Check out Junya Ishigami and Associates‘amazing studio + workspace where students of the Kanagawa Institute of Technology get to spend their days designing. The studio is about the closest you can get to the feeling of working outside while being indoors. The floor-to-ceiling glass makes the building appear weightless and elegant, and the open plan preserves the building’s sense of transparency as the viewer’s eye can shoot directly across the uninterrupted space. 305 columns of various sizes support the stripped roof of skylights, yet their white color keeps the focus on the space and the view, not the structure. The columns, although seemingly random, as specifically placed to create the sensation of zoned spaces, but their nonrestrictive quality provides a flexible layout to suit the changing needs of students.
Our Cities Ourselves: The Future of Transportation in Urban Life has just kicked off its worldwide tour starting in New York at the Center for Architecture. The exhibit shows the visions of ten of the world’s developing cities from ten of the world’s leading architects. Over the next 20 years, these places will experience urban growth on a grand scale and the urban planning efforts will create successful cities through better transportation.
We are loving the fact that as Field Operations and DS+R’s High Line keeps developing, new residential and commercial entities are following suite, popping up adjacent to the tracks, over the tracks, and even under the tracks. And now, Konyk Architecturewill join in the urban renewal which is unfolding in the Meat-Packing District with their new event space that will rest underneath the High Line adjacent to Neil Denari’s HL23 Condominium (previously featured on AD).
More about the winning event space after the break.
The DMY International Design Festival Berlin Awardannually highlights the most exceptional works in contemporary product design, with strong consideration of the teams’ approaches, rather than just their final results. This year, a facet of the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne - EPFL + ECAL Lab – was named one of the winners for their exhibition ‘Give Me More’. Eight installations depicted augmented reality scenarios, combining analogue materials and digital applications to “turn technology into a new medium.”
Shot by architect turned filmmaker Jeffrey Durkin, this introspective piece on designer/architect/professor Miki Iwasakiexplores how “the small objects in our life shape the big picture of how we live.” What began as a video aimed to capture the essence of Iwasaki’s furniture design quickly transformed into a short piece which addresses larger issues of society and the ramifications of design and consumerism.
In our latest AD Futures, we introduced JAJA Architects, an up-and-coming Danish firm. The backgrounds of the firm’s three principals (Norwegian, Danish, Japanese, Thai and Swiss) form an interesting design aesthetic, as their influences fuse together to make a strong statement. The young firm recently won a competition for a mix-use building in Denmark with their proposal entitled the Cornerstone – an office building that gives Vanløse a new visual anchor point and a place where people can meet to see the urban life unfold.
Not so long ago, we featured Cyril-Emmanuel Issanchou’sMaison Eco-rce, a timber residence, and today, we share his EC*-Cocoon, a low energy house. Designed for the competition BETWIN, the low energy houses are prefabricated modules that are installed upon a set of walls and plinths made from locally gathered stones.
This year is looking positive for women in the architectural field in San Francisco. As The Architect’s Newspaper reported, the city just sent out an RFQ to firms for its “as-needed work” list, a procedure which happens every three years.
Proposals should contribute to SUPERFRONT’s mission of supporting and promoting radical contemporary architecture while fostering creative interdisciplinary exchange. Please include list of exhibitors, description of works, select images, and relevant curatorial or exhibition experience.
We are sure that SO-IL‘s PS1 installation, Pole Dance, will be a hit this summer. On Friday we had a preview by Alan R Tansey and today, we found at Iwan Baan’s website another view on the installation. We hope you’ll be able to visit the project in person sometime.
We shared GENETO’sIvy Building a few days ago, and we just got our hands on this video of the project. Be sure to check out the full story on the project, and enjoy the video.
One World Trade Center has reached a construction milestone by rising 260 ft above street level. Upon its completion in 2013, it will become the tallest office building in the United States reaching 104 stories.
The University of California, Berkeley just announced that they have chosen to work with Diller Scofidio + Renfro to design the new Berkeley Art Musuem + Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA). The site of the new museum is a crucial component for connecting the Berkeley campus while also activating the downtown arts and commerce districts.
Our friend and architecture photographer,Iwan Baan, just published on his website some of his recently shot images of Steven Holl’s Horizontal Skyscraper in Shenzhen, China. The project is a long mixed-use complex which includes office spaces, apartments, a hotel and even a public landscape. Baan’s photos illustrate Holl’s idea that the “building appears as if it were once floating on a higher sea that has now subsided; leaving the structure propped up high on eight legs.”
We just featured an article about London’s construction frenzy, which includes over half a dozen skyscrapers for the city. This new era will completely alter the city’s skyline as tall buildings will be sprouting everywhere to house new office, commercial, and residential activities. Of these new structures, Renzo Piano’s 310 meter high mix-used tower, The Shard (be sure to check out our coverage of the tower), will not only become London’s tallest tower, but also the tallest building in all of Western Europe. Of all of London’s new developments, we are excited to see this dynamic tower’s impact on the city and its relationship with London’s context and future neighboring skyscrapers.
We have new images to share from Renzo Piano Building Workshopand more video clips of the construction progress after the break.
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.
Designed by GENETO, a Japanese firm,the Ivy Building is quite complex to the effect that the program changes so frequently. Although a small scale building, the programmatic needs shift from retail to office to residential, yet a wrapping staircase connects the fragment pieces into a whole. ”We wanted to create a new type of building by combining different kinds of program and propose a building that is opened to the society,” explained the architects.
As we are inching closer to the weekend, perhaps you might find yourself letting your inner child run loose by catching Disney/Pixar’s latest creation, “Toy Story 3″. We just found out some fun news from Architectural Record that the team of animators is supervised by David Eisenmann, an architect. After attaining his architectural degree, Eisenmann was working in San Francisco when he spotted a Pixar job posting. Eisenmann has climbed the ranks from set dressing for Pixar’s previous films, “A Bug’s Life” and “Toy Story 2,” to now overseeing all animation. And there’s a ton of elements to be animated, “We had 2,600 unique models in the daycare center alone,” Eisenmann says. When an artist on “Toy Story 3″ asked Eisenmann what kind of personal artwork he does outside the studio, he answered, “I came here as an architect. My artwork ‘outside,’ is my work in here.”
Dimos Moysiadis + Ioannis Oikonomou+ Xaris Tsitsikas, young Greek architects, have designed a conceptual house where a canal brings the ocean water both next to and underneath the house. Residents can enjoy a dive off the veranda into their natural swimming pool, or an artificial sandy beach just a few steps down from their front door of the house. The eastern concrete side of this canal stands as a strong edge against the property line, as an attempt to “create a “safe” border between our environment and the other properties.” With the long side of the villa parallel to the north coast, and vertically to the canal, the home creates a sense of enclosure around the landscape.
London’s skyline is about to get a complete makeover. While in the past, almost every tower proposed was stalled due to financial shortcomings, or workers just leaving the job site, now, London is dusting off their old building plans and getting ready to move into a construction frenzy. Thanks to Kieran Long’s article at the Evening Standard we get to know more details about this process:
Ousting 17 other companies from Europe, USA and Africa, SHoP Architects was awarded first prize for their design of the Botswana Innovation Hub. The 270,000 sqf office and research building will be a testament to Botswana’s support of research, as well as her promotion of innovation and entrepreneurship.
Field Operations and DS+R’s High Line has been enjoyed by many ever since its opening, but we’ve been waiting patiently for the next segment to be finished. And, thanks to Curbed.com, we’re able to share some recent construction shots of the progress being made.
Check out more photos and more about the second phase after the break.
As workers labor over the newest development at Ground Zero, moving, bolting and welding the 46,074 tons of steel can be tiresome and, well, make a person hungry. With an allotted 30-minute lunch break, workers wait anxiously for the hoist that descends dozens of stories, making their 30 minutes often times extend to 60. The solution – bring the lunch to the workers. The new sandwich shop, built by DCM Erectors (the same company that is putting up the steel girders and beams), is a movable pod made of stacked cargo containers which sit on either side of two tower cranes.
More images and more about the new restaurant after the break.
