Cloud Seeding Plaza Pavilion by MODU, Credit: Aviad Bar Ness
Phu Hoang and Rachely Rotem, co-directors of MODU, will present their work investigating architecture’s relationship with weather. The work proposes a significant shift in traditional modes of environmental thinking: architecture, as a conceptual and cultural practice, should be informed by and adaptable to weather.
Placing sixth in the competition to design the Romanian Pavilion for the 2015 Milan Expo, Collective East Architects offered a “simple and powerful landmark” that focuses on the history of Romania’s agriculture. Serving as an “attractor and orientation mark,” the structure was conceived by repeating a traditional Romanian pattern that “transformed the pavilion into a sculptural object with a powerful national identify.” From a distance, the facade appears “introverted and impenetrable;” as viewers move closer, the building begins to expose its contents, revealing a level of detail one would expect in a “jewelry museum.”