Designing Without Interiors: Seven Pedagogical Exercises on Body, Climate, Territory, and Politics

Abstract

This article presents seven pedagogical exercises developed within the Architectural Design Area at Universidad Europea de Madrid in response to the thematic framework Architecture Without Interiors. Conceived as transversal explorations across different academic levels, the projects examine how architectural thinking shifts when the interior is no longer treated as a stable point of departure. Through strategies based on networks, minimal devices, atmospheric gradations, and relational sequences, the exercises investigate how space emerges from the interaction between body, climate, territory, and collective life. Rather than defining enclosure, the projects test transitional conditions, porous limits, and negotiated comfort. Read together, they reveal teaching as a laboratory where architectural intelligence develops through experimentation, adjustment, and situated engagement.