Permission granted for Moxon Architects Hedgehog building
14
Apr 2009
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Last week, Moxon Architects announced that permission was granted to construct the Hedgehog building, also known as 163 PRS / Olivers Place. The 40,000 square foot office building is located in Prestons, England.
the primary architectural expression of the building is through an array of anodised aluminium fins, cantilevered from vertical support brackets on all four façades of the building. The aluminium fins, are all oriented in the same direction.
Seen at designboom. More images after the break.
Are those fins have any purpose?
wow a bird heaven
at least the building is protected just in case Godzilla or King Kong ever decide to attack. ;)
Why????
digital wet dream. i predict a hellish building
yum, bird kabobs
doesn’t aluminum have a lot of embodied energy? it seems like kind of a waste here..
Maybe something to do with sun shading or… possibly the same technology used on roads to generate electricity? I dont know much about that.
I wish there was more info on the project posted here. I’m gonna have to go research it now. Thanks for distracting me from my homework, ArchDaily.
I suppose its for shading, considering the whole facade is transparent. and it makes a rather boaring building dynamic
I like it :)
On another site they give the precision this is sun shading system, oriented to optimise on summer\winter basis the shading.
I don’t know but with the infos we have we can predict they will have a lot of funny issues with this design no? Birds a some of you noticed, flying plastic bags, trapped cleaning staff workers and so on…
Hairealism Architecture (a new movement)
renderings look cool and all but seems like a maintenance nightmare. at least now i know where to skewer my victims.
Looks good in renderings… Could you use these thin blades to trap some sort of energy for the building itself, or else seems no real purpose for them as there are some much easier sun louvres, and yes, the birds would love it!
The spines are to protect the building from architectural criticism, obviously. The purpose is in the title.
Anyone heard of the quip about the difference between porcupines and bmw drivers? Wonder what the natural frequency of the splines will sound like when the wind whistles through them on a windy day.
Hey Maxon! might want to do some research on Preston’s bird population!
I’d like to see a good rendering of this building complete with chip wrappers, crisp packets, tin cans and all manner of other detritus typifying northern towns like Preston wedged in amongst those fins. That would be the money-shot CGI for me
if I were a planner there.
architecture of the absurd. architecture that will surely discredit the profession in that town. architects that sat on pins and needles during the design concepting.
I like it better far away than close up (effect vs. reality).
I don’t get it. It looks cool but a serious waste of resources unless those things generate electricity – a billion solar panels would be more appropriate or maybe micro wind generators.
big bird´s mother
Isn´t this building the one that generate electricity with the movement/vibration of all those brackets that are -again- moved by the wind…?
Pecularity is not considered a function these times, don`t you know?
Hope all you comment guys have something to do in your life ..
I do think its an interesting solution towards shading. Although very expensive to build and maintain. At least it will be a photographers dream come true once built. ;)
it just like a building in the wind!
All I see are annoying quips about the needles. How about finding some evidence that they’re not useful before cutting the architect down, who obviously has put an extreme amount of effort into the design.
Troy. It really doesn’t take a lot of time to do a rendering, and my experience of the majority of architects is the amount of thought that goes into the construction / cost / maintenance issues of the building is generally very slim. Its all about the CGI, the bling, getting a bit more PR. Most people realise that about the industry, hence all the posts here questioning how it will be cleaned, what it will cost, what they actually do. The architectural industry as it currently stands is guilty until proven innocent when it comes to constructional conceits, I’m afraid.
As a student, I’ve put a huge amount of thought and work into my designs, and I’ve been taught to do so. Maybe I expect too much, but nonetheless, I think that comments should be a little bit more in depth and worth it to read through to gain a little knowledge instead of getting annoyed by one liners and insults written with horrible grammar. For example:
sisifo: “big bird’s mother”
Troy. Unfortunately you probably do have unrealistically high expectations of the ethics and rigour of practise. It normal, but that’s good – you don’t want to start out cynical, there’s plenty of time for cynicism to develop. Now I’ve been to Moxon architects site and researched those spines. They themselves say that in places, the fins function as a ‘brise soleil’ (solar shading if you’re not good on French or Corbusier), as well as providing the facade expression. Now, to my mind, I think that’s an overly elaborate and complicated way of achieving some solar shading, and I can forsee numerous problems in maintenance and cleaning. There is no mention of the reason why the spines are on all four sides of the building, despite this building being firmly located in the northern hemisphere, and there’s no comment about consideration that has been given to some of the potential problems that most people who have seen these renderings have flagged up.
We can only go on the info we are given.
Thanks Ralph, I appreciate that you actually went to their site and researched what they were for. I did the same a couple of days ago. Unfortunately, I’ve always been cynical, and unfortunately, I can’t take your word for it 100% about the practice, because this is a comment board on a website. Nothing against you, but this really isn’t a great forum of credibility.
Maybe my expectations are too high, but my own expectations for myself will always be high. I know you probably know a lot about the practice, but can’t be someone that throws a 5 minute problematic design to his draftsman. That’s not the way to change the world for the better.
Well, its good to have high standards and I wish you the best of luck. I have worked at a number of firms with strong reputations (RIBA award winners, featured in “40 under 40″ etc) and I’m consistently shocked, disappointed and alarmed by the slim amount of time that is given over to actually resolving the design in a holistic way. I think if you manage to find a firm that embraces construction, economy of means, aesthetics and function in a genuine way, then you will have found a great firm to work for – either that, or you’ll be working somewhere in eastern Switzerland. The majority of practises its a production line churning out either the same concept (the Paladio approach, just give them a tweak of the last one we did) or forever something shiny and bling in the hope of getting on here and getting their name in lights. Most architects are egomaniacs and love the attention, and regrettably, you have to graft for a long time to get money and accreditation from sensible design, whereas folly gets you there in a heartbeat.
very nice and very similar (for example) as this
http://bryla.gazetadom.pl/bryla/51,85298,6291380.html?i=27
hedgehog
What if there is a storm, or something breakthru? All those blades will be like a rain of knives..