Kengo Kuma Proposal

Just announced today, Kengo Kuma’s design was chosen for the new landmark building V&A at Dundee.  Kengo Kuma beat out the four other shortlisted designs from Steven Holl Architects, REX, Snøhetta, Delugan Meissl Associated Architects, and Sutherland Hussey Architects.

Kengo Kuma will lead the design team which includes the Scottish firms cre8architecture, Optimised Environments Ltd, and CBA, and the engineering firm Arup.

You can check out our ArchDaily article on all five of the shortlisted designs with photographs and a video here.

Bustler broke the news of Kengo Kuma’s win earlier today.

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Overall Winner / Maria-Cristina Banceanu

RESET Development are pleased to announce the winners of the first ever UK Integrated Habitats Design Competition, run in association with CIRIA and livingroofs.org. The competition focuses on valuing biodiversity in the built environment and received a wide range of entries from participants around the country which included submissions not only from architects, but from engineers, landscape designers and students. The success of this years competition has now resulted in the IHDC becoming an annual event with the 2011 launch to take place next year.

You can see the winning proposals after the break. read more »

© Ateliers Jean Nouvel. Photograph by Philippe Ruault

This just in from the Serpentine Gallery – Jean Nouvel’s pavilion is complete!  In honor of the Serpentine’s 40^th Anniversary, Nouvel’s pavilion is a bold and strong expression comprised of lightweight materials with dramatic cantilevers.  Designing the pavilion allows international architects to experiment with different architectural ideas, and over the years, the commissions’ varied aesthetics have added to the thrill of the exposition.  Nouvel’s bright red pavilion  is drastically different from SANAA’S subdued silvery curvillinear form of 2009, and its vivid color contrasts the park’s greenery, immediately drawing the eye.

More images and more about the new pavilion after the break. read more »

Jonathan Clark’s renovation of  the 1960s Longford Community School adds a colorful front for the two storey extension and partial conversion project.  Extending from a lifeless masonry building, the choice of using colourful timber offers a nice contrast with a more aesthetic touch. Timber was chosen because the clients desired that the main material selection include environmentally friendly materials.  The extension includes two classrooms and a fitness center on the ground level, and a library on the first floor. The interior also incorporates the vibrant color palette of the exterior, making the interior feel more “relaxed.”  Aluminium grating panels provide solar control as well as some structural stiffening to the external structure.   For the roof, the timber is clad with silver ‘Trespa’ panels that give the impression of “floating/sliding across the exposed timber roof beams.”

More images after the break. read more »

Greenpeace is holding an Open Ideas Architectural Competition to find a winning design to fortify the Airplot. The competition is open to architects, landscape architects, architectural students and architect-led mixed disciplinary teams.

The deadline is Friday 23rd April and entries will be judged by:

- Peter Clegg, Senior Partner, Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios
- Andrew Grant, Director, Grant Associates
- Nick Jonson, Deputy Chief Executive, Urban Splash
- Alistair McGowan, Comedian and Airplot co-owner
- Sarah North, Campaigns Director, Greenpeace UK
- Oli Rodker, Environmental activist
- Professor Neil Thomas, Director, Atelier One
- Rachel Whiteread, Artist

Shortlisted designs will be showcased at the OXO tower Bargehouse Gallery, 3rd – 6th June 2010. For more information, go to the competition’s official website.

The Architecture Society at the University of Cambridge (ArcSoc) will host several talk series starting November 11th till February 16th. All talks will be held at 7pm in Lecture Room 1, Architecture Dept., 1-5 Scroope Terrace, Cambridge, UK. The schedule is:

November 11th – Sam McElhinney
November 17th – Tarek Merlin
November 24th – Richard Roberts and Ruairi Glynn

January 27th – Janek Schaefer
February 9th – Adrian Forty
February 16th – Alex de Rijke

One of the latest projects by Foster and Partners, a 5-star hotel and conference center near the Heathrow airport in the UK, just got the city Mayor´s approval.

The project, developed by Riva Properties, has 60,000sqm aprox distributed among 13 stories. Some of these are sunken, resulting on an exterior height of only 25m.

The rooms are contained within six pavilions above the ground, linked by bridges and wrapped in a unifying glass envelope, which not only acts as a barrier to aircraft noise but also to flood the public spaces with daylight, contributing to a highly efficient energy strategy.

The entrance lobby has a floating glass deck with views down to the sunken restaurant level, shallow pool and waterfall. This restaurant floor is accessed via a timber walkway and incorporates a business centre, as well as a variety of venues to eat and drink. The double-height conference facilities, which have their own reception to allow separate access from street-level, encircle a top-lit atrium that brings natural light deep into the building and down to the lower levels.

More images after the break.

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Sometimes photos aren´t enough to describe a project. Wallpaper* featured a cool video showing how the Sliding House works. By british architects dRMM:

Alison Brooks Architects (ABA, previously featured in AD with their award winning Herringbone Houses) designed three buildings for Tribeca, a new development in Liverpool, UK.  This three buildings are located on the corner of  Great George Street and St James Street.

This buildings will provide 93 apartments and commercial space at street level. The design follows the Liverpool’s gothic architectural tradition, blending with the existing Wedding Shop. I like this new approach to tall buildings, away from the  glazed and lightweight looking contemporary towers.

The stone-clad facades stretch up toward the sky, gradually becoming lighter and more glazed as
they increase in height. Within the windows are vertical strips of coloured glass, totally relating to old cathedrals.

By the way, “Tribeca” is a development by Urban Splash that will create over 700 homes. Four practices were invited to design the buildings: Alison Brooks Architects (London, UK), Shedkm (Liverpool, UK), Riches Hawley Mikhail (London, UK) and Querkraft (Vienna, Austria). The site for the project is formed by three triangles, so Urban Splash put the phrase “Triangles Beneath the Cathedral”, then Tribeca. It echoes from the Tribeca area in Manhattan, which consists on a series of triangular sites beneath Canal Street.

More pictures below.

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