In an age of increased fragmentation, orientation and specialization, architectural research that aims at breaking new theoretical ground and introducing new techniques and methods of design makes sense only if it is able to formulate and make explicit an implied "discursive whole". The article argues that cartographic means enable architects to chart characteristics of space and explores the extent to which mapping in architectural design can potentially inform architectural construct. This form of activating spatial analysis is both projective and performative. By identifying three basic principles of activation, the article defines mapping as an instrumentalization, an operationalization or a conceptualization of the spatial map.

Spatial analysis and architectural design in border conditionsIt is in marginal urban areas, borders of states, territories and cities that limits of normal behaviour are transgressed and social and political differences become apparent. Such sites, where other spatial conditions have emerged, and that are "teeming with suggestive meanings and unexpected potential", have hardly been analyzed and discussed within the contemporary architectural discourse (Schoonderbeek, 2009, 30). Even though the spatial analysis of the city and the territory are seemingly well established practices in architectural discourse, the incorporation of characteristics of border conditions via these analyses have also hardly been discussed. The "operationalization of the contextual" within architectural design strategies remains conspicuously absent in reflections on architectural design procedures. Our paper addresses the speculative nature of the relationship between the spatial analysis of border conditions and architectural design by emphasizing and clarifying the "modus operandi" of an architectural project.By taking an experimental approach to spatial analysis and architectural design, we intend to challenge disciplinary borders. If borders are seen as the marginal urban regions where the "other" resides, it becomes important to provide alternative models to read the spatial, social and temporal conditions at hand. Therefore, we suggest bringing into play methods of spatial analysis such as mapping or literary techniques in the investigation of urban fringes, and in the speculative design of alternative urban realities. With this paper, we argue that an intrinsic relationship might exist between methods of spatial analysis and methods of architectural design. This text tries to clarify the underlying theoretical considerations of these architectural investigations and design projects. In order to achieve this, the article will first present four specific understandings of the border, namely as space of differentiation, as zone of performance, as space of encounter and as space of simultaneity. This part speculates on how this border space as a space of simultaneity should be explored. Second, the article brings to the fore how the border between architecture and literature can be employed for the reading of exactly such border spaces, and by extension, how to use methods deriving from the meeting of these disciplines in reacting upon border spaces through design interventions.

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