The German architectural gallery Aedes was established in West Berlin in 1980 by Kristin Feireiss and Helga Retzer, as a platform for discussing contemporary architecture through exhibitions, lectures, and publications. During its first 20 years, Aedes functioned as an entirely private gallery and presented mainly single architects and iconic projects. The gallery changed its institutional framework in 1999 by creating a parallel non-profit association, Aedes East, making it possible for Aedes to have new sources of funding and expand its program. From that moment on, the gallery organized more thematic and collective exhibitions, some addressing the way architects work and the role they should have in society. The message was initially directed to architects themselves. For instance, in 2005 Aedes organized the exhibition Find the Gap–New Spirits and Strategies for Architecture. Through the works and practices of 13 young German teams, the gallery showed the ways in which architects were redefining their profession to keep it alive and relevant. In 2013, Aedes went even further and encouraged architects to reach out to the rest of society and put their profession to the service of social and environmental issues in developing countries. That was the main intention behind Smart City, The Next Generation, Focus Southeast Asia, an exhibition with original projects for countries in Southeast Asia. Smart City stands as an example of a ‘reactive' and ‘activist' exhibition, one that attempts to solve contemporary issues in the world, an approach that Aedes shares with other institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The gallery is therefore aligned with the general architectural discourse of the last 15 years that exhorts architects to reconnect with their social responsibilities. As a smal and independent institution, Aedes further expands and experiments with this discourse in its own way.