Crystal Clear / C.F.Møller Architects + Kristin Jarmund Arkitekter
C. F. Møller Architects, in collaboration with Kristin Jarmund Arkitekter, have won a major competition to design a new landmark for Oslo. Their project, entitled Crystal Clear, consists of three towers, which are composed of stacked, prismatic volumes that will provide a dynamic new addition to the city’s skyline.
More about the towers after the break. (more…)
d3 Natural Systems 2009 Competition winners announced
Architectural Design Competition d3 is pleased to announce the winners of the Natural Systems competition for 2009. The program promotes investigation of natural systems from microscopic to universal toward determining new architectonic strategies.
The competition invited architects, designers, engineers, and students to collectively explore the potential for analyzing, documenting, and deploying nature-based, sustainable influences in urbanism, architecture, interiors, and designed objects.
The competition awarded seven prizes, with first place captured by London-based Kenny Kinugasa-Tsui and Lorene Faure for their project: “Urban Agriculture: Hybridized Farm Bridge as City Garden”. Some of the awards, after the break. (more…)
Modern Colosseum / Cepezed Architects
The Netherlands-based Cepezed Architects were recently appointed by the offices of the Hague Capital of Culture to design a temporary theater. The city strives to be named the European Capital of Culture in 2018, so the architects have created a contemporary version of the Roman Colosseum to become an important icon for the area.
More about the Colosseum after the break. (more…)
ARTIC / HOK
HOK‘s Los Angeles office, with Parsons Brinckerhoff, was just announced the winner for the ARTIC (Anaheim Regional Transportation Intermodal Center) in Anaheim, California. This new transit center, featuring a high-speed rail network, will update Anaheim’s public transportation system and ignite further development in the city. “We’re getting the critical infrastructure in place where you can actually envision a day in the future where you can reliably get around without a car,” added Todd Osborne, vice-president at HOK.
More about the ARTIC transit center after the break. (more…)
Design for Teheran / Giuseppe Iodice
As we shared earlier this week, the Desiging in Teheran international competition urged designers to creatively rethink the potential a retail area can have upon an evolving metropolis (Grzegorz Witold Woronowicz‘s won as we reported earlier on AD). Giuseppe Iodice‘s proposal placed third as it aimed to create an architecture that ”would investigate a social, political, cultural function and become an element of dialogue between different cultures…thus assuming a role of balanced mediation between western and eastern culture without renouncing its expressive identity.”
More about the proposal after the break. (more…)
Designing in Teheran / Woronowicz Kalinowski Kus Rewski
The international competition Designing in Teheran seeks to modernize the Iranian city by fusing the existing cultural area with a more contemporary environment. Such an environment will include influence from the fashion world through the introduction of new retail areas. This competition is comprised of the design for two towers, Tower A and Tower B, which will provide retail space for the popular clothing store the United Colors of Benetton. The jury has selected three winners for each tower, and soon will narrow the selection to one winner per tower. The proposal by the team formed by Grzegorz Witold Woronowicz, Jakub Piotr Kalinowski, Piotr Kus and Krzysztof Rewski was selected as a winner for Tower A, attempting to create a new kind of shopping experience for users within the complex.
More sketches and more information about the winning proposal after the break. (more…)
BIG wins International Competition to design Tallinn’s new City Hall
UPDATE: Thanks to your comments, BIG sent us the drawings and diagrams of the project. Check them out in the gallery!
An international idea competition was held for Tallinn’s new City Hall in Estonia and the best concept was presented by the Bjarke Ingels Group from Denmark together with Adams Kara Taylor of the UK.
The purpose of the international idea contest was to find the best architectural solution for the new administrative building of the city government that will be situated on a 35,000 m2 plot near the Linnahall building. The contest for the new city was met with a great interest, 81 architects and their teams were willing to present an entry. Of those, the international jury chose the best 9 to shortlist as finalists into the second phase of the competition. By May 15 the finalists handed in their final solutions. The international jury’s decision to award BIG’s entry first place in the competition was unanimous and was presided by the vice mayor Taavi Aas.
More images after the break. (more…)
ThyssenKrupp Elevator Competition / RSVP
Our friends from RSVP Architects just shared with us their proposal for the ThyssenKrupp Elevator competition in Za’abeel Park, Dubai. The tower seems to morph out of the water and into the air, creating a structure that acts as a monument during the day, and an icon during the night.
More images and further project description after the break. (more…)
Winners for the Bering Strait Project
1st place, Taller 301
The winning concepts for the Bering Strait Project International Ideas Competition were recently announced in both the professional and student categories. The objective of the competition was to construct a bridge or tunnel to span between Russia and the United States. The project would create a world highway linking Asia, Africa and Europe with North America and South America.
The competition seeks to not only achieve an architectural connection but also a connection among all races in an attempt to form a future society to prepare the world for unity rather than disjunction. The project, due to its massive scale, would require mutual efforts on both sides to complete, thus all must cooperate and communicate to reach success. ”Eventually, it aims to remove the barrier of human race, culture, religion, and nations by letting this obstructed way flow and to being peace to the world…the Bering Strait project can be rephrased as an elimination of all the barriers like spatial disconnection of national borders and chronological disconnection of today and tomorrow, and thus, stepping forward to peace and prosperity for all earth and mankind,” explained the jury.
A great video clip of the project and the full list of jury winners after the break. (more…)
OMA´s new landmark for Shenzhen: Crystal Island competition
Shenzhen Crystal Island @ OMA / Ole Scheeren
Shenzhen is one of the most active cities in China, and was recently appointed “City of Design” by the UNESCO (2008). A recent competition for Crystal Island, located in the center of the city, envisions the envisions the Shenzhen Creative Center, an iconic project in front of the city hall.
The project, won by OMA in collaboration with chinese firm Urbanus, includes a major new cultural center, transport hub, and public landmark. The Shenzhen Creative Center takes advantage of such a central location, and disaggregate the program over a 20-hectare landscape of parks and gardens, on which clusters of pavilions and small buildings form “Design Villages” creating a micro urban system which includes buildings for Design Administration, Tourism Center, buildings for design retail and expo and a design campus. It also includes a big open space, the Ceremonial Plaza.
All these buildings and open spaces are connected by an elevated pedestrian system, the “Ring Connector”, which also connects to existing and future train and subway stations.
At the center of this circular project, a spherical void becomes a landmark for the city: the Shenzhen Eye.
The disaggregation of the program on such an active area has the potential to mix the creative industry with the rest of the city’s activities, potentiating multiplicity, permeability, and openness towards creative activity.
The project collaboration between OMA and Urbanus includes the young Ole Scheeren and Rem Koolhaas, and Urbanus partner Meng Yan, with a team lead by OMA Associates Dongmei Yao and Anu Leinonen.
After the break, a schematic model of the program relations and another rendering.
Saxo Bank awarded RIBA International Award 2009
Danish firm 3XN won the RIBA International Award 2009 for their design of Saxo Bank (previously featured on AD), the new headquarters for the Investment Bank.
Kim Herforth Nielsen, Principal Architect of 3XN comments on the design saying, “The building is designed in such a way that it challenges the surroundings and yet contributes to a unified setting. The interior has been designed in close collaboration with Saxo Bank to create an environment of learning; encouraging interaction and sharing of knowledge”.
The RIBA International Award recognizes excellence conceived by its members from around the world. The awards ceremony will be held in London on July 14th.
Cairo Expo City / Zaha Hadid
We were just informed that Zaha Hadid Architects will be designing the Cairo Expo City, together with multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy Buro Happold, after a two phase competition.
This project follows the recently announced Stone Towers by ZHA in Cairo, Egypt.
The new Cairo Expo City will provide a facilities suitable for the international conference and exhibition industry, making Cairo more competitive in a global scale.
The Tolerant City / Adept Architects + Schonherr Landscape
The municipality of Helsingborg, in Sweden, chose Schonherr and Adept Architects as winners of the planning competition with their proposal entitled the Tolerant City. Their contextual project will add value to its urban environment by creating a new identity and exploring the future possibilities for Helsingborg.
More on the project after the break.
Planetarium de Montreal / Saucier + Perrotte
Canadian architects Saucier + Perrotte shared with us their finalist proposal for the Planetarium de Monteral competition, a black mantle connecting the different programatic pieces.
Architect’s description, credits and more images after the break:
Tina Manis Associates selected to design Art Fund Pavillion
The Lightbox and Tent London has selected Brooklyn‐based Tina Manis Associates from among a group of five finalists to design The Art Fund Pavilion.
The Pavilion will initially appear as part of Tent London’s exhibit at the London Design Festival 2009 before taking up residence at The Lightbox as an annual summer pavilion and gallery space. The structure is to be engineered and constructed by Facit and funded by the Lightbox Museum’s £100,000 Art Fund Prize 2008.
More images and architect’s description after the break. (more…)
House re-Growth Competition Winners Announced
The prize winners of the re-Growth House competition were recently announced. The competition, organised on behalf of the people of Victoria that lost their homes in the Black Saturday bushfires, sought inspirational design ideas that can offer a way, for residents who have lost their homes to the bushfires, to re-build.
The first stage of the competition attracted 36 entries that were assessed anonymously, with seven shortlisted.
The panel included Adam Kalkin, Marcus Trimble, Dan Honey, Peter Johns and Stoney and Jacqueline Black a family that lost their home in the fires and are now living in the re-Growth Pod.
Images and architect’s description of the four winning proposals, after the break. (more…)
Global Holcim Awards 2009 Winning Projects
The second cycle of the Holcim Awards competition has reached its pinnacle: the top sustainable construction projects out of thousands of submissions from all continents have been selected. THOLChe four winning entries are a river remediation scheme in Morocco, a greenfield university campus in Vietnam, a rural planning strategy in China, and a shelter for day laborers in the USA. A series of prize-handovers will be held at the site of each project to celebrate the winners and their highly-acclaimed examples of sustainable construction.
Almost 5,000 sustainable construction projects and visions from 121 countries entered the five regional Holcim Awards competitions in 2008. Winners of the Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards in each region automatically qualified for the Global Holcim Awards competition in 2009. The global jury was headed by Charles Correa (architect, India) and included Peter Head (structural engineer, UK), Enrique Norten (architect, Mexico/USA), Saskia Sassen (sociologist, USA), Hans-Rudolf Schalcher (civil engineer, Switzerland), and Rolf Soiron (economist, Switzerland).
More images and description of the winning projects, after the break. (more…)
Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects wins Urban Mediaspace Competition
Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects was recently announced as the winner to design ‘Urban Mediaspace’, the largest public library in Scandinavia. The 228 million euro project is located in Aarhus, Denmark and is only the latest in the studio’s history of library designs. Other finalist in the competition included Mecanoo, GPP architects and A-team, a collaboration between two danish studios, Aart and Arkitema.
Schmidt Hammer Lassen’s deisgn aims to re-examine the traditional concept of library design. Rather than focusing on books, the building is envisioned as a hub for social interaction that includes indoor and outdoor recreation spaces, as well as studying, socialising and relaxing areas. Measuring 30,000 square metres, ‘Urban Mediaspace’ is located in Aarhus’s old cargo docks area. The building is heptagonal in shape and features a glazed-facade.
Seen at designboom. More images after the break. (more…)
Sofia’s New City Center to be designed by Dominique Perrault
French architect Dominique Perrault has been selected to design the new city center of Bulgaria’s capital Sofia. The city center will be built in the next ten years and will house various state institutions. The center will be located along Sofia’s main boulevard “Tsarigradsko Shosse”. The vision of Bulgarian prime minister Sergei Stanishev and his brother – architect Georgii Stanishev – is to gather ministries and state agencies in the new “Sofia city”, relocated from the current center of Sofia.
Perrault was selected among six practices, all of them world architectural design leaders including Zaha Hadid, Norman Foster, and Massimiliano Fuksas. Two Bulgarian firms also participated in the final stages of the contest.
Seen at Bustler. More images of Perrault, Foster and Hadid’s proposals after the break.
Oslo Opera House wins Mies van der Rohe Award
Norwegian architecture firm Snøhetta has won the Mies van der Rohe architecture award for the Norwegian National Opera and Ballet in Oslo (previously featured on AD), the Mies van der Rohe Foundation announced Wednesday in Barcelona.
The price worth 60,000 euros (78,000 dollars) is awarded every two years by the European Union and the Mies van der Rohe Foundation in Barcelona for works completed over the previous two years.
David Adjaye wins competition for the National Museum of African American History and Culture
A couple of weeks ago, we featured the six finalists for the new National Museum of African American History and Culture. Finally, the Smithsonian Institute chose the team lead by Tanzanian-born, London-based architect David Adjaye.
The team that created the winning design also includes the Freelon Group, David Brody Bond and SmithGroup. When accepting the commission, Adjaye said, “Throughout the history of African-American struggle and celebration, there are these moments of praise,” he said. “It’s for us a deeply spiritual and powerful culture.” The museum will cost $500 million and is expected to open on the National Mall in 2015.
Seen at The New York Times. More images after the break.
