries to negotiate certain ideas of context and program, so there is no ideal one condition but it is always an architecture that transforms and mutates according to different aspects.

- The exhibition and the web page are about "exchange" through the discipline of architecture. What do you think about the concept of "exchange" and its possibilities?

This a very important moment in architecture. Of course not every person, but most people get educated in schools all over the world; they commute, they work in offices in other countries and come back. So it’s already an exchange that happens within the office itself. I used to work in Japan for a couple of weeks, in France for a couple of weeks, I was trained in Germany and in America and I think that’s a kind of biography that a lot of architects have nowadays. The idea of national identity is newly defined due to education exchange programs and at some point we commit ourselves to a place and work from there; maybe very internationally, maybe very local. But it also became clear today that it’s not so much about western world and eastern world but maybe we even better understand the differences in architecture culture discussions between Germany and France for example. So the idea of what is closer and what is further away is not necessarily a question of distances.

- Have you so far had good exchanges with the other architects?

Yes, some people you meet again because we joined other conferences before, some people you know their work but you don’t know the person. And then some people and work become a new discovery. I think it’s a very good event and it should continue.

- What kind of events would you want to have or do you have any suggestions to enhance this concept of “exchange”?

Well, I think the discussion format is a good idea. I don’t know if it’s the best way to have everybody at the same time because then, each person can only speak two sentences every half an hour. It maybe better to have smaller and more compact groups with denser and more lively discussion for let’s say half an hour, forty five minutes.
I think that an exhibition is a good idea but maybe you can also make a real workshop. Let’s just get our hands started and do something get out there and try to test out something for half a day, with sketches, models, to work together than just a discussion form.