Pêndulo by fala explores migrant care and domestic intimacy through an itinerant stage system

Presented across Lisbon, Zagreb, Berlin, Warsaw, and Bologna, Pêndulo by fala unfolds as an itinerant stage project that navigates the intersection of domestic intimacy and broader social structures. Developed in 2023, the work frames a set of questions that remain both immediate and unresolved. “How do immigrant workers relate to the families they care for, and how are they shaped by these relationships. What does it mean to leave one home in order to sustain another. And at a larger scale, how does a society position itself in relation to those it receives.”

Within this framework, the stage becomes a site where personal and political dimensions briefly overlap. It is not conceived as a neutral backdrop, but as an active spatial device that holds and exposes these tensions.

A stage set, in this context, operates with a different kind of clarity. Unlike conventional architecture, it does not seek permanence or enclosure. Its elements are intentionally thin, almost provisional, existing less to define space than to project meaning. The design embraces this condition, using it as a way to foreground relationships rather than conceal them.

The structure is conceived as a modular system, capable of adapting to different theatres and spatial constraints encountered throughout its itinerant journey. This flexibility allows the project to maintain conceptual continuity while responding to varied contexts, reinforcing its role as both object and situation.

The material palette is deliberately modest. MDF panels, slender metal profiles, corrugated sheets, and layers of paint are assembled with clarity and efficiency. These ordinary components are not concealed but articulated, forming a temporary architecture that prioritises legibility over permanence.

Through this economy of means, the project establishes a direct relationship between construction and meaning. Each element contributes to a spatial narrative that is both immediate and open-ended, where the boundaries between fiction and reality remain intentionally blurred.

Pêndulo exists as a transient structure, moving across cities and contexts while maintaining its conceptual core. Its temporality is not a limitation but a defining quality. The project does not aim to endure physically, but to frame a condition, to stage a moment where private relations and collective structures become visible.

In doing so, it positions architecture not as a fixed object, but as an instrument capable of articulating social questions through space, material, and presence.

Project Credit

Project name: fala 189 (pêndulo by Marco Martins)
Design firm: Fala / @fala.atelier
Location: lisbon, zagreb, berlin, warsaw, bologna (itinerant)
Year: 2023
Area: 150m2