© Tom Arban
Architects: Zerafa Studio llc.
Location: Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada
Architect of Record: Chapman Murray Associates Architects Inc.
Structural Engineer: ACA Engineering
MEP: Hallex Engineering LTD.
Client: Withheld at Owner’s Request
Facility: Private Residence
Project Area: 464.5 sqm
Project year: 2009
Photographs: Tom Arban
© Angelo Kaunat
Architects: kadawittfeldarchitektur
Location: Aachen, Germany
Project Manager: Dipl.-Ing. Daniel Trappen
Project Area: 68 sqm
Project year: 2007
Photographer: Angelo Kaunat & kadawittfeldarchitektur
© Trahan Architects
Louisiana based Trahan Architects, a firm with expertise in institutional design and religious architecture (check the Holy Rosary Church Complex, remarkable project), recently unveiled conceptual design for the renovation and expansion of the River Center Branch Library.
The project stands at the intersection between civic buildings and the city’s arts and entertainment district, overlooking a new town square. This new building becomes an urban piece, exposing the interior activity to the outside with a rippled translucent skin. But also the library takes care of the exterior, with reading areas and a urban patio.
© Trahan Architects
As with changes on how people consume information, the typical library approach as a storage/reading facility gets obsolete. In response to this, the project is a public place for gathering and sharing around information, with circulation patterns that place stationary structures in the center of the floors and create space for staff and patron interaction, with movable parts and multiple paths along the perimeter.
During this days, the changes of information trough technology challenge library designs, while offering an opportunity to become important public spaces among our cities. In this way, I think this concept has a good start.
More images courtey of Trahan Architects after the break.
LAN Architecture’s Mirror Tower contains more than 30,000 identical facets that reflect 14 of the city’s monuments and are orientated to produce smooth transitions between these panoramic viewpoints. “The starting point of the project was to imagine Beirut in all its complexity. We have imagined the city as an ‘un-finished’ superposition of histories, contexts, architectures and situations; Our project was conceived as an interface, an algorithm that generates new connections and that creates new view axis, ways of observing the history, the present and the future,” explained LAN architects. The building’s complex envelope reflects changes in surroundings, the seasons and light. The reflective façade works by globally defining the orientation of each facet of the cylinder’s surface to create the desired reflection. With the help of specialists, LAN Architecture produced an automated 3D tool that allowed the team to visualize different instances of the facade by changing viewpoints at will, both the reflective area and the position of the reflected images on the tower.
More about the tower and more images after the break. read more »
Photo © Nikolaos Zachariadis, SPLITTERWERK
Architects: SPLITTERWERK
Location: Graz, Steiermark, Austria
Project team: Irene Berto, Mark Blaschitz, Erika Brunnermayer, Marius Ellwanger, Hannes Freiszmuth, Johann Grabner, Edith Hemmrich, Ute Himmelberg, Bernhard Kargl, Benjamin Nejedly, Josef Roschitz, Maik Rost, Ingrid Somitsch, Nikolaos Zachariadis
Client: PRISMA Engineering Maschinen- und Motorentechnik GmbH
Project Management: Ingenos ZT GmbH
Structural Consultant: werkraum zt-gmbh, Peter Bauer, David Lemp
Building Services Consultant: Ing. Rudolf Sonnek GmbH
HVACR Design: Guenter Grabner
Energy Consultant: Dr. Tomberger ZT GesmbH, Hannes Veitsberger
Electrical Design: Erich Watzke, Moskon & Busz GmbH, Rudolf Busz
Project Area: 1,400 sqm
Project year: 2009
Photographs: © Nikolaos Zachariadis
Danish architectural company schmidt hammer lassen architects has won a 52,863 m2 mixed-use complex “Konstitucijos Avenue 21” in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania.
The project is the result of a successful collaboration with Oslo-based Lund+Slaatto Architects, a strategic partner of schmidt hammer lassen architects.
The client had requested cross-scandinavian architect teams for the task which led Lund+Slaatto to invite schmidt hammer lassen to join them. Architect’s description and more images after the break. read more »
Architect: Produkcija 004
Location: Zagreb, Croatia
Client: City of Zagreb and Zagreb Holding
Project architects: Davor Katušic & Martina Ljubičic
Project team: Margareta Ćurić,d.i.a., Jana Kocbek, u.d.i.a., Robert Franjo, arh. teh., Ivo Petrić, d.i.a., Marija Burmas, d.i.a.
Graphic Design: Juri Armanda, Karl Geisler, Bor Dizdar
Builder: Dalekovod d.d., ZagrebMontaža d.d.
Project area: 15,000 sqm
Budget: 15 mil. Euro
Project year: 2009
Photographs: Produkcija 004
© Cornbread Works
Architect: Zecc Architecten
Location: Utrecht, The Netherlands
Project Architects: Rolf Bruggink, Marnix van der Meer
Collaborators: René de Korte, Marc Brummelhuis, Thijs Toxopeus
Project area: 250 sqm
Project year: 2006-2007
Photographs: Cornbread Works
The influential figure of Eric Owen Moss doesn´t require introduction… what an interesting conversation we had, Bob Dylan included. A bit long, but worth it.
On a side note, when I came by his office I saw a gigantic book called “Eric Owen Moss Construction Manual”… which I thought was like an internal book for new employees, but is actually a monograph covering design, engineering, fabrication, and construction of 40 projects over the past 20 years. Impressive. See a video after the break.
To start this week’s Round Up, we bring your our second part of previously featured stone houses. And of course, remember to check the first part right here.
Breuillot’s house / Bernard Quirot & Olivier Vichard
Located in a small village 10 kilometers south of Besançon, the main town of the region « Franche Comté », this house was built far from the center of the village, up on the hill which dominates the river « Loue » and beneficiates of a clear and wide view . It was made for a single grandma’ who takes care of her daughter’s children every day (read more…)
Box House / Alan Chu & Cristiano Kato
It is a small construction with an equally simple program: A caretaker’s house of a property on an island on the North coast of the State of São Paulo, Brazil. The site, at 100 meters above sea level, next to two enormous rocks, already had the old caretaker’s house, one-story house with stone walls and clay roof tiles (read more…)
House in Scaiano / Wespi de Meuron
This house for vacations is located at the border of a small historical village, which is still quite good preserved. There is a beautiful view over the lake and towards the mountains. It’s only possible to reach the house by foot. There isn’t a street leading close to the site, what made the construction more difficult (read more…)
Pachacamac House / Longhi Architects
A hill in Pachacamac, located 40 km south of Lima near Peru’s coast, is the site for the retirement home of a philosopher. The response to the site’s conditions was to bury the house, trying to create a balanced dialogue between architecture and landscape, where inside / outside becomes a constant interpretation of materiality (read more…)
Valle House / Sebastian Mariscal Studio
This weekend single-family dwelling is located in the Valley of Guadalupe in Baja California, Mexico. The valley, known for its wine production, is surrounded by amber-colored mountains and pierced by dirt roads continuously winding between vineyards and olive trees. These surroundings serve as visual lines and filters (read more…)
© BIG
BIG, in collaboration with AKT, Tyréns and Transsolar, just won the competition for the World Village of Women Sports in Malmo, Sweden, a 100.000sqm complex for research, education and training of women’s sports.
Rather than a program organized around a sports arena disconnected from the city, the project becomes a town inside a town, offering rich public spaces as you can see on the renderings.
© BIG
The central space of the village offers a large area for public gathering, which can host professional football matches, concerts, conferences, exhibitions and flea markets. Around this space we find a series of sloped buildings, which reduce the visual impact of the complex to the adjacent neighborhood.
Between these buildings we find a pedestrian network around the main sports hall which plugs into the surrounding street networks as well as the interior galleries of Kronprinsen, turning it into a complete ecosystem of urban life.
More images and drawings after the break.
Architects: Suppose Design Office
Location: Kure city, Hiroshima, Japan
Program: Private House
Site area: 451.18 sqm
Building area: 109.43 sqm
Total floor area: 110.55 sqm
Photographs: Toshiyuki Yano from Nacasa&Partners Inc.
11th Ave view, Image by Christopher Hoxie & Brandon Hicks
John Jay College of Criminal Justice, an active college in the City University of New York, currently occupies a former Public School building, Haaren Hall, on 10th Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets. With ownership of the entire Manhattan block, the college has ambitions to grow over two phases into the full Zoning capacity of the block. The charge of this project is to occupy the entire site with an integrated campus while providing a base for future growth.
The Emerging New York Architects Committee (ENYA), AIA NY Chapter, is pleased to announce its fourth biennial international ideas competition, High Bridge: Bronx, Building Cultural Infrastructure (HB:BX).
This competition is open to all emerging professionals, including, but not limited to, architects, artists, engineers, landscape architects, urban designers, and planners who have completed their education at the undergraduate or graduate level within 10 years of the competition announcement (September 10, 2009). The registration deadline is November 18, 2009, and the submission deadline is January 18, 2010. An online gallery will feature all submitted design entries. In addition cash prizes and inclusion in an exhibition and publication will be awarded to the winning designs.
HB:BX is an open ideas competition to design an arts center that culturally reinforces the physical connection between the Manhattan and Bronx High Bridge communities of New York City. Working in cooperation with the arts organizations Artists Unite and the Bronx Museum of the Arts, ENYA means to draw awareness to the current efforts to restore and reopen the historic High Bridge. More information on the competition’s requirements available at the official website.
Architects: PK Arkitektar ehf
Location: Hveragerði, Iceland
Client: Ministry of Social Affairs
Design team: Pálmar Kristmundsson and Bernd Kolb
Consultants: ÞB verkfræðistofa og Verkfræðistofan TERA sf.
Construction Supervisor: VST – Verkfræðistofa Sigurðar Thoroddsen hf. Selfossi
Site area: 1,560.8 sqm
Constructed area: 430 sqm
Project year: 2006-2007
Photographs: Rafael Pinho & Helge Garke
Architect: HyoMan Kim – IROJE KHM Architects
Location: Sungmam, Gyeounggi-do, Korea
Design team: Su Mi Jung, Jung Min Oh
Structure designer: Guang Min Jun
Site area: 330 sqm
Bldg. area: 168.52 sqm
Gross floor area: 296.03 sqm
Photographer: JongOh Kim
© SOM
The Chicago and Shanghai offices of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM) won the international design competition to expand the Beijing Central Business District (CBD).
Basically, their plan proposes the creation of 3 new districts anchored by parks and green boulevards as you can see on the renderings. But the an important aspects of this project is on the small scale, a network of walkable blocks to offer pedestrian (and bike) friendly scale for development. Because sustainable doesn´t have to mean just “green”, but also to offer an environment on which people can actually establish social relations on a neighborhood scale.
The plan also proposes an express commuter rail service between the Beijing Capital International Airport, the CBD, and high speed rail service at Beijing South Station. A new streetcar system is proposed to conveniently link all areas of the CBD.
Sometimes, a good transportation system and focusing on the pedestrian scale sound obvious, but they are the foundations to establish neighborhoods that can bring life to parts of the city 24/7, instead of business districts that die at night with dormitory cities with a lack of services.
More images after the break.
read more »
A few months ago I had the chance to interview Ila Berman, director of the Architecture program at the California College of the Arts. She holds a doctorate in architectural history, theory, and criticism from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design.
Dr Berman created New Orleans: Urban Mappings for a Future City, an exhibition in the U.S. Pavilion at the 2006 International Architectural Biennale in Venice.
I visited the school by the end of the semester, and had the chance to see the final projects by the students and an exhibition on building technologies that was currently being assembled on the main hall. I really liked the atmosphere of the school, the students were very into it. I also meet a group of young teachers who are doing interesting work professionally, such as Douglas Burnham (envelope A+D), Mona El Khafif ( CCA URBANlab, IG Architecture), Craig Scott (Iwamoto Scott) and David Gissen.
My architect friends from San Francisco are always mentioning the lectures at CCA, as they have done a very good work inviting some of the best architects around the world to their lecture series: Alejandro Zaera Polo (FOA), Paul Lewis (LTL Architects), Bernard Tschumi, Winy Maas, Toyo Ito, etc (you can download some at iTunes U).
A school to keep an eye on…
This villa is located in plot #86 of the ORDOS project.
Architects: JSª / Javier Sánchez
Project team: Aisha Ballesteros, Juan I. Reyes, Gerardo Fonseca, Juan Manuel Soler, Juan Pablo Victal, Laura Ivanschitz, Jair Navarrete
Location: Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China
Design year: 2008
Construction year: 2009-2010
Curator: Ai Weiwei, Beijing, China
Client: Jiang Yuan Water Engineering Ltd, Inner Mongolia, China
Constructed Area: 1,000 sqm aprox
© Gintaras Cesonis
Architects: E.Miliuno studija / Dvieju Grupe
Location: Siauliai, Lithuania
Chief architect: Eugenijus Miliunas
Project Architects: Gintaras Balcytis, Algimantas Bublys, Eugenijus Miliunas, Linas Tuleikis
Project Team: Julius Baronas, Vytautas Calka, , Aurimas Ramanauskas, Kestutis Scevinskas, Kestutis Vaiksnoras
Urban Architect: Algimantas Cerniauskas
Structural Engineer: Audrius Razaitis
Client: Municipality of Siauliai
Contractor: AB Panevezio statybos trestas
Constructed Area: 19,600 sqm
Budget: € 21,500,000
Project year: 2005-2006
Construction year: 2006-2007
Photographs: Gintaras Cesonis
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