Arch Daily |
- Residence in Colares / Frederico Valsassina Arquitectos
- Damushan Valley Teahouse / DnA
- Over 700 Experts and Active Citizens to Discuss Modern Housing Trends and Challenges in Kaliningrad
- Nobu Hotel Shoreditch / Ben Adams Architects
- Hundun University Education Center / VARY DESIGN
- Row House 200 / Ryuichi Ashizawa Architects & associates
- Lens Office / TAO - Trace Architecture Office
- Brunswick West House / Taylor Knights
- Kanye West's New Architecture Venture: Who, What, Why and... Really?
- 11 Meia 1 Gallery / Debaixo do Bloco Arquitetura
- Residence in Los Quebrachos San Luis / CMS arquitectas
- OMA’s Ellen van Loon on the Influence of Casa da Música in Her Latest Project, BLOX
- House 711H / Bloco Arquitetos
- BLOX / OMA / Ellen Van Loon
- How To Add People To Your Renders Like a Pro
- "Pixel Facade" System Combines a Love for Nature With Next-Generation Workspaces
| Residence in Colares / Frederico Valsassina Arquitectos Posted: 07 May 2018 08:00 PM PDT  © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
 © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG Text description provided by the architects. In the dense pine forest next to Praia das Maçãs (Apple Beach) the house hovers over the landscape.  © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG  Floor Plan  © Juan Rodriguez The exterior porch due to its elevation relative to the terrain appears as a porch above the pine forest. If the house on one side is born from the land, on the other due to the natural topography delicately levitates on it. This solution appears in a way as a strategy of environmental comfort, the Sintra mountain range has a very high humidity level, with this solution decreases the transfer of moisture from the soil to the house.  © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG The program is simple and was thought to the place where it is, with the existing climate. In this way is intended the greater absorption of sunlight: Rooms facing south, an office that appears as a place of collective activities and open for passage, room to the west and kitchen to the north. The large glazed windows allow the entrance of natural light in much of the day and therefore the heating of the space.  © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG  Section  © Juan Rodriguez Minimizing the effects on the natural landscape of the place, the pine forest was left as it was before this existence: the house is a platform that floats on the sand terrain. .jpg?1522152936 "© Juan Rodriguez") © Juan Rodriguez  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Damushan Valley Teahouse / DnA Posted: 07 May 2018 07:00 PM PDT  © Hao Chen
 © Hao Chen Text description provided by the architects. The tea gardens in the Damushan area of Songyang are situated in a hilly landscape before the backdrop of imposing mountains. The tea plantations extend over the ridges of the hills in smooth sweeps and have shaped the landscape space with their linearly planted bushes for centuries.  © Ziling Wang The Xujing pool was constructed between the tea plantations for irrigation purposes in 1968, and was later equipped with a circular path for pedestrians. At the edge of the pool, Xu Tiantian designed a teahouse for visitors, from which the view over the pool stages the scenic charms.  Diagram The new building is embedded linearly between the edge of the pool and the boundary of the site in such a way that it was possible to preserve five large sycamores, which provide the forecourt with shade thanks to their leafy canopy. The difference in the height of the terrain between the path and the edge of the pool is now filled with the new teahouse, which disappears between the trees and the natural topography.  © Hao Chen The tea pavilion, which was erected using black-dyed concrete, consists of a series of different spaces. The two-storey, open main room has a skylight and a glass front towards the pool. The owner here imparts aspects of tea culture and a contemporary form of the tradition that also attracts interest in urban centers. .jpg?1525396667 "© Ziling Wang") © Ziling Wang Connected to the main room are spaces for private tea ceremonies. At the periphery follows the meditation room, through whose round opening, the sunlight reflected by the surface of the water enlivens the interior space. Small courtyards and views, which raise awareness of both the landscape and aesthetic phenomena of nature, interrupt the sequence of spaces. .jpg?1525396632 "© Ziling Wang") © Ziling Wang The building itself is so well embedded in the landscape situation that the spectacular view first becomes apparent from the interior: the pool in the foreground serves as a mirror for the tea garden and the mountain scenery in the background.  © Hao Chen  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Over 700 Experts and Active Citizens to Discuss Modern Housing Trends and Challenges in Kaliningrad Posted: 07 May 2018 05:05 PM PDT  On May 18-19, the city of Kaliningrad, capital of the westernmost part of Russia, will host the Living Environment: All About Housing Forum. The Forum includes a business program and the Urban Weekend outdoor public festival. Besides sessions and roundtables, the ambitious program of the event includes the shortlist presentation of the projects submitted for the Open International Competition of Architectural Concepts for Standard Housing and Residential Buildings. Architects and bureaus from 39 countries took part in this prestigious competition with their projects of innovative residential housing for future generations of Russians. The competition announces a remarkable prize fund: 20 finalists will receive 1 million roubles (about € 13 300) each, up to five winning projects will be awarded 2 million roubles (about € 26 600) each, and up to five runners-up will receive 1.5 million roubles (about € 19 900) each. The experts and guests of the Forum will explore the current trends of housing stock development in the Russian context. The business program will bring together an audience of more than 700 authorities worldwide: developers, architects, economists, as well as experts in urban planning. Among reputed speakers are Winy Maas, co-founder and director of an architecture and urbanism enterprise MVRDV from Netherlands, former deputy mayor of Barcelona Antoni Vives, Russian political columnist and influencer Ekaterina Shulman, UN advisor and British ecological urbanist Brian Mark Evans, economist and real estate consultant Elliot Eisenberg, and Jeffrey Morgan, senior development consultant at MBL Housing, USA. These and many other renowned experts will try to answer the most crucial questions:
 All across the world, people are concentrating in cities, and Russia makes no exception: about 50% of the country's GDP comes from the economies of agglomerations. That said, standard residential buildings in Russia make up 77% of the built-up environment, while panel and block apartment houses account for 46%. As many as every second resident lives in an apartment that was constructed 50 years ago. Only 5% of Russian homes are compliant with OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) and UN-Habitat recommendations. According to a recent poll, 45% of Russians would like to improve the quality of their housing. In this country, the global trend of urbanization represents a complex and urgent challenge, and participants of the Forum will discuss urban planning with regard to Russia's unique history and development's flaws and features.
The Living Environment: All About Housing Forum is organized by the Ministry of Construction, Housing and Utilities of Russia, DOM.RF, Russian Housing and Urban Development Corporation and Strelka Institute for Media, Architecture and Design. Urban Weekend highlights urban issues through a festival programme which takes place during the days of the Forum. A street-food market with over 20 participants from the country's different regions (Kaliningrad, Kazan, Vladivostok) tours off the beaten track in Kaliningrad guided by the residents themselves, and more than 15 other activities for children and adults are part of a special programme of events aimed at opening up the potential of the region and the city in a new way for their inhabitants and engage the public in a larger conversation about living environments. It should be noted that the location of the third Living Environment: All About Housing Forum is not just any city. Kaliningrad, formerly known as Königsberg, is a Russian exclave between Poland and Lithuania. Due to its challenging location and therefore rich history, Kaliningrad region stands out among other Russian cities and boasts its truly distinguishable architecture and even mentality.
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| Nobu Hotel Shoreditch / Ben Adams Architects Posted: 07 May 2018 05:00 PM PDT  © Nicholas Worley
 © Nicholas Worley Text description provided by the architects. The client required a beautiful hotel that could accomodate a variety of unique rooms, from suites to luxury apartments, a gym, spa and state-of-the-art restaurant.  © Nicholas Worley This design marries the creative energy of the location with Nobu's values of simple luxury with a façade that fragments at the eastern end and descends into a welcome new pocket park, overlooked by the warehouses of Great Eastern Street to the North.  © Nicholas Worley Nobu requires that all their buildings reflect their immediate context. Our palette of concrete, bronze, timber and glass, overlaid with creative textiles and warm fabrics create a simple, considered and raw aesthetic.  © Nicholas Worley  Long Section  © Nicholas Worley An intimate garden at basement level is articulated into terraces, seating and planting, and provides natural light to the triple height restaurant and bar space that sits below the hotel.  © Nicholas Worley The target market is affluent professionals who enjoy luxury travel destinations and exceptional cuisine.  © Nicholas Worley Nobuyuki "Nobu" Matsuhisa is a renowned Japanese celebrity chef with an established reputation and well-loved brand. People will often travel the world to taste his food so this hotel needed to represent this brand and offer a true Nobu experience.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Hundun University Education Center / VARY DESIGN Posted: 07 May 2018 03:00 PM PDT  © ARCHEXIST
 © ARCHEXIST Text description provided by the architects. The project is located in TESTBED 2, an innovation campus regenerated from the previous Chongqing No. Printing Factory which also known as Central Bank's Banknote Printing Factory of Republic of China.  Location It sits on the top of topographical Eling Park with excellent views towards Yangtze River. It is an educational center in Chongqing for Hundun University, a 21-century internet based university. To create a new form of educational space fitting the contemporary context is the biggest challenge for us.  © ARCHEXIST Firstly we set up the overall strategy as adaptive design, meaning recycling the derelict buildings rather than building new constructions. Secondly, together with Hundun University we selected the site of BESTBED 2 with strong industrial characteristics that widely welcomed and favored on internet by the youth. Next we decided to do the renovation and extension of the Building-7, a building with a unique feature of eleven-continuous-arch structure.  © ARCHEXIST According to our analysis, the education center for an internet-based should no longer be singular function of education, but rather should be a happy sharing space, to share both knowledge and experience but also interests, gaming or foods.  © ARCHEXIST In the design, we reversed the layout pattern of traditional educational facilities, instead, making educational space as supportive space to surround the different cores of lecturing, exhibiting/gallery, leisure/gaming and dining space. Noticeably, our design proposal makes the place with higher openness and adaptivity that all the space is interchangeable inside the building.  © ARCHEXIST The entrance of the space is in the material of poured concrete and glass in high contrast with the brick material of the old factory plant. The concrete box of entrance, and the plug-in glass box of gallery, together with the brick box of old factory plant, form a three-dimensional "transparency".  © ARCHEXIST All the designs are intended to stimulate the communications in between the users. Online-popular-restaurant is the first core of this spatial series followed by the lecture hall led mix-use space and internet bar oriented educational space.  © ARCHEXIST The major body of the building keeps the original arch structure and all the brick walls, with the new glass casement and steel cantilevered balcony , forming another attractive material contrast.  © ARCHEXIST  Courtesy of VARY DESIGN Through the manipulation of materials and form, we implanted a brand-new life with new functions and meanings into a previous derelict warehouse. This whole process as an urban practice would be a prototype of the development of internet university in the physical conditions  © ARCHEXIST  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Row House 200 / Ryuichi Ashizawa Architects & associates Posted: 07 May 2018 01:00 PM PDT  © Kaori Ichikawa
 © Kaori Ichikawa Text description provided by the architects. The project is a two storey, 248.80 m2 floor areacommercial-lease building located in Tenjinbashi, the longest shopping strip in Osaka, Japan. This commercial area has its roots in the Edo Period, where it started developing as a business place for merchants. Commercial buildings in general last for only a few years. Looking to preserve the long-lasting commercial tradition of the area, this project was designed to last for at least 200 years.  In order to preserve the history of the site -where three row-houses used to exist- the project proposes a two story building with space for three tenants. The shape of the building looks to inherit the characteristics of the context, by tracing the roofline of the three row-houses that previously existed.  © Kaori Ichikawa Proposed for 200 years, flexibility is a key point in this project. The interior planning sees an open layout, in addition to a deck slab with adjustable height that allows the space to be divided to the tenant's layout needs. Considering future expansion, the exterior walls on the rooftop projected upward, so the building can easily grow by adding a new level.  Tenant Layout Options The exterior high durability concrete wall, besides working as a firewall, is a medium to convey the characteristics of the surrounding land. The surface texture looks to simulate the ground layer formation, with a coarse texture applied by different treatments, eleven layers in total.  © Kaori Ichikawa Surrounded by commercial facilities, this project is a long-lasting architecture that pays respect to the historical commercial area Tenjinbashi.  © Kaori Ichikawa  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Lens Office / TAO - Trace Architecture Office Posted: 07 May 2018 12:00 PM PDT  North Elevation. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office
 South Elevation. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office Text description provided by the architects. This project is designed for Lens Magazine, located in 1958 Industrial Avenue in Beijing, as their head office and event place. The building was built in 1958 and served as a warehouse of Transportation Department of Beijing Commercial Storage Company. The Large span pitched roof, supported by wood trusses and iron joints, is a typical warehouse typology in 1950s and indicates an aesthetic of structural purification.  Physical Model  2nd Floor Bookshelf Corridor. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office  Physical Model As restoration project mainly interprets the strength of time by reconciling the old and new. The design strategy intends to present the trace of time through spatial sequence and materials. The new plan rearranged the interior with spatial diversity and flexibility. The dark steel panel, due to its mottling surface and straightness, is integrated with the original site specific and brings a new life.  View From 2nd Floor. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office The interior space is divided to several rooms with different scale by a central bookshelf corridor. The bookshelf not only connects the public and private space but also conducting human activities to the spatial fellow. .jpg?1525351255 "South Working Area View From 2nd Floor. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office") South Working Area View From 2nd Floor. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office  Exhibition Area 2nd Floor Lounge. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office The book gallery is in the center of the building. It is constructed with book shelves to rebuild rituality that is fading away from modern life, but still corresponding to the cultural identity of Lens magazine. The verticality also brings people's concentration on the old roof structure. In the south area, the double height space with natural light encouraged people to communicate and enjoy the pleasant office atmosphere. On the other side, the northern area is quieter.  View to Book Corridor. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office The domestic scale with lower ceiling and lounge attaches to the bay windows offers the sense of peace and tranquility. The exhibition space is enclosed by revolving steel wall panels, which are both working as partition walls and exhibition boards for art works. When the panels are opened, the space has a better spatial circulation. As the panels are closed, the exhibition area turns to a courtyard that brings the viewpoint to the upper old roof. It also creates a space for holding lectures and exhibitions.  Interior Passage. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office The openings are corresponding to interior spaces. As the original south windows are too high, the project blocked the higher window and inserts lower windows which bring more light to eye level. The blocked upper window also creates a profound darkness in the roof. The ventilating function is detached from the window and transformed to the ventilation void below. The windows are able to capture the exterior landscape without any structural distractions.  Exterior Resting Platform. Image Courtesy of TAO - Trace Architecture Office  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Brunswick West House / Taylor Knights Posted: 07 May 2018 10:00 AM PDT  © Tom Blachford
 © Tom Blachford Text description provided by the architects. Brunswick West House is a small-scale, 50-square-meter alteration and addition to a Californian Bungalow home. The addition forms a low-volume, compact intervention on the project's site, that aims to re-engage the home with the generous north-facing garden beyond.  Proposed Floor Plan - Sketch The modest nature of the project called for simple, incisive moves that would sidestep the need for an arduous and costly re-configuration of the existing home. In turn, our strategy looked to repurpose an ivy-lined sideway, creating a new, central entry for the home.  © Tom Blachford This approach enables the home to operate succinctly in two halves: the original rooms now accommodate more private activities, while the addition forms its new social heart. These new living spaces are arranged in and around three sculptural masonry walls, creating nooks and reveals within the open plan – spaces that could offer a place to sit and share with family or retreat within at other times.  Plan - Sketch  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Kanye West's New Architecture Venture: Who, What, Why and... Really? Posted: 07 May 2018 08:01 AM PDT On Sunday evening, rapper Kanye West took to Twitter to announce the creation of a new architecture wing for his popular Yeezy company. With "Yeezy Home," West is "looking for architects and industrial designers who want to make the world better," leading to a flurry of speculation, excitement—and a certain amount of ridicule—across the online world. Whether or not you welcome the news, or believe it will be realized, there is undoubtedly an interesting relationship between West and architecture which merits exploration, and which may provide clues as to Yeezy Home's future, if indeed it has one. With that in mind, we dive into three questions: How likely is Yeezy Home to happen? What might the architecture of Yeezy Home look like? And how can architects get involved? How likely is Yeezy Home to happen?
Apart from West's Sunday evening tweet, there has been no official announcement by Yeezy, and no further details on their architectural ambitions. Looking to history, West's design-related announcements have a mixed picture of bearing fruition. In a January 2016 interview on BBC Radio 1, West announced his interest in collaborating with IKEA to "make furniture for interior design, for architecture." Despite the immense public intrigue, West's offer fell flat, as exemplified by IKEA Australia's ironic response. One month later, his call for Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg to invest $1 billion in his creative ideas, from holograms to hovercrafts, went unanswered. Perhaps the reason was pointed out by Stephen Colbert: If you are going to ask the CEO of Facebook for $1 billion, don't do it via Twitter. And then there is West's recent wild claims about Yeezy. Since returning to Twitter from a one-year exile, West has made some bold claims about his apparel business. Likening himself to Steve Jobs and Henry Ford, West declared Yeezy would be "working with the most genius-level talents and creating product at an affordable price." Given the current three-figure price of West's product line, the tweets are a difficult knot to untie.
However, for those excited by West's announcement, there is hope. In 2012, a similar sequence of events occurred when West announced via Twitter the creation of his design company DONDA, named after his late mother, which he tweeted would assemble "a team of architects, graphic designers, directors, musicians, producers... and put them in a creative aspect to bounce their dreams and ideas."
While ridiculed at the time, the entity has been credited with the creation of West's "Cruel Summer" seven-screen film, the marketing campaign for West's Yeezus album, and album covers for Lil Wayne, Big Sean, and other music giants. History offers a mixed reading of West's design ambitions, but for architects excited about the possibility of working with Yeezy Home, DONDA offers precedent that their day might come. What might the architecture of Yeezy Home look like?West has an undeniable interest in architecture, with a litany of previous statements and collaborations offering clues to what Yeezy Home might create. In 2015, Vogue gave an insight into West's New York apartment, a scheme which inspired his Yeezy collection. Designed by Claudio Silverstrin, the Soho apartment features neutral, modernist tones of limestone, pearwood, and stone. In an interview with Vanity Fair, West expressed his love for the apartment: "stressing the importance of color, the importance of that to our sanity, these Zen monochrome palettes... I love those types of palettes and that's my opinion," he explained. Perhaps the Yeezy Home designs of the future will reflect this modernist, unisex, somewhat minimalist ethos.  © Noam Dvir, Instagram User dvirnm However, evidence also exists that West might tackle broader issues through design. In 2013, West paid a visit to the studios of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, standing on a table to make an impassioned speech to students about the value of architecture, stressing that the world's issues can be tackled through an architectural lens:
This is not an isolated incident. In a BBC interview in 2013, West riffs about his desire to help architects confront big ideas, describing the profession as world builders, before famously declaring "this is the reason why I'm working with five architects at a time." West has also associated himself with some high-profile architects. In 2013, he shared a stage with Jacque Herzog of Herzog & de Meuron, at an event in Miami's Design District. He has also exhibited a working relationship with OMA founder Rem Koolhaas. In 2013, West was interviewed by Tomas Koolhaas for the production of the documentary "REM," in which he discussed the impact Koolhaas had on his interest in architecture, influenced by the OMA-designed temporary pavilion at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, which screened West's debut short film "Cruel Summer."
 © OMA; Photography by Philippe Ruault  © OMA; Photography by Philippe Ruault Given West's impassioned belief that architecture can change the world, and that everything should be "architected" to the "doped" degree, perhaps Yeezy Home will offer a new intersection between architecture, politics, and visionary theory, one which has often featured in both OMA and Koolhaas' output? How can architects get involved? © Seth Browarnik/startraksphoto.com, via Surface Magazine's Facebook Page Until further official details are released, there is no clear answer. With the announcement of DONDA in 2012 came an email address for interested architects to submit ideas or examples of work for West's team to consider. Until history repeats itself, your best hope is to log onto Twitter, find the Yeezy Home tweet, reply with your inner Kanye, and hope for the best—or to try something else similarly bold. For architects who do hope to play a part in West's new venture, the rapper has provided more than enough material to understand his architectural tastes and his ambitious outlook on what architecture can be. To many of us, the chance of working with West may seem distant, but as the rapper once said, "reach for the stars so if you fall you land on a cloud."  © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/aktivioslo/6030764372/'>Flickr user aktivioslo</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/'>CC BY-NC-ND 2.0</a> So where does this tweet and analysis leave us? As with much news surrounding Kanye and his life, it leaves us with a sense of either wonder, confusion, or unease. West has had a long illustrious career, one with many chapters left. His announcement may be met with ridicule by some, but to dismiss his intentions out of hand runs the risk of ignoring a long, intriguing, and worthwhile contribution to the world of design, creativity, and architecture. This article was written using information sourced from:
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| 11 Meia 1 Gallery / Debaixo do Bloco Arquitetura Posted: 07 May 2018 08:00 AM PDT  © Joana França
Text description provided by the architects. The Almeida Prado Gallery always had its base in Brasília, but after a few years the demand changed and the owner decided to take his gallery to the city of São Paulo. In this change, the architecture office Debaixo do Bloco was invited, with the intention of taking the typical traces of the capital of the country to a noble district of São Paulo, so the store would not lose the identity of the city where it was born even being in another state. The biggest premise of this space was to create a cozy gallery where the client could visualize the exposed pieces as if it were in his house, something different from the existing galleries in the region.  © Joana França The challenge of this project was to solve the layout that should be arranged in a terrain 13 meters long by 4.5 meters wide, without appearing too narrow. Knowing this, the solutions found were; to implant a 3 meters ceiling height, to create communication with the street, to elaborate a background in the store that was more inviting and to sector the floors. On the first floor was concentrated an exhibition space of the pieces, with furniture and pictures arranged along the hall, down the stairs were located shelves with the purpose of displaying the sculptures and includes a pantry, in addition, a bathroom located in the open loft below the ladder.  © Joana França  Floor Plans  © Joana França To the bottom was established a limit of construction to 100 cm of the wall already existing in the later side of the store, that both on the ground as on the second floor, which made possible the creation of a winter garden on the first floor, that communicates with the second floor and with the terrace, this purposeful spacing created a connection of the floors that through skylights chimneys bring natural light and ventilation to the back of the Gallery, a place that doesn’t allow the installation of windows and was unattractive.  Isometry 1 The stairs leading visitors from one floor to the other one was made with plaid sheets supported by a central beam, on the second floor it gains a new functionality, in addition to the communication between one floor to another, it receives a body guard curtain screens painted in yellow and that pivot when necessary to expose works of art. This floor also gains a window that functions as a large showcase and generates communication between the street and the inner space of the gallery, because it is an area with fewer functions - restrooms, pantry, displays - it receives the bigger furniture of the store, like tables, shelves and armchairs.  © Joana França The terrace has a small free area, a bathroom and an office that can turn into a café in the future. In the facade of this space the cobogos serve to highlight the volume created at the top of the small building, and remind the residential houses of Brasília where this resource was widely used, this artifice also hides the water tank at the bottom of the terrace. In the interior architecture part, the coauthor Fabio Almeida Prado defined the colors used that resemble the brand created in Brasilia - yellow, black and gray - the curatorship of the pieces is also made by him and brings important works such as Oscar Niemeyer, Lucio Costa, Tomie Ohtake, the furniture comes from all over Brazil, that is, the creation of the store's identity was conceived by him next to the layout of the office. Another interesting part to solve a common function in the gallery was the way of exposing the frames, instead of nails on the walls, suspended chains were placed and the pictures are exposed in different heights and positions without having to damage the walls. After solving the obstacles of function and use of the terrain, the facade needed to stand out in the street, then precast concrete blocks were applied to vertical garden, so was created movement with a simple element where the same techniques of Athos Bulcão was used, that is, to create a composition logic, so a constructive element directed to receiving plants in the wall became a key piece to transform the facade into something attractive.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Residence in Los Quebrachos San Luis / CMS arquitectas Posted: 07 May 2018 06:00 AM PDT  © Walter Salcedo
 © Walter Salcedo Text description provided by the architects. The residence is found inside the district Los Quebrachos in the extreme northwest of the city of San Luis (Argentina). It is a permanent home for a family consisting of a couple with three small children at the time of construction. During the design process there were very specific requests that the program had to incorporate. The most important, because of its scope and nature, was to have a large enclosed space for recreation activities and some sporting practices due to the limitations imposed by the Chorrillero wind for activities in open spaces.  Transversal Section / Swimming Pool  © Walter Salcedo  Longitudinal Section The characteristics of the lot and its surroundings were considered as determinants of the formal, functional and material definition of the project. The most important ones are:  © Walter Salcedo
 Underground Floor Plan  © Walter Salcedo  Upper Floor Plan Once the requirements and constraints were consolidated, the criteria that guided the design decisions were established:  © Walter Salcedo
 © Walter Salcedo  Views The used materials are the apparent concrete in the upper dimension volume and the San Luis dark gray stone as a base in the lower level of the terrain. Both materials respond to the requirements of minimal maintenance and good behavior in earthquakes.  © Walter Salcedo The visual connections between spaces through large glazed surfaces is a constant: the glances can pass from one space to the other, and can cross several spaces to get the views of the surrounding environment. These visual connections in multiple senses, which at the same time don’t neglect the intimacy of spaces, are those that give a unitary character to a program, which, despite being a single-family dwelling, is very complex.  © Walter Salcedo  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| OMA’s Ellen van Loon on the Influence of Casa da Música in Her Latest Project, BLOX Posted: 07 May 2018 04:15 AM PDT  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST On Saturday, at the opening of her latest building, Ellen van Loon sat on the terrace of BLOX in Copenhagen exuding the satisfaction and fulfillment that comes with finishing a major public building. A day of opening activities concluded, van Loon spoke with ArchDaily about the 27,000-square-meter mixed-use building. Built for client Realdania, it's the Danish Architecture Center's new home on the edge of the harbor, located on an incredibly challenging site that is bifurcated by a busy street.  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST "The nicest thing is that you can design a public building," says van Loon. "The doors are always open." Her palpable passion for buildings without barriers comes with a commendable record of working on some of the most interesting and innovative public projects in Europe, like the Reichstag, New German Parliament in Berlin—which she participated on while working for Norman Foster—and later the Casa da Música in Porto.  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST The exterior of BLOX only hints at its internal organization. But the glass facade does communicate a visual transparency that forms the heart of the project's philosophy. Van Loon, a self-admitted workaholic, told a packed house during the opening that the building is about showcasing work.  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST Inside, a large central exhibition space serves as the central core of the project. The offices that surround it have direct views of the shows put on by DAC—and of the performance of making architecture. One such workspace, BLOXHUB, with its motto "Co-Creating Better Cities," is an urban innovation incubator that facilitates collaborative projects between members such as Gehl Architects, 3XN, The Danish Design Centre and the Institute for Urban Economic Research. It creates, literally and physically, a side-by-side working relationship between Denmark's companies, research institutions, and municipalities. Conceived to facilitate real-time collaboration between the Danish Architecture Center and the members of BLOXHUB, the spatial organization of the BLOX building give this collaboration a very public stage. The idea that architecture is a performance is not one van Loon confers in passing. An architecture center should convey as much as possible about the built environment, and the design of BLOX helps to exhibit the fundamental tenets of the profession; it highlights and frames views of the city (context) while demonstrating the "it takes a village" nature of making architecture come to life (collaboration).  OMA's Casa da Música in Porto, Portugal. Image © Philippe Ruault "Casa da Música really changed my life, in a way, because it was a project for performance and I learned so much in that project from performers, not from architects. I learned so much about making scenes," she says of the performance space completed in Porto in 2006. In the hall at BLOX, in particular, the magic of Casa da Música re-emerges. When asked about how previous projects affect subsequent designs, she explained that Casa da Música in particular "changed my whole way of looking at architecture. [Casa da Música] is about staging. It is about framing views. It is about going from dark spaces to light spaces. So that building changed me so much. In a way, you could say that every building becomes a bit of a theater since."  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST The theatricality of BLOX also draws on familiar design decisions for OMA. BLOX "is an architectural center that feels more like an architectural office because you see the work that is produced. It's also something that we tried to do on Casa da Música; we opened the back of house because you don't normally see the backstage and people are really interested in what is happening behind the scenes," says van Loon.  © Søren Svendsen Copenhageners and tourists alike are also treated to the performance of an inhabited exterior. The fantastic weather during opening weekend saw crowds of people taking to the projects' elevated outside spaces.  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST Our conversation drawing to a close, van Loon tells us to return to the building in 12 months to really experience what she hopes will take form. "They just moved in, so you feel like the different users are still wondering, 'Is this my boundary? Can I go there?' I think we should come back in a year to see how they develop," she quips with a smile.  © BLOX / Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST We've published the full project here, which includes drawings, diagrams and photographs.   This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 04:00 AM PDT  © Joana França
 © Joana França Text description provided by the architects. The 711H house is located on the West portion of the W3 avenue in Brasília. The W3 is an avenue inside the protected area of the Plano Piloto in Brasília and has formerly been known as the main commercial street during the capital´s first years. The project that was finally developed and built for its west side differ from what was envisioned by Lucio Costa´s winning proposal for the Plano Piloto, which saw the area as an alternative for big plots of land for small farms and food production. The initial great demand for housing has pressed for changes in its uses and it was finally transformed in an area with different sizes of row houses with narrow service streets and wide green strips right in front.  © Joana França Over time the decline of the commerce in the area together with the messy occupation in its residential plots has generated a landscape that is composed mostly by houses that exceed the maximum height limits besides covering and occupying their front yard and close themselves to the green public space, turning their front to the service streets. Therefore, the wide green public space in front of the houses is nowadays derelict, underused and potentially dangerous for pedestrians.  © Joana França  © Joana França The project for the 711H House was designed for a young coulple with a kid and two small dogs. It aknowledges the present reality and its official and unofficial rules of occupation and aims to recover the activation of the green strip that is adjacent to the house by proposing a model that uncovers the front yard and transforms it into a green space that can be directly connected to the green public strip, also allowing for direct connection to the service street through the house itself.  Ground Floor Plan  © Joana França  1st Floor Plan A ground-floor existing house in the plot had most of its structure condemned, which has led to the decision of reusing only part of its foundations and the existing landfill. This also has defined the limits of the internal occupation, although all its uses were redefined. To alleviate the weight on the foundations, all the structure in the ground floor is made of laminated steel beams and columns. Here the structural concrete blocks are used only as partitions, while in the second floor it also works as structure, for reasons of cost. The form of the roof is generated by an imaginary line connecting the highest point that is officially allowed for the constructions in the neighborhood to the slighlty sloped roof of the construction on the other side, which defines a stepped wall with two roofs with different inclinations. Here the project aimed to create a patio that is only opened to the sky, taking advantage of the morning sun.  © Joana França The wall that separate both has the maximum height that will be eventually aligned with the new construction on the side once the old house is replaced and therefore will keep the privacy of the upper patio.  © Joana França  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 03:13 AM PDT  Photograph by Richard John Seymour, Courtesy of OMA
 © Rasmus Hjortshøj – COAST Text description provided by the architects. The BLOX project, home of the Danish Architecture Center (DAC), contains exhibition spaces, offices and co-working spaces, a café, a bookstore, a fitness centre, a restaurant, twenty-two apartments and an underground automated public carpark, but it is not the acrobatic mixing of uses that defines this project; its ultimate achievement is in 'discovering' its own site.  Situation © OMA  © Dragør Luftfoto  Situation © OMA The Old Brewery site, split into two by one of Copenhagen's main ring roads, didn't really register as a building site until the design of the new DAC identified it as such. Straddling theroad, making public connections both above and below, BLOX connects the parliament district with the harbour front and brings culture to the water's edge. A space for cars becomes a space for people; a space to pass through becomes a space to reside.  Photograph by Richard John Seymour, Courtesy of OMA  Diagram © OMA  Diagram © OMA  © Søren Svendsen The Copenhagen inner harbour has a long industrial and military history. On reclaimed land, the building site initially housed a cluster of brewery buildings which burnt to the ground in the 1960s. Since then the harbour has become the home of some of Denmark's most notable architectural icons; a linear display of the tenets of Danish Modernism: monumentality, simplicity and politeness.  Photograph by Delfino Sisto Legnani and Marco Cappelletti, Courtesy of OMA BLOX adds a new impulse: creating an encounter between the water frontages, Kierkegaard's Square and the city. Its square volume, positioned directly along the harbourside, creates a sheltered public city square against the traditional yellow buildings and a much needed built front for the existing library square.  © Søren Svendsen Contrary to most city blocks in Copenhagen – often introverted and inaccessible – the building absorbs the city's life. The urban routes through the building lead to unexpected and unpredictable interactions between the building and the city, linking the different museums, libraries and historical sites around the culturally rich Slotsholmen area. A linear park along the harbour flows down below water level along the quay wall and through the building. The former playground is incorporated into the new building, as a partially covered and terraced public space, which can be transformed in the evening into an open-air cinema acting as a public foyer.  Section-A © OMA  © Rasmus Hjortshøj – COAST  Section-C © OMA  Photograph by Delfino Sisto Legnani and Marco Cappelletti, Courtesy of OMA  Section-E © OMA The building's exterior is marked by a stacking of the same geometric forms in different arrangements. The offices are contained in a rectangular ring of glass facades shaded in a white frit. The ground floor functions are located in separate volumes generating openings which form the public entrances and bring the city in to the center of the building. The apartment volumes are fragmented and recessed for privacy, the landscaped terraces encircle the DAC's central rooflight. The building's coloured textures subtly echo the sea tones of the harbour, ever-present in the reflected light of the water.  Photograph by Richard John Seymour, Courtesy of OMA The DAC itself forms the core of the BLOX Project, positioned in the centre, surrounded by and embedded within its objects of study: housing, offices and parking. It is organized as a vertical sequence of spaces running through the building, starting below ground and moving upwards to the cafe with its view over all of Copenhagen.  Photograph by Delfino Sisto Legnani and Marco Cappelletti, Courtesy of OMA Sustainability  Photograph by Hans Werlemann, Courtesy of OMA Denmark's advanced low energy requirements for buildings, arising from the 2009 Copenhagen Accord, demand an operational energy usage much lower than other countries. Bringing the building's design in line with these criteria involved rethinking its mass and façade concepts, involving ways to reduce CO2 emissions and embodied carbon during construction and operations, as well as researching new solutions to offset and neutralise the carbon usage. The building makes use of on-site renewable energy and achieves the Low Energy Class with a primary energy usage of under 40 kWh/m2/yr.  Photograph by Delfino Sisto Legnani and Marco Cappelletti, Courtesy of OMA User comfort and lifetime flexibility are important elements for the durability of BLOX. The building is acoustically isolated from road noise and vibrations with a highway bridge construction and high insulation facades. The office facades are fully glazed to provide a generous outlook and to reduce lighting energy usage. Minimal low-energy lighting fixtures combined with user task lights are used, and both lighting and facade sun shading are automated through centralised daylight control, with user controls. The building is served by a high specification heat recovery plant which uses Copenhagen's district heating and cooling system based on seawater cooling and the use of residual heat from electricity generation.  Photograph by Richard John Seymour, Courtesy of OMA  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| How To Add People To Your Renders Like a Pro Posted: 07 May 2018 02:30 AM PDT  The proposed plan for the TheaterSquared's mainstage. Image © Charcoalblue. Rendering by Kilograph. It's no mystery why we put people in our designs. People are the quickest way to an emotional connection. With the right visual cues, you can evoke deep feelings, turning a simple image into a source of awe or aspiration. In architectural visualization, we try to shape those feelings, working off the perceptions most of us share. While we are all creatures of circumstance, using our experiential knowledge to guide us day-to-day, a lot of our conditioning is the same. Which is why it is so important to consider how you use people when you create visualizations of your designs. Entourage are your visual guides, alerting the viewer to the story or feelings you want to convey. Sometimes that story is one of usage, an explanation of how someone interacts or moves about a space. Other times, it's a bit more abstract. Whatever the direction, the art of entourage is really a study of composition, conditioning, and narrative. The more you know about each topic, the better your visualization will turn out—especially when you have a complicated brief. In this piece, I'd like to show you how we approach entourage at Kilograph. Since our backgrounds are diverse—artists, architects, brand experts, and VR technicians—we are constantly having discussions about how to make people stand out, from a psychological and aesthetic perspective. Here's what we've found. Pick a StyleAbove, I alluded to the two types of visualization: editorial and usage. Usage is fairly self-explanatory, and is often what clients ask for when they want an image or animation from you. Usage allows you to remove the unknowns from a visualization, relying on clear presentations of an environment's attributes to do the heavy lifting. This can be especially helpful on entitlement projects where the fate of a neighborhood lies in the balance. Showing those bike lanes or a family hanging out on the grass can really be soothing, especially when it's presented in a positive light.  The proposed plan for NoMad Walk in New York City. Image © NoMad Walk. Rendering by Kilograph. For editorial, on the other hand, you are trying to be eye-catching, in a way that doesn't always prioritize the space at first. Most companies look to fashion spreads, centering the image on costumes or props to raise a mood. Those underlying feelings, which connect to a bigger idea of a building's brand, are what you are going after in an editorial push. So if you have a good idea, an open brief, and a target audience that would respond to some creativity, this route can be a lot of fun.  Interior rendering for a residential project in Silverlake, Los Angeles. Rendering by Kilograph. Build a NarrativeThere's a reason why we are still talking about The Odyssey: good stories stay with you. With entourage, you can tell visual narratives without words, using the right presentation of people to keep someone scanning around the image, or leaving with an intended takeaway. We recently did a project for The Coloradan, a residential project in Denver. Our goal was to make the amenities of this condo development feel a little more alive. For example, in one illustration the viewer is launched into a four-year-old's birthday party, filled with parents chatting and kids tearing around the place. Think about all the elements at play here: families, gatherings, togetherness, all contained within an events room. The adults look successful, the children look maybe middle to upper middle class, and everyone looks comfortable. Everything ties back into the brand of the building and the types of people they wanted to attract—the right entourage, inserted in an appealing way, can do that. And because humans come with years of social conditioning, an image like this can get there in nanoseconds.  Proposed interior for The Coloradan by East West Partners. Image © East West Partners. Rendering by Kilograph. Another thing to consider is how the different parts of an image, including all the mini-stories, play off each other. A lot of times we put the narrative in the foreground. Since that's where most people's eyes go first, that's where you should put your A story. Each part of the image should either expand or supplement that A story in some way though. For instance, if I were to show you an image of a museum, you might expect to see people staring at a painting. But it's often smart to think about what else I (or the client) wants you to see. What if they have specific exhibits that are interactive? You could insert a group engaging with them in the background. And maybe to the side, you put someone getting a drink of water, a much-needed break. Together, these characters create a multi-layered narrative; the key is figuring out how to make sure your background stories don't compete or take away too much from the main one. Humans can only process so much information, so it's always best to serve your main concept over everything else. Use Custom EntourageWhen clients come to us, they want something unique. The quickest way to look commonplace is to start filling their visualizations with a bunch of stock models that they've already seen before. That's why we create our own entourage libraries, using a green screen and models we hire for the job. It goes back to what I was saying about brand; certain people are going to evoke certain types of feeling in the viewer. Casting allows an agency like us, who often handles branding and visualizations top to bottom, the highest level of control.  The proposed plan for the TheaterSquared's mainstage. Image © Charcoalblue. Rendering by Kilograph. One of our new favorite toys for this process is Apple's ARKit, as it allows us to line up models with our 3D environments. You just hold up an iPad and check angles on set, which saves a lot of time in post. Compose and PlaceSo now you have your characters, you have your story. What's next? It's time to consider the placement and integration of your entourage—which admittedly is no easy task, since these decisions can directly impact the perception of the architecture. Entourage placement can make a space look big or small, spacious or narrow, or even highlight key elements of the design (or hide an unresolved aspect of the design). To illustrate this, let's break down an illustration I did for an imaginary office in Malibu.  Courtesy of Kilograph There are two stories operating in tandem here: an office in crisis and some surfers on their way to the beach. The juxtaposition is supposed to be amusing, but notice how other key compositional considerations are at play, like a clear view of the ocean, a feeling of spaciousness, and the use of symmetry, which is pleasing to the eye. Before: Without the people, you are left with an open, warm design that allows the viewer's eye to scan unimpeded.  Courtesy of Kilograph After: Introduce the people, different story. You lose your line of sight on specific furniture or architectural elements, so placement matters. But what you gain is narrative, and that's better than an open room.  Courtesy of Kilograph Active vs Passive areas: When considering placement, you have to think about how a space is supposed to function. For instance, where is motion permitted? You wouldn't have someone running between the desks, as it would create tightness and feelings of chaos in an area that is supposed to be for collaborative work and quietness. In this image, the chairs act as an active meeting point for people, which makes sense in an office environment.  Courtesy of Kilograph Actors: Next, you'll want to define the number of characters, their role, and a hierarchy, as it will set a path for their position and scale. In this case, the main story (the office drama in blue) is set in the middle-ground, giving it the same level of importance as the architecture. The scale, body positioning and location of the people play a key role. By having the main actors positioned close together in the center of the frame, you leave room to tell a secondary story (the surfers in Green) and space for the architecture. If the main actors were too close to the camera, it would become all about them.  Courtesy of Kilograph Composition: If you analyze this scene, you'll see it's balanced, symmetric and in a landscape orientation with one main point perspective. When you work through composition decisions like this, you create a structure that helps with placement. For instance, if you know you want symmetry, you don't put your main actors in an off-center position. It would cause the whole image to feel unbalanced.  Courtesy of Kilograph Finally, when we overlay all the analysis diagrams at once, we can see everything we need to know about the composition from where the main action and movement are happening, to how symmetry is broken by main story, to how the secondary story counterbalances this movement. Each piece serves the other, creating a dynamic, pleasing visual for the space.  Courtesy of Kilograph A few other points worth considering during composition: The path: Every image has a visual path that guides the viewer's eye. But some are better than others. When considering placement, take into account what you want the viewer to see. If you want to call attention to one area, grouping helps. If you want them to discover space and narrative in an orderly manner, then disperse your actors, putting more of the focus on the areas you want to highlight. The horizon line: Is your entourage above or below it? This line will tremendously affect someone's perception of the scale and proportion of your people. You can also use it as a guidepost for making sure a person is aligned and blended properly with the surrounding elements. The camera: Lens distortion is an important factor to be aware of in the photography world. It can make or break our images as artists. Distortion can shift perspective, making objects or people seem out of proportion if not balanced right. The guidelines: Are you incorporating the classic rules of composition: the rule of thirds, golden ratio, etc? Evoke Emotions Proposed plan for the Sunset Spectacular Billboard by JCDecaux/Zaha Hadid Architects. Rendering by Kilograph. While all humans are hardwired to scan, not everything can be whittled down to biology ("I see danger," "they look nice," etc). Cultural conditioning plays a huge role as well. What's important to consider with entourage is how your target audience feels about different aesthetics, looks, colors, clothes, etc. Everything can trigger somebody, so you want to be conscious about what you are putting together, so the viewer is left feeling good or intrigued by what you are showing them. Here are a few things to pay attention to: Facial expressions/body language: Do the faces match the mood? Do the gestures match the faces? A lot of times we are guarding against overacting in our shoots. Viewers can quickly spot a fake smile or an over-the-top gesture and they don't like either, so ensuring that the look is synonymous with the feeling is extremely important. Context also matters. When we created designs for Frank Gehry's Ascend, a creative workspace, we included a mix of gestures that made sense in the situation, from the way someone comfortably leans back with their hands on their hips during an impromptu office chat, to the way another browses a magazine on a break. The gestures you pick should fall in line with a viewer's expectations. And we all have thoughts about how different situations or environments should function. Age: In some cultures, it's respected. In the US, not so much. Age can be associated with everything from maturity to being over the hill, which means it is one of the quickest identifiers for brand intent. If twentysomethings are mixing with seventysomethings, what does that say about a space? If the visualization is child-heavy, what does that say? Age ranges can completely change the feeling of an image, so it all comes down to the narrative. Who belongs there and who gets priority? What are the biases and what are the expectations? Consider the norms and work from there. Colors: There's a reason why blue is thought of as comforting. Or why red cars get more tickets (eye-catching). There are whole studies on this subject, and you should read them, but for our purposes consider this: colors carry moods, draw attention and tell your eyes where to go. Remember that as you assign them to your entourage. If your A-character needs to stand out, don't give the red to another group. It robs the hero. Consider the FutureCities think big. So big that plans can often live 50 years in the future, especially when they involve central services like transportation or infrastructure. So how do we, as visualization artists, work with a gap like that? 50 years is a long time. When we plot out the future, we look to trends, trajectories and what's not currently being used in the world, especially on the street. What's on the runway isn't always out and about, but it might be in 50 years. Or consider Google Glass. It didn't work, but the idea of some form of technological eyewear is likely in time. At the end of the day, the people you choose should seem natural within the environment. It's fun to be space-y, but if it doesn't pass the scan test, it won't feel right. And feeling right is the goal. If the presentation isn't believable, the design is moot and the emotional connection is squandered. Or, thought of another way, you'll get an emotion... just not the one you want. Fredy Castellanos is an art director and senior associate at Kilograph in Los Angeles.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| "Pixel Facade" System Combines a Love for Nature With Next-Generation Workspaces Posted: 07 May 2018 01:00 AM PDT  © Mengyi Fan Recently shortlisted for the 2018 Design Challenge "Design the Next-Generation Facade" by Metals in Construction Magazine, this "Pixel Facade" system is an adaptive, scalable and repeatable building system that can be applied to various building typologies. The system draws inspiration from our innate desire for nature, also known as "biophilia." The "Pixel Facade" system merges a contemporary office environment with biophilic environments to create the next generation of office design.  © Mengyi Fan  © Mengyi Fan With an abundance of break-out spaces incorporating modular planters, shades and furniture, the occupants have the ability to take a break from work and "immerse themselves in an outdoor environment." The various break-out spaces also allow for a work environment that is more conducive to collaboration and innovation, which is becoming the norm in contemporary workspace design today.  © Mengyi Fan  © Mengyi Fan The variability of the system allows the tenant the flexibility to configure the layout of the work and break-out spaces. The system also takes advantage of construction industry innovations such as "generative design, BIM, prefabrication and timber frame construction" to create a more economic and sustainable design-build process.  © Mengyi Fan News via: Oliver Thomas.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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