Konrad Braun (Germany)
Konrad Braun is an architect, urban researcher and project developer for an user-generated city in Berlin. As a co-founder of openBerlin e.V. and founding member of the Hidden Institute he is permanently in search of the city`s hidden potentials, tagging latent conflicts between urban society, politics and economy and focuses on the present practices of city residents everyday life who enable co-exisence and solidarity.
The online platform openberlin.org ia a socio-economic network for social initiatives of urban development and provides a essential tool for participative urban development, self-governance, spacial transformation and idea production. OpenBerlin e.V. was one of the initiators of initiative Haus der Statistik, an integrative proto-living project supporting refugees and work space for art, culture and education in a vacant administration building at Alexanderplatz.
Upon the publication FreiRaumFibel, a handbook of law for the creative usage of open spaces, a result of a two years scentific research has been completed, enables the transfer of knowledge between complex legal framework and simple appropriation of urban space.
For an user-generated city, we need a non-commercial approach to public land and a sovereign culture of the appropriation of open spaces in the city.