Architecture spaces can be formed in many ways, the new environment depends on the object which will be forming a part of it. Going against trends and occupying spaces, using contrast elements to reconstruct it. The project looks for new and unusual territories in small and dark underground spaces investigating it and using different parts to construct through the eyes of botanist. One of the objectives is to construct an underground environment, to build up the space for the hybrid orchids species. The architectural idea is to interlace the delicate and pure organism of nature with dark, deep and hidden subterranean spaces. Since the begging of my project I was always interested in a dualistic approach and two spaces above and below ground, the connection of two things, looking through the totality about the connection between opposites in the spaces.

I'm trying to develop and reconstruct something that can be inhabited and planted in the subterranean space. The aim of my project is to seek, activate and define new roles for the new place, new territory underneath and digging deep below the surface to make the whole underground to grow. As in the architectural terms, creating an environment for the growing orchids, creating space of living that would be a new living space for plants which would allow to articulate spatially and to deal with it architectonically. The film "Adaptation" ( by Charlie Kaufman 28/02/2003) is a great and inspirational movie, especially related to orchids and the idea how they adapt to different environments. It is based on Susan Orlean's non- fiction book "The Orchid Thief" through the self- referential events.

SITE
The special underground location to develop my architecture is situated at the intersection of cardinal roads with the cave sitting underneath of crossroads in Royston. The two ancient roads forming the crossroads around which Royston developed. This below the surface artificial cave has different suggestions about the way it was created. This cave is unique in Britain for its numerous carvings, unknown mysterious origin, symbolism and unfamiliarity. The real origin and one of suggestions were humans interacting with the landscape in which the crossing of two roads was visualised as 'axis mundi' . The meaning of "axis mundi" describes the vertical connection of both spaces above ground and below ground there the cave is also very important part of it and Phillip Coppens in his article "Royston Cave: creating a medieval magical centre" emphasizes the unique combination of the site'' ... the creation of roads and crossroads was an important aspect- the crossing of two roads was visualised as an axis mundi: an axis of the world, in which not only two roads on the horizontal plane crossed, but a vertical line existed that connected Earth both to Heaven and the Underworld...." (Phillip Coppens "Royston Cave: creating a medieval magical centre ", article appeared in "Hera" nr.90, july 2007). The fascinating part of subterranean cave is narrow shafts leading up to the ground level, different carvings, holes, opening going through to the dark and hidden areas and connecting them with the other spaces of the cave. In my project these underground openings could be transformable spaces, using the sections through them and the landscape building up the new network of the caves and creating the new below ground living.

The traditional perception of the shape of orchids was always pleasing due to the symmetry of the flowers to the steams and leaves. This has led for the orchid to be a symbol of perfection and beauty for hundreds of years. Also stylish nature and wide range of selection of orchid makes it unique. They are often well thought-out to be a grouping of beauty and variety, the appeal comes in all colors except the color black. In addition, to this, it is known that there is no other plant species which have as many different flowers as orchid have. It grows on another plant upon which it depends for the mechanical support but not for the nutrients, this organism needs the skeleton which would help to frame it and hold it, this support usually is a key to grow up. Orchids belong to epipyhite* plant group and also is called air plant.

Epipyhite*- A plant that grows on another plant and depends on it for support but not food. Epipyhite get moisture and nutrients from air or from small pools of water that collect on the host plant.

The whole idea of orchids has an amazing history, how they develop very strategically. This organism doesn't give anything back to its environment, but it just takes and shows a beauty which is almost obsessive to the human eye. It's a varied selfish artificial organism which gives the idea of thinking about the orchid in a different diverse way. People are obsessed with by orchids and that is a huge architecturally, moreover all people have to be obsessed what they are going to do...

".....The Orchidaceae are a family perennial plants with one fertile stamen and three petalled flowers that, depending on the species, can be anything from pale specks to voluptuous masses. Generally speaking, orchids seem to drive people crazy. The people who love orchids love them madly, but the passion for orchids is not necessarily a passion for beauty. Something about the form of an orchid makes it seem almost more like a creature than a flower. Many orchids are-strange looking, and others have bizarre shapes and jarring color combinations, and all orchids are rather ugly when they aren't in flower.....Orchids have adapted to almost every environment on earth. They can be mutated, crossbred, and cloned. They can take the form of complex architectural structures or of garish, glamorous, luscious flowers. Not surprisingly, orchids have all sorts of sexual associations; few other flowers are as plainly erotic in appearance or effect. Even other creatures find orchids alluring.

Orchid collecting began in Victorian England as a hobby for the very rich people with enough land for greenhouses and enough money to sponsor expeditions to where the rarest species could be found. The hobby grew so consuming that it was known in Victorian times as orchidelirium, because a sort of mania seized collectors....

..."The bug hits you. You can join A.A. to quit drinking, but once you get into orchids you can't do anything to kick." Collecting can be a sort of love sickness. If you begin collecting living things, you are pursuing something imperfectible, and even if you manage to find them and to possess them, there is no guarantee they won't die or change. The botanical complexity of orchids and their mutability makes them perhaps the most compelling and maddening of all collectible living things.....New orchids are being created in laboratories or discovered every day, and others exist only tiny numbers in remote places. To desire orchids is to have a desire that can never be fully requited. A collector who wants one of every orchid species will die before even coming close....

The really special orchid is the ghost.The shape, the delicacy, and the quivery sensitivity of these slender tails makes the flower look like feathers or the legs of ballerina or two little flags. Because it is leafless and grows on trees, and because the root system blends into the tree or rock it wraps around, the bloom of the ghost can appear invisibly suspended, as if it were a creature in flight.

Carlyle Luer, the author of "The Native Orchids in Florida," the definitive guide to the subject, once wrote of the ghost orchid, "Should one be lucky enough to see a flower, all else will seem eclipsed."....."

Orchid Fever by Susan Orlean, The New Yorker, January 23, 1995

Ghost Orchid ( luminousinspiration.wordpress.com/)

Environment for the sensitive organism

Orchids in different surfaces create a new context, mapping planting areas on certain growing surfaces. The same organism can change its appearance or have a mask in wide range of colours in relationship to its environment. Orchid's mysterious appeal is always changeable and blurry. The series of sections through the plant shapes and curves slowly transform the cave into the different spaces. One of the objectives of the project is to create an environment for delicate and sensitive organism, there they could adapt to the certain climatic zones, hot, cold, solid surfaces, flexible and stiffer interiors.

What role am I in my project? Am I a part of it? Or just an observer from the distance?

In exploration of my project I would act as a botanist, collector which collects all these orchids together, collecting architectural spaces amongst orchids, developing the language through that and transforming fascinating cave spaces and designing hybrid orchid spaces. The list of my orchids, ink drawings, how ink and water are bleached in the surfaces of orchids and trying to think as an architect botanist, who creating collections of amazing organisms, thinking of the space in which they grow up and try to change underground spaces and transform the cave in relationship to the orchids.