View from Rosemount Viaduct - Rendering provided by the Diller Scofidio + Renfro submission boards

Aberdeen City Garden Trust has announced Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R) as winner of the international design competition that will transform the center of Aberdeen. The New York City based firm will be working with the Scottish practice Keppie Design and Philadelphia landscape architects OLIN. The “rich and varied” shortlist included Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Foster + Partners, Gustafson Porter, Mecanoo, Snøhetta & Hoskins and West 8. After an extended run-off between DS+R and Foster + Partners, the Aberdeen City Garden competition will be DS+R’s first major win in a European design competition.

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Trust for the National Mall has announced the Stage II results, naming the ten design teams selected to continue in the third and final stage of the National Mall Design Competition. The National Mall will undergo an approximate $700 million restoration in three selected areas – Union Square including the Reflecting Pool and the Ulysses S. Grant Memorial, Sylvan Theater on the Washington Monument Grounds, and the Constitution Gardens between the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Lincoln Memorial.

“We are excited about the teams selected to advance to Stage III and have no doubt each of them will create beautiful, useful and sustainable designs for the National Mall,” said Caroline Cunningham, President of the Trust for the National Mall. “We are eager to share their final designs with the public in April.”

Continue reading for more information and the complete list of finalists. read more »

Over 1,200 entires from 30 states and 10 countries submitted applications for the National Mall competition. Late last month fifteen design teams were chosen as finalists to advance to the second stage of this prestigious contest.

Hosting 25 million visitors annually, the National Mall will undergo an estimated $700 million restoration beginning in 2012. The competition has been broken down into three areas of restoration: Union Square including the Reflecting Pool and the Ulysses S. Grant Memorial, Sylvan Theater on the Washington Monument Grounds, and the Constitution Gardens between the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Lincoln Memorial.

Among the finalists to move on to stage two of the competition, Diller Scofidio Renfro, Weiss/Manfredi, and Rogers Marvel Architects who are shortlisted for two out of the three areas of restoration, as well as Snohetta, Michael Maltzan Architecture, Ten Arquitectos, and Bohlin Cywinski Jackson who are finalists for one area of restoration.

“Entrants were evaluated on past design performance, philosophy, design intent, thoughtfulness, creativity and overall resume,” according to a release from the Trust of the National Mall. The jury, compiled of architects, professors and other members of the architecture community, included Michael Gericke of Pentagram NYC and Pritzker Prize Laureate Thom Mayne founder of Morphosis.

The second stage of the competition includes interviews of the teams conducted by the Trust for the National Mall and the National Park Service, and the last stage will include proposed plans for the restoration. The competition will culminate in May 2012 and the proposed designs from stage three of the competition will be available to the public prior to the winning design being selected.

Follow the break for a complete list of design finalists for the National Mall Competition.

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Courtesy of Diller Scofidio + Renfro / View from Corner of Center and Oxford Streets

The University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA) today held a community open house to present the schematic design for its new facility to the public. The project, designed by the renowned New York City-based firm of Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R), will unite a repurposed former UC Berkeley printing plant at 2120 Oxford Street with a new structure. More information and images after the break. read more »

For this week the Architecture City Guide series headed to the city of Boston including neighboring Cambridge just across the Charles River Basin. This area has an overwhelmingly large amount of modern architecture in a small radius, and our list reflects just that. What buildings do you want to see added to our Boston list, share them with us in the comment section below.

The Architecture City Guide: Boston list and corresponding map after the break!

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© Iwan Baan

The Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Creative Arts, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, recently opened for spring semester classes at Brown University. Providing performance space, exhibitions, installations, and an outdoor amphitheater, the Center’s long structural spans, high ceilings, and large floor plates stimulate a necessary collaborative environment with flexibility. Seeking LEED Gold certification, the exterior venetian blind system and green roof are just a few of the sustainable features for the Granoff Center.

Charles Renfro, partner-in-charge for the project, stated the following about Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s design:

In creating the design for the Granoff Center, we needed structural elements that would stimulate the creative process from virtually every aspect of the building. The Granoff Center is a merger of architectural gesture and academic pedagogy. Our strategy was to encourage and illustrate collaboration across every level.

The six half-levels that make up the Granoff Center were derived from a stacked floor slab system. The three initial floors were divided in half down the length of the building and then offset. This intentional misalignement provided a unique connection between levels, therefore the landings were expanded, providing gathering space for breakout sessions for both students and faculty.

Architects: Diller Scofidio + Renfro
Location: Providence, Rhode Island, USA
Acoustician: JaffeHolden
Construction Management: Shawmut Design & Construction
Project Area: 38,815 sqf
Project Year: 2011
Photographs: Iwan Baan

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BOOM

Headed for Palm Springs, California, BOOM Community is a new master-planned community costing $250 million and will provide an exciting new design for the desert that surrounds it.  Collaborating to create this pedestrian friendly, neighborhood development are ten architecture firms, including Diller Scofidio + Renfro of New York.  Envisioned for the gay community BOOM aims to provide an urban lifestyle promoting healthy living.  Included within the masterplan: a boutique hotel, gym and spa, BOOM health and wellness center, and entertainment complex.

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Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center © Iwan Baan

Last week, we were happy to share DS+R‘s much anticipated design for the Broad Museum.   In addition to winning the 120,000 sqf California project, it has also announced that Columbia University selected DS+R to design the Business School’s new two-building home for Manhattanville in West Harlem.  The new state-of-the-art teaching and learning facility will add to the firm’s notable New York presence, along with the renovation and expansion of New York’s Lincoln Center (including their Hypar Pavilion, also designed with FXFowle) and the High Line park with Field Operations in lower Manhattan.  “We’re thrilled to have the opportunity to make a new home for the Business School,” said Elizabeth Diller, principal of Diller Scofidio + Renfro. “Our challenge is to support Columbia’s progressive new approach to business education with architecture that participates in pedagogy and that animates a public center within the new campus and its richly layered social and industrial context.”

More about the project after the break. read more »

Courtesy of Diller Scofidio + Renfro

If you are a regular ArchDaily reader you know that we have been providing ongoing coverage of Eli Broad’s Broad Museum in Los Angeles. Nearly 120,000 sqf and $130 million dollars, invitations were given to six top architects to submit designs for the new museum. Rem Koolhaas, Herzog and de Meuron, Christian de Portzamparc, Ryue Nishizawa and Kazuyo Sejima, Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Foreign Office Architects competed and in August we informed you that Diller Scofidio + Renfro garnered the commission.

Today, the design for the Broad Museum has been released. Situated adjacent to Frank Gehry’s Walt Disney Concert Hall and Arata Isozaki’s Museum of Contemporary Art, the museum has become a key part of the Grand Avenue redevelopment project that has been losing steam.

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© Iwan Baan

This years architectural events in New York are bound to have a meaningful effect on the years to come; the decision by NYU to add another tower complementing I.M Pei’s existing Silver Towers complex (rather than their initial plan to demolish them), the opening of the first section of Brooklyn Bridge Park coupled with the completion of the High Line has re-established New York City as a key model to reference when it comes to designing urban public space, and finally construction began on Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, by Louis Kahn, to name a few.

From transportation, urban planning, exhibitions, residential and office buildings follow the break to see the New Yorkers list of some of the most influential decisions surrounding architecture over the past year in New York.

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© Iwan Baan

Construction is complete on Hypar Pavilion at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, situated on the edge of Hearst Plaza and 65th Street, the new free standing structure is the home of a new public lawn and restaurant.

The dual requirements of a destination restaurant and a public green space located within the confines of the Plaza are satisfied with a single architectural gesture sited between the reflecting pool and the plaza’s north edge. Elizabeth Diller comments, “Hypar Pavilion’s moment of invention came when we discovered how to design a destination restaurant without consuming public space on the Lincoln Center campus. The roof became a new kind of interface between public and private, with an occupiable twisting grass canopy over a glass pavilion restaurant.”

Follow the break for more photographs of the new Hypar Pavilion.

Architects: Diller Scofidio + Renfro with FXFOWLE
Location: New York City, New York, USA
Design Team Principals: Elizabeth Diller, Ricardo Scofidio and Charles Renfro
Design Senior Associate: Kevin Rice
Architecture Team: Zoe Small, Haruka Saito, Ann-Rachel Schiffman, Stefan Roeschert, Michael Hundsnurcher, Roman Loretan, Dan Sakai, Chris Andreacola, Anthony Saby, Mateo Antonio de Cardenas, Toshikatsu Kiuchi, Felipe Ferrer, Hallie Terzopolos
Core and Shell Design: Diller Scofidio + Renfro with FXFOWLE
Kitchen Design: Yui Design
Lighting: Tillotson Design Associates
SMEP: Ove Arup & Partners
Acoustical: Jaffe Holden
Telephone and Data Consulting: Shen Milsom & Wilke
Construction: Turner Construction
Project Year: 2010
Photographs: Iwan Baan

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Zaha Hadid's Tondonia Vina Pavilion

“How Wine Became Modern: Design + Wine 1976 to Now” is a brand new exhibit at the San Francisco Modern Museum of Art.  Co-created and designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the exhibit was organized by Henry Urbach, SFMOMA’s Helen Hilton Raiser Curator of Architecture and Design.  Bringing attention to the wine industry and its integration with the latest artists, designers and architects the exhibit will be on display at SFMOMA until April. A main part of the exhibit is featuring the architectural spaces that house the wine making process, tastings, museums, etc.  Some big name architects who have developed designs for cutting-edge wineries include: Zaha Hadid, Frank Gehry, Norman Foster, Herzog and de Meuron, Renzo Piano and Alvaro Siza.

Mr. Urbach stated that the idea stemmed “from an observation and curiosity about why there was so much activity around wine in various design fields. There are probably a score of world famous architects who have done wineries in the last fifteen years and they’re not doing dairy farms or orange juice bottling plants.”

Here at ArchDaily we have featured many great wineries.  Be sure to take a look at  Zaha Hadid’s Tondonia Vina Pavilion, Norman Foster’s Faustino Winery, as well as AD Wineries Roundup I and Roundup II.

Architects: Diller Scofidio + Renfro
Principals-in-Charge: Elizabeth Diller, Ricardo Scofidio and Charles Renfro
Project Leader: Ilana Altman
Project Manager: David Allin
Project Team: Kumar Atre, Donna Pallotta, Jose Vidalon and Chris Hillyard

Chad Batka for The New York Times

Amidst finishing the second installation of the High Line with James Corner Field Operations, and beginning to design the Broad Museum in downtown Los Angeles, DS + R has carved out a little pocket of time to add the finishing touches to their redesign of Lincoln Center.    According to the Times, the team has turned their attention to the smaller details of project, specifically the Center’s electronic infoscape.   It takes a lot to stop a New Yorker, yet Reynold Levy, Lincoln Center’s president, told the Times, “We think this will cause them to stop in their tracks and really take a look. We are endeavoring to create a feeling, engender a mood, provide a sense of the drama and the beauty of what goes on in our halls. We want to attract passers-by, but we also want to surprise Upper West Siders.”

More about the new infoscape after the break. read more »

Proposed Site for Broad's Museum. Photo credit: Bryan Chan

Back in May, when American philanthropist, Eli Broad, announced his plans to build a new museum in downtown Los Angeles, six invited top architects competed for the commission ( Rem Koolhaas, Herzog and de Meuron, Christian de Portzamparc, Ryue Nishizawa and Kazuyo Sejima, Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Foreign Office Architects).   Yesterday, Broad confirmed that Diller Scofidio + Renfro (one of just two invited firms who have not been awarded the Pritzker) will design the  120,000 sqf downtown museum. read more »

The Spur

A few days ago, we shared some information about the second segment of Field Operations and DS+R’s High Line, including construction shots to show the progress being made. Today, we share renderings from the firms which illustrate some of the cool features we can look forward to seeing.  The second phase will include a “spur” – a framed space recalling the historical billboards that once attached to the railway, a “floating platform” which rests above the exposed girders, “Chelsea Thicket” – a dense stretch of trees and shrubs, a “flyover” where the walkway rises into the canopy of sumac trees, and of course, a grand lawn for lounging.

Take a look at the renderings after the break, and we’ve also included a video of the whole project to see how the pieces will come together.

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Proposed Site for Broad's Museum. Photo credit: Bryan Chan

Eli Broad, an American philanthropist, is getting ready to design the newest home for his extensive art collection.  For his latest museum project, on the corner of Grand Avenue and 2nd Street in Los Angeles, Broad invited six of the professions’ leading minds to compete.  Resting across the street from Gehry’s Walt Disney Concert Hall and Arata Isozaki’s 1986 Museum of Contemporary Art, Broad’s museum with include approximately 40,000 square feet of top-floor exhibition space, along with offices for the Broad Art Foundation.

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Two events will take place next week at Columbia University. On Monday, ‘Pointless’,  a lecture by Elizabeth Diller. Then on Wednesday, ‘Re:Activators’,  a lecture by Jürgen Mayer H. Both events will take place at 6:30 PM in Avery Hall, Wood Auditorium, Columbia University.

Elizabeth Diller is a founding member of DS+R, New York. Born in Lodz, Poland; she attended The Cooper Union School of Art and received a Bachelor of Architecture from the Cooper Union School of Architecture. Ms. Diller is Professor of Architecture at Princeton University.

Jürgen Mayer H. is the founder and principal of the cross disciplinary studio, J. MAYER H. Architects, founded in 1996 in Berlin, Germany. He studied at Stuttgart University, The Cooper Union and Princeton University. National and international awards include the Mies-van-der-Rohe-Award-Emerging-Architect-Special-Mention-2003 and Winner Holcim Award Bronze 2005. Jürgen Mayer H. has taught at Princeton University, University of the Arts Berlin, Harvard University, Kunsthochschule Berlin, the Architectural Association in London, the Columbia University, New York and at the University of Toronto, Canada.

© Iwan Baan

This seems to be a very good year for Diller Scofidio + Renfro: The opening of The Highline (a project in collaboration with Field Operations), the competition for the Audio and Image Museum in Brazil, the Creative Arts Center at Brown, the Alice Tully Hall at the Lincoln Center in New York…

And now, thanks to architectural photographer Iwan Baan, we present you the recently completed Juilliard School, part of the major redevelopment plan for the Lincoln Center, project on which DS+R has been working with FXFOWLE.

The details on this project are stunning, specially the stairs.

More photos after the break. You can see our previous coverage of DS+R projects here.

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Winner: Diller Scofidio + Renfro

A restricted competition for a new museum in the middle of one of the most iconic places in Rio de Janeiro, the Avenida Atlantica at Copacabana, has just been awarded.

The building will host the Museu da Imagen e de Som (Image and Audio Museum), that as of now is desegregated through the city in separate offices. The new building will host in one place facilities for the conservation and study of the brazilian visual heritage, along with a state-of-art museum.

The competition included the local practice Bernardes & Jacobsen, that has been previously featured on ArchDaily, along with Sao Paulo´s Isay Weinfeld (see his previous works featured on AD), Brasil Arquitetura and Tacoa Arquitetos. On the international side we have the regulars Daniel Libeskind and Diller Scofidio + Renfro, along with the japanese architect Shigeru Ban.

Just when I was writing this post, I found that the competition was awarded to Diller Scofidio + Renfro, at a ceremony held today.

I´ve heard a lot of buzz about this competition in Twitter and Facebook from our brazilian readers, it seems to be generating a lot of debate as of now. And it´s very obvious, as the building will be erected on a very iconic avenue, at a close distance from Museum of Modern Art by Affonse Eduardo Reidy and the Niteroi Contemporary Art Museum by Brazilian master Oscar Niemeyer.

Not much to say about the winning entry by DS+R, it´s just another project along their line. But it´s not just the jury who voted unanimously for their project, they also won a reader´s poll at the main Brazilian news site O Globo.

And Libeskind… seriously?

My vote goes to Isay Weinfeld. And yours?

Images from all the projects so you can be the judge, after the break.

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Diller Scofidio + Renfro

Diller Scofidio + Renfro‘s Creative Arts Center for the Brown University campus is slated for completion in 2010.  The new 36,000 square foot center will include a 200 seat recital hall, 35mm screening facility, recording studio, multimedia lab, gallery space and large multi-purpose production studios.

More about the Arts Center and more images after the break. read more »