srijeda, 9. svibnja 2018.

Arch Daily

Arch Daily


Spotlight: Rafael Moneo

Posted: 08 May 2018 09:30 PM PDT

National Museum of Roman Art. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/pictfactory/2842858053'>Flickr user pictfactory</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a> National Museum of Roman Art. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/pictfactory/2842858053'>Flickr user pictfactory</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a>

As the first ever Spanish architect to receive the Pritzker PrizeRafael Moneo (born 9 May 1937) is known for his highly contextual buildings which nonetheless remain committed to modernist stylings. His designs are regularly credited as achieving the elusive quality of "timelessness"; as critic Robert Campbell wrote in his essay about Moneo for the Pritzker Prize, "a Moneo building creates an awareness of time by remembering its antecedents. It then layers this memory against its mission in the contemporary world."

Image <a href='http://www.abc.es/20120509/cultura-arte/abci-rafael-moneo-201205091211.html'>via Diario ABC, S.L.</a>. Image <a href='http://www.abc.es/20120509/cultura-arte/abci-rafael-moneo-201205091211.html'>via Diario ABC, S.L.</a>.

When he was young, Moneo was more attracted to philosophy and painting than architecture, however it was the influence of his father - an industrial designer - that eventually led to him pursuing a career in architecture. He graduated from the Madrid University School of Architecture in 1961, after which he traveled Europe in order to work with Jørn Utzon and Alvar Aalto before returning to Madrid. Shortly afterward, Moneo spent two years in Rome as part of a fellowship with the Spanish Academy in Rome, a period which he credits as being "fundamental" to his development as an architect.

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, Los Angeles. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/cwsteeds/5324514176/'>Flickr user cwsteeds</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a> Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, Los Angeles. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/cwsteeds/5324514176/'>Flickr user cwsteeds</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a>

After returning to Madrid, Moneo became highly active in architectural circles, taking on a teaching role at Madrid University, and hosting gatherings known as "Little Congresses" with active Spanish architects, as well as prominent international designers such as Aldo RossiÁlvaro Siza and Peter Eisenman. In 1968, he founded the magazine Arquitectura Bis, where many of his writings were published.

National Museum of Roman Art. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/pictfactory/2840558654'>Flickr user pictfactory</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a> National Museum of Roman Art. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/pictfactory/2840558654'>Flickr user pictfactory</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a>

Aside from his 1996 Pritzker Prize, Moneo has also been awarded the 2003 RIBA Gold Medal and the 2012 Prince of Asturias Award. Some of his key buildings include the National Museum of Roman Art and the Auditoria Grans D'Europa in Spain, the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, and the Davis Art Museum in Massachusetts.

L'Auditori amb els Grans D'Europa. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/francesc_2000/4116798705/'>Flickr user Francesc_2000</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a> L'Auditori amb els Grans D'Europa. Image © <a href='https://www.flickr.com/photos/francesc_2000/4116798705/'>Flickr user Francesc_2000</a> licensed under <a href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/'>CC BY 2.0</a>

See all of Rafael Moneo's works featured on ArchDaily via the thumbnails below, and further coverage of Moneo below those:

Rafael Moneo Selected as 2017 Praemium Imperiale Laureate

Rafael Moneo Wins Inaugural Soane Medal for Contribution to Architecture

Video: Enter the Ethereal Spaces of Los Angeles' Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels

Rafael Moneo receives the 2012 Prince of Asturias Award

References: Pritzker Prize (1, 2) and Wikipedia

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Russian Pavilion at 2018 Venice Biennale to Explore Rich Railway History

Posted: 08 May 2018 09:00 PM PDT

Courtesy of Bulanov Courtesy of Bulanov

As part of our 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale coverage we present the proposal for the Russian Pavilion. Below, the participants describe their contribution in their own words. 

The Russian Pavilion is delighted to present Station Russia, which explores the past, present and future of the Russian railways. In an environment which is in parts uninhabitable, to the extent that roads cannot be built, railways have become the lifeblood of the largest country in the world. Station Russia explores how they, and the people who use them, negotiate the vast and often empty expanse of the Russian landscape.

In a new exhibition conceived and created for the 16th Venice Architecture Biennale, the national pavilion has been transformed into a train station. Within its five 'Halls', contemporary Russian architects, designers and artists use sound and multimedia installations, as well as photographs, models and artifacts, to explore the past of the network and to present their vision of its future. 

The exhibition is supported by JSC Russian Railways, whose involvement reflects its pivotal role in maintaining the strategic importance of the Russian railway network. The focus of the exhibition forms a parallel with the history of the Russian Pavilion itself, which was inaugurated in 1914. The building's designer, Alexey Shchusev, was also responsible for the Kazansky Railway Station – the Moscow terminus of the line which first connected the capital with Ryazan, in the south east of the country, and beyond, to Kazakhstan and central Asia. 

Courtesy of Arkady Shaikhet Courtesy of Arkady Shaikhet

Hall 1: The Geography of Free Space

The first hall of the Pavilion demonstrates the complexity of the railway system that spreads throughout Russia's vast empty spaces and multiple time zones.  An infographic installation by Russian artist Arden Vald presents the country's railways as both its circulatory system - its living, vital veins - and as its backbone, supplying crucial connectivity for the Russian populous, who depend on this form of transport as the only way to navigate an often formidable landscape.

Hall 2: The Architectural Depot

In the central hall of the Pavilion, The Architectural Depot showcases plans and models of train stations past and present, such as the renovated station at Sochi (Studio 44, Architect: Nikita Yavein) and the proposed High-Speed Rail connecting Moscow to Kazan (Metrogiprotrans, Architect: Nikolai Shumakov).

A large-scale installation, suspended above the central stairwell, recreates the first Russian voksal – or Vauxhall - a train station and Pleasure Gardens in the suburb of Pavlovsk, built in the early 19th century, which functioned both as a terminus for the first Russian railway and as a summer retreat for St Petersburg's elite.

Hall 3: The Waiting Hall of the Future

The Waiting Hall of the Future presents two projects dedicated to the future of habitable development surrounding train stations: a re-examination of the futuristic New Unit Settlements (NUS), first shown at fifty years ago at the Triennale di Milano in 1968, and a showcase of proposed developments around one of the busiest railway termini squares in central Moscow, put forward by a new generation of contemporary Russian architects, Citizenstudio and Studio 911 (Citizenstudio: M. Beilin, D. Nikishin. Studio 911: V. Krylov, A. Churzin, I. Assorov). Titled "A Dichotomy of Free Space", the proposals reflect on train stations in other megacities to suggest ideas for how the area around Moscow's train station might be repurposed. On the walls of the gallery, Graffiti artist Anatoly Akue has created an imagined visualization of the urban surroundings of this future space.

Hall 4: The Crypt of Memories

In The Crypt of Memories, the walls of the Pavilion's lower gallery are lined with steel cabinets, mimicking a traditional luggage room. The lockers, which visitors are invited to open and explore, hold 'lost and found' property: historical artifacts, including Soviet memorabilia, which reveal the history of the material world behind the Russian Railway.

Hall 5:  Aboard the Free Space

The final hall of the Pavilion brings the significance of the railway in Russia full circle, with a short film by director Daniil Zinchenko. Presented behind the frosty window of a train carriage, Seven Days in Seven Minutes shows Daniil's journey from Moscow to Vladivostok, an excursion of 9,300km along the route of the Trans-Siberian Express, to meet his long-lost grandfather. The film offers visitors to the Pavilion a marked contrast to the heat of Venice, and highlights again the vital role of train travel in the country, as well as giving a human aspect to the connectivity it facilitates.

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Cuatrecasas Lawyers Headquarters / GCA Architectes

Posted: 08 May 2018 08:00 PM PDT

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas
  • Architects: GCA Architectes
  • Location: Barcelona, Spain
  • Architects In Charge: Josep Riu , Francisco de Paz
  • Architects Gca: Juan Velasco, Rosa Solà
  • Area: 28000.0 m2
  • Project Year: 2017
  • Photographs: Rafael Vargas
  • Project Directors: Genoveva Jorba, César Delgado
  • Execution Directors: Jesús Hernando Fernández, Daniel Fernández Muñoz
© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

Text description provided by the architects. From the outset, the concept of a continuous façade along the New Avenida Diagonal, stretching from plaça de les Glories to Forum, was always at the forefront of the urban planner’s vision. This façade was to be composed by buildings offering an iconic counterpoint, leading up as a gateway to the 21st century Poblenou neighborhood.

Floors Contour Diagram Floors Contour Diagram

Located in Barcelona’s Campus Audiovisual 22@ business section and designed as a corporate headquarters, this building by GCA Architects rises as a pure and minimalist design, responding to the unique necessity of the place, as a building that interacts with the street. With a capacity of more than 1,000 people, the functional programme is divided into two towers of 11 and 18 floors respectively, reaching 72m high. 

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

The towers are connected by the three-story glass entrance, lit by natural light through extra clear glass and a direct view from either entrance. The main entrance also accommodates the reception desk and other common amenities in this space of about 11x26m. The glass perimeter of the roof allows for the natural flow of light and the central skylights also act as means of extraction in the case of emergency. 

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas
© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

The entrances consist of rounded doors with sliding entrances on either side marked with a glass awning. Indoors, the building houses restaurant with open kitchens, fitness center, a conference hall with a 200 people capacity, along with a car park with a 240 space capacity below ground, to name but a few of the features.

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

All in all, the building reaches 28.000 m2. Each tower has a compact core zone with staircases, restrooms and a group of 4 elevators with innovative systems to manage the smooth flow of people.

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

The shape of the Western tower creates a cantilever and allows the creation of a green terrace on the seventh floor at the same time. The façade is assembled by a modular construction system, which is finished with extruded aluminum slats and uprights providing both sunlight filtering and interior privacy, further reinforced by a highly reflective technological glass surface with the bottom third in opaque and visibility through the top two third. 

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

The effect is a homogenous second skin that envelopes the building like a protective layer. Beyond the seventh floor, once the interior privacy is ensured, this skin fades out, offering a clearer view of the city and the sea. The building structure is made up of a heavy concrete core containing the restrooms, staircases, and elevators; and a metallic framework for the cantilever, which balances the structural load and helps to reduce the height of the slab.

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

For the structure construction, it was used as an ascending-descending system, which allows building from the ground level down and upwards simultaneously, shortening the construction time. To achieve this, the steel columns were driven directly into the piles during the construction of the foundation, playing a part on the corresponding final structure steel frame once excavation and concrete works are finished.

Type Floor Plan Type Floor Plan

High-quality materials such as oak wood and modular furniture have been used in the interior design and a dividing system that allows for a more flexible spacing scheme. There are private rooms and offices as well as open office work areas. Regarding functionalities, there is a waste room on the ground floor, which is connected to a pneumatic waste collection system.

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas
© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

The air conditioning system is connected to the heat and cold urban distribution net, significantly reducing CO2 emission levels. The lighting system is powered by energy-efficient led technology lamps, including presence and light sensors system to get an additional energy saving. In terms of water consumption, restrooms are fitted with double-flushed technology and low water flow taps as well as electronic sensor control in order to save a considerable amount of water.

Facade System - Sketch 1 Facade System - Sketch 1
© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

GCA Architects building has been conceived according to the rigorous sustainability standards of the US Green Building Council, aiming to obtain a LEED GOLD certification, which would allow up to a 30% of energy savings compared to other traditional high-rise buildings.

© Rafael Vargas © Rafael Vargas

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House with a Missing Column / Christian Kerez

Posted: 08 May 2018 07:00 PM PDT

© Georg Aerni © Georg Aerni
  • Architects: Christian Kerez
  • Location: Zürich, Switzerland
  • Project Architects: Werner Schührer, Hannes Oswald
  • Project Team: Lukas Ingold, Raphael Jans, Marc Leschelier, Hermes Killer, Oliver Dubuis, Angela Schütz, Nathanael Weiss, Lau Hing Ching
  • Project Year: 2014
  • Photographs: Georg Aerni, Milan Rohrer
  • Structural Engineer: Dr. Schwartz Consulting AG, Zug, Joseph Schwartz, Neven Kostic
  • Building Physics: BAKUS, Zurich, Michael Herrmann, Clemens Moser
  • Mechanical Engineer: WL Partner AG, Rapperswil, Fabrizio Macari
  • Building Management: Caretta + Weidmann, Zurich, Nicolas Dassler, Sandro Wölfli
© Georg Aerni © Georg Aerni

Text description provided by the architects. Every apartment in this house occupies one entire platform of the house. All functions, which are shared by several apartments like staircase and elevator installation shafts stay in front of the facades. They build the load-bearing structure of this house.

© Georg Aerni © Georg Aerni

Their position as additional building parts has to closely follow the restriction of the building code. Regular structural arrangement becomes impossible; therefore the beams holding the slab and prolonging the interior space towards the outside have an enormous weight. 

Floor Plans Floor Plans

The steel structure supporting the individual slabs offers an extraordinarily large scale to each apartment. The glazing and the position of the furniture and side rooms change from one level to the other and give a different interpretation of the monumental structure on each slab. The steel structure lies on the sunken, irregular pedestal of concrete which contains cellar and parking garage.

© Milan Rohrer © Milan Rohrer

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5x12 House / Toob Studio

Posted: 08 May 2018 05:00 PM PDT

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức
© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

Text description provided by the architects. The project is built on a land area of 5mx20m with an airy surface

After leaving a part of the area for the front yard and backyard in accordance with the planning of the city, the remaining building area is 5mx12m, the typical area for the "portion house " in Vietnam.

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

When approaching from the spaces of traditional housing, we find that the "buffer zone" is a very important space that many modern homes today are no longer able to hold, namely the porch, the loggia, the middle yard...

Model Model

In this space, a renewal impact has been brought by external elements upon the interior, which has actively promoted the initiative the to control the impact of the user. 

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

Due to the limited width and depth, portion house's structure is usually developed in height. 

Therefore, we put buffer spaces alternatively between private spaces, their forms and positions are different between floors. The buffer zones, in this case, play roles as traffic or public areas, where family members will connect more in these spaces.

Plan Plan
Plan Plan
Plan Plan

The "buffer space" is like an important chain linking between private spaces, and with the exterior as well.

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

Finally, we control the effects of the external environment on the interior at these buffer spaces. 

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

Natural light is brought into the buffer space but it must limit the thermal effect to deep in the interior; the wind entrance is created while the exit is also open.

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

As a result, space is static, but its inner body is always moving.  Besides, we always search for natural materials in those buffer zones in order to be suitable with external elements. 

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

Finally, that the combination of materials, light, and swirl air themselves have been creating a fresh and comfortable feeling for users without any decorations.

© Lê Anh Đức © Lê Anh Đức

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Tomi House / Takeru Shoji Architects

Posted: 08 May 2018 03:00 PM PDT

© Koichi Satake © Koichi Satake
  • Architects: Takeru Shoji Architects
  • Location: Yuzawa, Japan
  • Architect In Charge: Takeru Shoji
  • Project Architect In Charge: Yuki Hirano
  • Structural Design: Tetsuya Tanaka
  • Area: 82.5 m2
  • Project Year: 2017
  • Photographs: Koichi Satake
© Koichi Satake © Koichi Satake

Text description provided by the architects. Tomi House is located in Niigata Prefecture's Yuzawa, a town notable for its particularly heavy snowfall.  Our first introduction to the site was in January of 2015. By the side of a neatly cleared road rose a mountain of snow four meters or so high.  "This is it" we were told.
Our brief was to build an open and spacious house from which this family of four, inundated by snow for half the year, could comfortably enjoy the surrounding greenery and starry skies.

© Koichi Satake © Koichi Satake

Through necessity, dwellings in the area are typically built on raised concrete foundations, elevating the living space high above ground level. After considering the clients' everyday needs and ways to incorporate outdoor space into the building, as well as discussing the new living environment they hoped to create, we settled on a three floor design.  The third floor houses the entrance and a shared living space. The second floor is divided into modestly-sized 5sqm private rooms.

Section A-A' Section A-A'

The ground floor comprises the raised concrete foundations. This space would normally serve as a garage, enveloped completely in concrete and blocked off from light and fresh air. We opted to open the space up wide, creating an airy and bright expanse to act as a pleasant gathering place for the family, if not the entire neighborhood. Taking full advantage of the parameters outlined in the local building convention, known as the "Code Exception for Raised-floor Housing in Areas of Heavy Snowfall", we set about pouring the wall-height reinforced concrete foundations. Atop the foundations, rather than pouring a reinforced concrete slab as is typical, we laid a light wood frame, on top of which sits the two-storey house.

© Koichi Satake © Koichi Satake

The wood frame makes use of a reciprocal structure, keeping structural materials to a minimum while making the 5.4m-wide opening and dynamic 1.5m overhang possible.  The resulting underfloor area, below this light wooden frame reminiscent of a gazebo ceiling, suggests a critical approach to this type of building and its unique challenges, while strictly adhering to local regulations and local vernacular and with the highest safety standards in mind.

1st and 2nd Floor Plan 1st and 2nd Floor Plan

Inhabitants of the local area must contend not only with winter's harsh northwest winds and unforgiving snowstorms, but also the summer sun's unrelenting heat. In order to create a stable and comfortable environment within the house all year round, we wrapped the building in a long stair extending up to the third-floor entrance, as well as multiple terraces, creating a buffer zone which can be used as both windbreak and sunroom. This blurred line between interior and exterior allows the house to adapt to suit the climate, and needs, of the moment, allowing flexibility of lifestyle and a greater perception of spaciousness.

© Koichi Satake © Koichi Satake

Heating and cooling is provided by way of a single reverse cycle air conditioner unit situated in the ceiling cavity.  An inline duct fan forces conditioned air within the walls of each floor, resulting in a radiant heating and cooling effect. Thus, rather than maintaining a comfortable room temperature by excessively heating or cooling the air, heating and cooling is delivered directly to the people within via the walls of the building itself.  The building draws deeply from the long established local vocabulary of raised floors, windbreaks and sunrooms, while finding nuance in and reinterpreting these staid conventions. By simultaneously conforming to and breaking the mold, we have striven to realize an architecture that will shape both the local landscape and way of life.

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ONE Teahouse / MINAX Architects

Posted: 08 May 2018 01:00 PM PDT

© Zhigang Lu © Zhigang Lu
  • Architects: MINAX Architects
  • Location: 1 Tong Xin Lu, Hongkou Qu, Shanghai Shi, China
  • Architect In Charge: Zhigang Lu
  • Design Team: Congyi Huang, Li Liu, Like Niu, Zhirui Liu
  • Area: 17.8 m2
  • Project Year: 2018
  • Photographs: Zhigang Lu
© Zhigang Lu © Zhigang Lu

Text description provided by the architects. Drinking tea is one of the most featured activity which can fuse the functional requirements with the sense of ritual in Chinese life. In China, tea is considered as a belt that can fulfill spiritual communication between human and nature, it means that "a person stands among the woods and grass" in ancient Chinese. Tea is one symbol of Chinese Zen life, so a teahouse is not just a place for people to have tea, but also has some profound significance. We can gain the generosity of spirit in a confined space once we start to enjoying a cup of tea. 

© Zhigang Lu © Zhigang Lu
Concept Concept

999 wooden sticks arranged by an identical center in the rectangular room, and they are cut out of an oval space. In this case, every stick has its own different angle and length, and the available space has a clear outline. These sticks accomplish a gradual transition from the rectangular room (size: 3.8m*4.7m) to an oval activity space. The teahouse contains two geometry shapes and three different densities. All these designs display a great orderliness and refinement. When the sunlight is reflected from the cut surface of every stick, we will see a rhythmic change in different sizes of circles.

© Zhigang Lu © Zhigang Lu

On one side of the room, a round window faces the urban road, while a square doorway is adjacent to a garden on the other side. That is because the designer was inspired by an old Chinese saying—"The circle has a tread of auto-rotating , and the square has a tread of stable". The specificity of the space brings the people strong psychological hints. The theme of the teahouse is "ONE". "ONE" and"RESTART" are two words of the space where we could reach a higher state of consciousness.

Concept Concept

It took workers three months to renovate the house. In the teahouse, everyone will get spiritually reborn by tea.

© Zhigang Lu © Zhigang Lu

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The Beehive / Luigi Rosselli + Raffaello Rosselli

Posted: 08 May 2018 12:00 PM PDT

© Prue Ruscoe © Prue Ruscoe

Revaluing Waste
Architecture is often reliant on expensive and scarce materials to define its value. The beehive explores how an undervalued waste product, like the ubiquitous terracotta roof tile can be redefined and revalued.  This exploration of waste as a material stems from the knowledge that construction creates up to 50 percent of Australia's waste output; and that a buildings energy footprint is largely based on the materials embodied energy. Material reuse solves both these environmental impacts and is by far the most efficient form of building. Raffaello Rosselli collaborated with Luigi Rosselli architects to design their new office building. Through experimenting with waste material reuse on its own studio it aims to be a role model for future projects. 

© Ben Hosking © Ben Hosking

Search for a waste material
The project started with the study of material waste streams looking for an appropriate object for a brise-soleil to filter the harsh western sun that the main façade faces. The terracotta tile, an overlooked symbol of suburbia, was chosen as it is easily sourced and without an adequate reuse market. (While out of manufacture tiles are collected, newer tiles have no market value and find their way to landfill.) Putting aside the tiles commonality, the terracotta tile appealed in its raw elemental materiality, with no tile exactly alike, cast in clay and fired still by hand. Contextually, the terracotta also related to the raw brick materiality of the neighbouring masonry buildings. 

© Ben Hosking © Ben Hosking

Designing through making - 1:1 prototypes
The process of design was also unique for this building. In response to an object which was geometrically complex, the façade design was largely conceived through multiple full scale tests and hand built prototypes. This opened up an intuitive form of designing through making. The tactility of the process allowed rapid prototyping, including experimenting with multiple tile course types.

© Callum Coombe © Callum Coombe
Facade Setout Facade Setout

These prototypes informed the final design, where each tile course was placed based on its function. The acute course was used at the bottom due to its strength, as well to obscure the solid spandrels. Equilateral tiles were used at eyelevel to reduce visual obstructions. While diagonal tiles were used at the top due to their low clearance and were angled north. The variation of tiles also allowed us to hide the slab edges that reduced the structural load to single stories discreetly.  This design process allowed us to make of the use of the module to further tackle challenging elements of the design and resolve them physically. Such as the curved tile façade, which was crucial to give the façade proportion within its built context by linking its misaligned neighbouring buildings and stepping back from the paperbark tree in front of the site. 

© Raffaello Rosselli © Raffaello Rosselli

Responding to the site.
The projects primary gestures came through a consideration of its immediate context. The building's form responds to the neighbouring setbacks and heights. As well as curving around the paperbark street tree (Melaleuca) which encroaches the site. The brise-soleil façade filters the harsh sun while at the same time maximising light through the small 8m wide frontage.  The façade retains the feeling of the two storey warehouse to the south, with the top level set back. The curved awning raises above the first floor to match its context and provides a generous interface with the street. 

© Prue Ruscoe © Prue Ruscoe

Internally the building houses, amongst other commercial spaces, a light-filtered architecture studio designed as an environment to stimulate creativity and teamwork: a 'Beehive' of architects. Challenging the generic and often alienating nature of open plan office buildings, the design sought to provide an active but intimate environment with multiple working positions offered by custom-built joinery, which was largely repurposed from the former studio, another component of the upcycling drive on this project. The main space does not have any walls, rather is defined by two linear rows of semi-enclosed booths with each architect provided with two desks, linked by a long linear standing bench which facilitates collaborative work. 

© Prue Ruscoe © Prue Ruscoe

On the top floor, a communal garden terrace offers a point of release to work in the sunshine, hold community events or relax after a long day. Below this level, the conference table is semi-enclosed by a terracotta tile bookshelf, another variation of a stacked terracotta module, brought into the interiors. This was a conscious attempt to re-contextualise the value of reusing materials, advocating for more sustainable solutions and showing clients and the wider public that it is possible to reuse the waste products of the construction process, with all their intrinsic beauty from façade design to the displaying of books. 

© Prue Ruscoe © Prue Ruscoe

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SL House / ANX

Posted: 08 May 2018 10:00 AM PDT

© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones
  • Architects: ANX
  • Location: Los Angeles, United States
  • Lead Architects: Aaron Neubert, Jeremy Limsenben, Xiran Zhang, Jina Seo
  • Structural Engineer : Craig Phillips Engineering
  • Area: 3500.0 ft2
  • Project Year: 2017
  • Photographs: Brian Thomas Jones
© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones

Text description provided by the architects. A slightly descending hillside parcel in the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles serves as the location for this single family residence. In addition to the site's gentle topography near the highland of the surrounding hills, the opportunity to capture commanding views of Downtown Los Angeles, the Hollywood sign, and the Griffith Observatory influenced the position and orientation of the home.

© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones
First Floor Plan First Floor Plan
© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones
Second Floor Plan Second Floor Plan

Arranged into two spatially interlocking volumes – a "cube" and a "bar" – the residence responds to the massing, scale, and setbacks of its suburban context, while also extending deep into the site to maximize relationships with the landscape and the distant vistas beyond. Entry into the home is found at the interstice between these two volumes, terminating upon arrival at the centrally located sculptural stair. Weaving these two volumes together, the stair core serves as the home's interior center of activity.

© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones

On the ground floor, the "cube" contains the garage and the voluminous kitchen opening to the pool terrace, while the well illuminated family room and deck are stacked above on the second floor. The street-oriented den, internally positioned dining room, and fully glazed living room and expansive terrace are placed on the ground floor of the "bar", with the bedrooms and laundry room achieving privacy on the second floor.

© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones

A private terrace, screened from the street and neighboring properties is enveloped by the interior spaces of the home, promoting direct access to the pool, landscape, and the exterior living and dining areas. An exterior deck, with sunset views, is located adjacent the family room, while the master bedroom's balcony looks out towards Griffith Park.

© Brian Thomas Jones © Brian Thomas Jones

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Juan Soriano Cultural Center and Museum / JSa

Posted: 08 May 2018 08:00 AM PDT

© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro
  • Architects: JSa
  • Location: Amatitlán, Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico
  • Architects Authors: Javier Sánchez + Aisha Ballesteros
  • Design Team: Jorge González, Gabriel Martínez, Santiago Arroyo, Juan Jesús Pérez, Ana Castillo, Marie Florence, Alfredo Aguilar, Alejandra Medina, Selene García, Iraiz Corona, Dante García, Francisco Martínez, Dania Gutiérrez, César Cruz, Christopher Vargas, María del Pino, Israel Silva.
  • Area: 5100.0 m2
  • Project Year: 2018
  • Photographs: Jaime Navarro
  • Patio Area: 6,350 m2
© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro

Text description provided by the architects. This story begins by recognizing the project as an addition to the city of Cuernavaca. Inside a property surrounded by trees and the flow of water from a little creek, this garden of 7,366 square meters invites people to cross it and live it.

© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro
Site Plan - Scheme Site Plan - Scheme
© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro

The access to this narrative is offered through four entries distributed in different points of the property. To the southwest there is a square opened to the city, a livable space that receives its visitors with a staircase that leads to the building. From the east you can access trough the workshops, with a central courtyard scheme. From the west, a small stairway offers an alternative path to Dr. Guillermo Gándara Street and, finally, from the north a corner opens onto the arboreal richness of the site.

© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro
Section A-A Section A-A
© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro

The objective of creating continuity and connection with the garden is translated into gestures such as the elevation of the project on a set of perimeter columns to offer an extended free floor, with a marked public character, in horizontal relation with the context of the garden and the city ​​. A second gesture for the environment are the elements that integrated into the garden: water mirrors; a set of paths of concrete, gravel and soil around the preexisting vegetation; and monumental sculptures by Juan Soriano. This is how visitors have crossed this great urban promenade to continue on their way.

© Jaime Navarro © Jaime Navarro

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MASS Design Group’s Poignant Memorial for Victims of Lynching Opens to the Public in Alabama

Posted: 08 May 2018 07:00 AM PDT

Corridor at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures Corridor at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures

The "National Memorial for Peace and Justice," designed in collaboration with MASS Design Group, has opened in Montogomery Alabama. Commissioned by the Equal Justice Initiative, the scheme is America's first memorial dedicated to "the legacy of enslaved black people, people terrorized by lynching, African Americans humiliated by racial segregation and Jim Crow, and people of color burdened with contemporary presumptions of guilt and police violence."

The memorial's April 23rd opening coincided with the opening of the Equal Justice Initiative's Legacy Museum, addressing similar injustices.

Exterior of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures Exterior of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures

The memorial was conceived with the goal of creating a sober, meaningful place of reflection for America's history of racial inequality. Set across a six-acre site, the memorial contains over 800 corten steel monuments: one for every county in the United States which experienced racial terror lynching. Engraved in the columns are the names of lynching victims, symbolizing thousands of people through history who suffered from brutality.

Memorial Monuments at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures Memorial Monuments at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures

A journey through the memorial begins with a confrontation by a sculpture by West African artist Kwame Akoto-Bamfo, before leading visitors on "a journey through slavery, through lynching and racial terror, with text, narrative, and monuments to the lynching victims of America."

Kwame Akoto Bamfo Exhibit at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures Kwame Akoto Bamfo Exhibit at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures
Hank Willis Sculpture at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures Hank Willis Sculpture at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures

The center of the site is occupied by a memorial square designed in part by MASS before the journey continues through the Civil Rights era with a sculpture dedicated to women who sustained the Montgomery Bus Boycott, created by Dana King. At journey's end, the memorial confronts issues of contemporary police violence and judicial bias, in a final work by Hank Willis Thomas. The memorial also displays writing from Toni Morrison, words from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, and a space dedicated to Ida B. Wells.

The Legacy Museum Exterior. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures The Legacy Museum Exterior. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures
The Legacy Museum Lobby. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures The Legacy Museum Lobby. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures

Also opened on April 26th in Montgomery, Alabama was the Equal Justice Initiative's "Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration," an 11,000-square-foot museum on the site of a former warehouse where enslaved black people were imprisoned. Relying on first-person accounts of the domestic slave trade, the EJI's extensive record of materials and exhibits, and recently created content on segregation, the museum explores racial inequality and its relationship with contemporary injustices.

Slavery Evolved Wall at the Legacy Museum. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures Slavery Evolved Wall at the Legacy Museum. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures
The Legacy Museum Jars. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures The Legacy Museum Jars. Image © Equal Justice Initiative / Human Pictures

Visitors to the museum are confronted by slave pen replicas, narrated by first-person accounts of the dreadful conditions. Enriching visuals and data give visitors the chance to investigate America's history of racial injustice, as do curated sculptures by Titus Kaphar, Sanford Biggers, Elizabeth Catlett, and John Biggers. Creative partners also include Local Projects, HBO, and Google.

News via: Equal Justice Initiative 

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Callow Residence / Corsini Stark Architects

Posted: 08 May 2018 06:00 AM PDT

© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography
  • Senior Designer : Brenda Delgadillo
© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography

SITE CONDITIONS: 8,263 SF lot area with an 8 foot down-slope from the street. No construction allowed within drip line of two protected oak trees on adjacent property to the west.

© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography

PROGRAM:  Residence for an empty nest couple with ample outdoor living space, consisting of 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, and outdoor workshop with the master suite on main living level to accommodate clients' long-term aging-in-place.

© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography

DESIGN INTENT: The clients expressed a desire for a house with a modest scale from the street; a fluid relationship between interior and exterior space with privacy from adjacent neighbors; and a distinctive design conceptually situated on the trajectory of Los Angeles modernism.  

© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography

We organized the site into functional bands of varying widths running north-south, and overlaid a pattern of alternating angled walls and roof lines to shape space and direct view and movement from the site and through the house.

© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography

Since the site offered no obvious desirable views, courtyards, a south-oriented deck and rear garden serve as focal points framing the sky, existing and new tree canopies, and the play of light wherever possible.

Site Plan Site Plan

The entire site is engaged in the architectural composition. The plan is bi-laterally symmetrical with an upward spiral progression around the entry courtyard, leading to the upturned cantilevered roof. The angular and folding form language of the house reads alternately planar and volumetric.

© Steve King Photography © Steve King Photography

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New Photographs Explore BIG’s Waste-to-Energy Plant as Ski Slope Roof is Installed

Posted: 08 May 2018 05:00 AM PDT

© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti

Photographer Aldo Amoretti has captured new images of one of 2018's most awaited projects, as the BIG designed Amager Bakke Waste-to-Energy Plant takes shape in Copenhagen, complete with an SLA-designed park and ski slope. The images show to the completed power plant, which opened in March 2017, while work progresses on the 170,000-square-foot (16,000-square-meter) park and ski slope that will cap the scheme.

Initially master planned by BIG, the unique design seeks to reclaim a typically unused element of a building for the public through the introduction of the nature-filled program. During summer months, the SLA-designed rooftop activity park will provide visitors with hiking trails, playgrounds, fitness structures, trail running, climbing walls, and of course, incredible views. In the winter, the park will be joined by over 1,640 feet (500 meters) of ski slopes designed by BIG.

© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti
© Aldo Amoretti © Aldo Amoretti

You can check out the full gallery below.

SLA Reveals Park and Ski Slope That Will Cap BIG's Groundbreaking Waste-to-Energy Plant

The final designs for one of 2018's most awaited projects have been revealed, as SLA has released plans for the 170,000-square-foot (16,000-square-meter) park and ski slope that will cap the BIG-designed Amager Bakke Waste-to-Energy Plant in Copenhagen, Denmark.

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Bjarke Ingels Takes Role as Chief Architect at WeWork

Posted: 08 May 2018 04:35 AM PDT

CEO of WeWork Alex Neumann with Bjarke Ingels. Image © Alexei Hay CEO of WeWork Alex Neumann with Bjarke Ingels. Image © Alexei Hay

WeWork has announced that Bjarke Ingels will be its new Chief Architect. Ingels, who has taken the architecture world by storm since founding BIG in 2005, will continue in his role as Founding Partner and Creative Director of his firm, however in his new role at WeWork he also "will offer his insights and ideas to extend and help us push the boundaries of architecture, real estate, technology, and design," explained WeWork today in a press statement.

"WeWork was founded at the exact same time as when I arrived in New York. In that short amount of time—the blink of an eye at the time scale of architecture—they have accomplished incredible things and they are committed to continuing their trajectory to places we can only imagine," said Bjarke Ingels. "WeWork's commitment to community and culturally-driven development is perfectly aligned with our active, social and environmental agendas. As WeWork takes on larger and more holistic urban and architectural challenges, I am very excited to contribute with my insights and ideas to extend their community-oriented vision to ground-up buildings and urban neighborhoods. BIG and I are incredibly thrilled to take an active role in WeWork's evolution as a company and a design culture."

"Bjarke caught my attention because he's changing the way we think about architecture," explained Adam Neumann, the co-Founder and CEO of WeWork. "His designs inspire as much as they surprise. When we started WeWork eight years ago, we knew the world didn't need another office building, it needed spaces where people could collaborate on projects, connect and create together, and potentially change the world. As WeWork's Chief Architect, Bjarke Ingels will help us reimagine and reshape the future of our spaces, our company, and ultimately our cities."

News via WeWork.

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Boiler House Libčice nad Vltavou / Atelier Hoffman

Posted: 08 May 2018 04:00 AM PDT

© BoysPlayNice © BoysPlayNice
  • Architects: Atelier Hoffman
  • Location: Kolonie 411, 252 66 Libčice nad Vltavou, Czech Republic
  • Lead Architect: Patrik Hoffman
  • Area: 886.0 m2
  • Project Year: 2018
  • Photographs: BoysPlayNice
  • Co Authors: Ing.arch. Simona Benátská In collaboration with: MgA. Matyáš Švejdík , Ing.arch. Rudolf Pástor. Ing.arch. Tomáš Havlíček
  • Client: Pelupro s.r.o.
© BoysPlayNice © BoysPlayNice

Text description provided by the architects. The Brownfield (Drátovny a Šroubárny n.p. industrial estate) was established in 1872 by the Prague Association of Ironworks near the Prague – Dresden railway line by the Vltava river. It significantly influenced the development of the nearby municipalities and has left a considerable mark on this locality, giving it a unique character and ambiance. In the past, more than 1600 people lived and worked here; nowadays it is less than a hundred, even though there is almost everything here: housing, railway, technical infrastructure, river, grown trees and, first and foremost, genius loci.

Site Plan Site Plan

The boiler house stands next to the already renovated Coal-Grinding Mill to which it was connected for operational reasons. It represents another important project of the gradual regeneration of the entire estate. The buildings in question are among the oldest parts of the estate and help to create its genius loci. That is why we made the decision to treat the project with respect and consideration, to preserve the buildings and avoid any significant changes, even though it is no longer possible to give them back their original functions. Our objective was to find a new use for them and, at the same time, preserve the quality of the existing architecture and urbanism and honor the fact that we are in the middle of an industrial estate with a nearly 150-year tradition.

© BoysPlayNice © BoysPlayNice
Ground Floor Plan Ground Floor Plan

The project concerns two, interconnected buildings. The construction of the older northern part of the boiler house with wooden trusses dates back to around 1880. In 1921, following an increase in production, a newer boiler house with basement and metal roof framework was added to it. In the same year, a water tank was built onto the chimney which works to this day. After 1991 the buildings were used as a warehouse and a garage for electric platform trucks. In 2002 they stopped being used altogether and fell into disrepair.

© BoysPlayNice © BoysPlayNice
First Floor Plan First Floor Plan

We did not make any substantial changes to the spatial arrangement and urbanism of the place. There was landscaping carried out, part of which were the newly built paved roads followed by planting trees and lawns. Between the Coal-Grinding Mill and the Boiler House, a pedestrian street was built leading from the main estate road towards the river. Our objective was to preserve the building, rid it of all unsuitable alterations carried out in the past and give it back its original industrial character so that its historic function remains visible even after the renovation. We also wanted to streamline the layout and adapt the building to serve its new function. The basic shape of the house, its tectonics and volume remained largely unchanged. The brick cladding was restored using original bricks.

© BoysPlayNice © BoysPlayNice

The architectural design, the layout, and the technical solution were created with regard to the required flexibility of use, a long-term sustainability of the building, and also with a view to the fact that the estate was hit by a flood in 2002. At the very beginning, we defined the future use of the building as a multifunctional showroom for cultural, corporate and social events with an ambition to become the heart of the future arts & culture district existing in a symbiotic relationship with traditional crafts and technological innovations.

Longitudinal Section Longitudinal Section

The multifunctional hall is situated in the southern part of the Boiler House. The northern part of the Boiler House has been rebuilt to become a regular restaurant; however, it is currently used mostly for catering during events. The basement provides other facilities with a possibility of having a peek into the formerly inaccessible smoke flues and the chimney itself. For the next phase, we are planning on integrating the railway siding into the estate's transport system and using the existing pipeline bridge as a scenic route for walkers connecting the renovated parts with the yet undeveloped area in the northern corner of the brownfield. We also intend to include charging points for electric cars and bicycles.

© BoysPlayNice © BoysPlayNice

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ArchDaily's 2018 Refurbishment in Architecture Awards Are Now Open for Nominations

Posted: 08 May 2018 03:00 AM PDT

This year, in partnership with MINI Clubman, we are launching a special award that highlights the best refurbishments of buildings and spaces from around the world. 

Alongside MINI, we have decided to promote this category in the belief that one of the most sustainable ways to develop architecture now is through the recovery of existing structures. From urban renovations to new uses for former factories, or even simply giving new life to an old house, refurbishment projects demonstrate the flexibility of our existing cities and the many scales at which old buildings can be repurposed.

As in our Building of the Year Award, we entrust our readers with the responsibility of rewarding the best refurbishment projects in architecture—the designs that have had an impact on our profession. By voting, you are part of an impartial and distributed network of professionals who act as a jury to choose the most relevant works of the last eight years. Over the next 3 weeks, the collective intelligence of our audience will filter more than 450 projects to select 3 winners representing the best of architecture refurbishment published on ArchDaily.

This is your chance to reward the architecture you love—make your nomination for the Refurbishment in Architecture Award

iD Town by O-office. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu iD Town by O-office. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

The Process

During the next 3 weeks, you’ll be in charge of nominating buildings to create a fifteen projects shortlist, and then voting for 3 winners. We will guide you through these stages accordingly.

During the nominating stage, each registered user of the My ArchDaily platform will have the chance to nominate one project per day (published between January 1st 2017 and December 31st 2017). This stage starts on May 2nd and ends on May 14th at 10:00AM EST. After this, Fifteen projects will move into the voting stage, starting May 15th and ending on May 21st at 10:00AM EST. The winners will be announced on May 22nd, 2018. 

Moritzburg Museum by Nieto Sobejano. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu Moritzburg Museum by Nieto Sobejano. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

Eligible Projects

  • All completed buildings published between January 1st 2017 and December 31st 2017 under the Refurbishment category are eligible for this award.
  • By submitting their works to ArchDaily for publication, offices agree to enter this competition and to be present on the promotional material.
  • Authorship and copyright of each project belong to the offices and architects mentioned on each project’s page.

Moritzburg Museum by Nieto Sobejano. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu Moritzburg Museum by Nieto Sobejano. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

First stage: Nominations

  • Starting May 2nd, 2018, registered users will be able to nominate their favorite project. One nomination per day.
  • Nomination ends on May 14th, 2018 at 10:00AM EST.
  • The fifteen projects with the most nominations will move on to the voting round.

Shed #19 by Andrea Oliva Architetto. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu Shed #19 by Andrea Oliva Architetto. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

Second stage: Voting

  • On May 15th, 2018, we will update the platform with the shortlisted projects and registered users will be able to vote for their favorite project among the finalists.
  • Users can vote for one project per day.
  • The voting round will end May 21st, 2018 at 10:00AM EST.

iD Town by O-office. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu iD Town by O-office. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

How to Nominate and Vote

  • Only registered users of the My ArchDaily platform can nominate/vote.
  • Anyone can register on the My ArchDaily platform to nominate/vote. To do so, you must follow the registration link and complete the required steps to become a registered user (or use your existing My ArchDaily account).
  • All registered users can nominate/vote once per day. After the system reboot each day at midnight (EST)
  • To register you must use a valid email address. Votes coming from users without a valid email address will be removed.
  • Offices and architects are encouraged to promote their works for voting, but no monetary or virtual gift compensation should be offered. You can use the following link:

http://boty.archdaily.com/mc/2018

Shed #19 by Andrea Oliva Architetto. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu Shed #19 by Andrea Oliva Architetto. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

Winners

  • 3 Winners will be announced on ArchDaily’s home page on May 22nd, 2018.
  • Each winner will receive a physical award from ArchDaily, delivered to their offices.
  • The 15 finalists and the winners can use the respective title for their own purposes. ArchDaily will provide promotional material.

Timeline

  • The nomination process starts on May 2nd and ends May 14th, 2018 at 10:00AM EST.
  • The voting round starts on May 15th and ends May 21st, 2018 at 10:00AM EST.
  • The winners will be announced on May 8th, 2018.

Moritzburg Museum by Nieto Sobejano. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu Moritzburg Museum by Nieto Sobejano. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

Important notes

  • All data of registered users will be kept private and will not be shared with 3rd parties.
  • After each stage, all nominations/votes will be checked. Votes submitted by fake/invalid registrations will be removed. All attempts to abuse the system, such as creating dummy accounts, suspicious behavior from individual IP addresses or any other techniques to generate nominations/votes in automated ways will be logged and reviewed for removal.
  • ArchDaily reserves the right to analyze the data during every stage of the Awards in order to ensure a fair process.
  • All questions should be sent to David Basulto, director of the awards, through our contact form.

iD Town by O-office. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu iD Town by O-office. Image © Laurian Ghinitoiu

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Mexico City's Controversial Airport Project Could Be a Preservation Site for a Collection of Modernist Murals

Posted: 08 May 2018 02:30 AM PDT

Centro SCOP in Mexico City was shuttered after a series of devastating earthquakes. A new exhibition proposes rehousing its historically significant murals. Image Courtesy of Pablo López Luz/ Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura Centro SCOP in Mexico City was shuttered after a series of devastating earthquakes. A new exhibition proposes rehousing its historically significant murals. Image Courtesy of Pablo López Luz/ Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura

This article was originally published by Metropolis Magazine as "How a Small Mexico City Exhibition Fueled a Debate About Preservation and Power."

It's a slate-gray day in Mexico City's Colonia Narvarte neighborhood and mounting gusts signal imminent rain. Centro SCOP, a sprawling bureaucratic complex, rises sharply against this bleak backdrop. The building is a masterful, if not intimidating, example of Mexican Modernism, an H-shaped assemblage of muscular concrete volumes designed by architect Carlos Lazo, covered in an acre-and-a-half of vibrant mosaic murals.

At its peak, the building accommodated more than 3,000 workers for the Secretariat of Communications and Transportation (SCT). Today, save a security guard in its gatehouse, it is empty.

Disaster has struck twice at Centro SCOP—first on September 19, 1985, when a deadly 8.0 magnitude earthquake tore through Mexico City and flattened portions of the complex. The building and its murals were quickly rebuilt, but in a freakish twist of fate on September 19, 2017—32 years to the day of the 1985 catastrophe—another earthquake dealt Centro SCOP its coup de grace.

Damage sustained at Centro SCOP after the 1985 earthquake. The building ultimately had to be lowered from 10 floors to seven. Image Courtesy of Archivo de Arquitectos Mexicanos, Facultad de Arquitectura de la UNAM/ Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura Damage sustained at Centro SCOP after the 1985 earthquake. The building ultimately had to be lowered from 10 floors to seven. Image Courtesy of Archivo de Arquitectos Mexicanos, Facultad de Arquitectura de la UNAM/ Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura

Due to irreversible structural damage, the building has been shuttered and will likely be demolished. The fate of its 15 murals by important Mexican artists such as Juan O'Gorman and José Chavéz Morado remains uncertain.

A small yet potent exhibition at Archivo, a local architecture and design gallery, has delved into the significance of Centro SCOP and its looming future through a series of specially commissioned artworks and installations. The show, named for the building, hinges on a radical proposition to relocate Centro SCOP's murals to Mexico's most ambitious, and controversial, urban project of the last century—its forthcoming $13 billion airport.

"After the earthquake, we really wanted to reorient our programming to think about architectural responses," explains Archivo's director, Mario Ballesteros, "so we decided that we could take a more historic perspective and push that into a very urgent, current issue, which was what would happen to the [SCOP] building."

The exhibition, which closed at the end of April after a three-month run, was at once a vigil and a provocation. It showcased artifacts from Centro SCOP, including a '50s-era desk and the original 1986 model of the building post-earthquake. Photographer Isaurio Huizar created Pictorial Absence, a series of images that blot out portions of the building with white paint. Architectural collective Tercerunquinto built a "mural" out of paving stones dislodged from the earthquake. Artist Pedro Reyes, a key force behind the exhibition's organization, employed the same techniques as Centro SCOP's muralists to create a one-meter-by-one-meter mosaic of a red raised fist.

All of these works build up to the exhibition's piece-de-resistance—a 1:300 acrylic model of the new Mexico-City airport, designed by Foster + Partners and FR-EE (not-so-incidentally, Archivo co-founder Fernando Romero's architectural practice). In it are tiny versions of Centro SCOP's murals, installed within an airy, double-height atrium.

"It's definitely the strongest and most controversial gesture, because it's really a design proposal," says Ballestero of FR-EE's vision. "This could actually be something that could generate response and change."

As part of the Archivo exhibition, FR-EE has proposed relocating Centro SCOP's murals to the airport it is co-designing with Foster + Partners. Image Courtesy of FR-EE Fernando Romero Enterprises/ Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura As part of the Archivo exhibition, FR-EE has proposed relocating Centro SCOP's murals to the airport it is co-designing with Foster + Partners. Image Courtesy of FR-EE Fernando Romero Enterprises/ Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura

Outside the walls of Archivo, the proposal has certainly generated a response—and its share of controversy.  In mid-March, the current head of SCT Gerardo Ruiz Esparza declared that with the help of the Ministry of Culture, the murals would indeed be transferred to the airport, so "we could be seeing them in the future, in two or three more years, adorning the structures."

But weeks after Esparza's pronouncements, members of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM)'s Aesthetic Research Institute sent a letter to SCT and cultural officials, arguing that removing the murals from their contexts would fundamentally alter the nature of the work. The UNAM group called for a more thorough, civically minded review.

Others still have different ideas for the Centro SCOP site. Most recently, the Commission of Culture and Cinematography proposed that the murals stay in place, and that the building site become a park—the "lungs" of the Narvarte neighborhood.

Upcoming Mexican presidential elections this July have further complicated matters: populist frontrunner Andrés Manuel López Obrador (who goes by his initials, AMLO) has vowed to halt the airport altogether, an enterprise he deems corrupt.

Ballesteros is doubtful that anything will move with the project before the elections. Regardless of the end result, he sees important parallels between Centro SCOP's era and the present day.

"These buildings are about power, about politics, about identity, about image, and about expectations," he says. "In the end, architecture is so much about how—and especially in a country like Mexico—the country wants to project itself. The same sort of issues that were relevant in the '50s are still relevant today."

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Pasqua House / Studio MK27 - Marcio Kogan + Carolina Castroviejo + Elisa Friedmann

Posted: 08 May 2018 02:00 AM PDT

© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
  • Interior Design: Diana Radomysler
  • Landscape: Dorey Brasil Paisagismo
  • Structural Engineering: Pasqua e Graziano Associados - Eng. Luiz Roberto Pasqua
  • Electrical And Hydraulic Installations: Grau Engenharia De Instalações
  • Air Conditioning: Fundament-Ar
  • Automation: GF Automação
  • Construction Company: Construtora Gaia - Eng. Renato Luis G. Gonçalves
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

Text description provided by the architects. The Pasqua House, in Fazenda da Boa Vista, Porto Feliz, has a ground floor plan, in an "L" shape, a totally permeable volume with direct access to the garden. These crossed volumes implantation takes advantage of the terrain and marks the difference between the social and intimate uses of the residence. The leaked element, which has become the trademark of the project, provides privacy without barring the landscape, and brings emotion throughout the day, as the passage of time is marked by the entrance of light, which arrives with different intensities and makes drawings of light and shade on the floor.

© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

The main access, discreet, is on the side, and is bordered by a wall of cobogos (made of precast concrete plates painted in white) that defines the subtle relationship between exterior and interior, with a delicate view of the mall and their flamboyant. The leafy boulevard of flamboyant, which seasonally tinged with intense red one side of the land, directed the implantation of the house. The lateral walls of the terrain were executed with local rustic stones that visually contrast the leaked elements and connect a semi-private space - an intermediate garden - with the social area fully exposed.

© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

The program is distributed in two nuclei, social and private. In its social area, the use of transparencies and the possibility of completely opening the windows articulate the garden, its visuals and the totality of the terrain. This creates a sense of welcome and comfort, a unique open space that allows the organization of furniture. The social nuclei dissolves on the ground, leaving only the presence of a volume and a large terrace. Due to the elevated temperatures of the region, the need to use air conditioning was minimized. In this way, the use of cross ventilation in the social area was a matter of significant importance in the conception of the project. In addition, the concrete slab protrudes 4 meters from the facade, protecting the rooms from the direct incidence of the sun.

© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Ground Floor Plan Ground Floor Plan
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

The spatial connection between the two nuclei takes place through the kitchen. The private nuclei, destined to the dormitories is showed with the use of wooden cobogós panels as closure. They define the degree of interaction and permeability between the nuclei, allowing direct relationship with the garden and pool or serving as a visual shield. In addition, the cobogós paneling leaves the rooms protected from the sun's impact and, so, helps the environmental comfort. The architecture of Pasqua House creates intimate spaces and some of common use and a range of possibilities of levels of interaction between them and outer spaces.

© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG © Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

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These Reflective Bricks Seek to Return Natural Light to Dense Neighborhoods

Posted: 08 May 2018 01:00 AM PDT

© Nathanaël Abeille © Nathanaël Abeille

French designer, Nathanaël Abeille's metalized pieces in 'Proyecto Reflexión' shows how a building could reflect sunlight and share it with another building in some of the narrow spaces of Villa 21 de Barracas, Buenos Aires. These "metal bricks" came about as a combined team effort with architects Francisco Ribero and journalist Cecilia Fortunato.

Review the full project after the break.

© Nathanaël Abeille © Nathanaël Abeille

'Proyecto Reflexión' was born in 2013 in the hands of French designer Nathanaël Abeille, who came from France after working in Jean Nouvel's office, to investigate the lack of light in narrow streets of Buenos Aires.

© Nathanaël Abeille © Nathanaël Abeille

During his 6 months in the capital of Argentina, he developed, in collaboration with Carlos Muniagurria –an engraving specialist– a process of metalizing common bricks to produce a certain reflection when exposed to sunlight, with the objective of taking advantage of solar energy and distributing it in those shadow sites. 

© Nathanaël Abeille © Nathanaël Abeille

Abeille's concern over the lack of light in cities began in Paris while living in a small and dark apartment devoid of natural light, once in a while, his living room would receive a solar reflection when his neighbor opened her window.

© Nathanaël Abeille © Nathanaël Abeille

From this moment he began to investigate natural energy in the field of design, imagining how a building could reflect light and share it with another building. Following this line of thought, he developed important works in the city of Marseille. 

The sun, which governs all growth, should penetrate the interior of every dwelling, there to diffuse its rays, without which life withers and fades - Le Corbusier, in The Athens Charter.

© Nathanaël Abeille © Nathanaël Abeille

In 2016 he began to work together with architect Francisco Ribero and journalist Cecilia Fortunato, who for some years had been collaborating with the Caacupé parish in the construction of community kitchens in Villa 21 de Barracas. The narrow corridors in the neighborhood and the lack of natural lighting was the initial push to work together and bring about the first metalized bricks.

These bricks were thought as a new option within construction materials, ideal for distributing sunlight both indoors and in outdoor areas. A new material that besides being functional, contains a poetic vision of inverting the North-South sense of the natural sun course, capable of providing a new sensory experience. 

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Morpholio's "Smart Fill" Extension Calculates Areas In Your Drawings As You Sketch

Posted: 08 May 2018 12:00 AM PDT

Morpholio has released details of Smart Fill, which they describe as "the world's first area calculator for live design sketching." Designed for the TracePro app on iPad and iPhone, Smart Fill calculates the area of spaces in active sketches, without the need for further drawing or alterations.

The Smart Fill calculation evolves as space is altered through further sketching. As rooms are sliced in half, the area reduces, while as walls are erased, the area expands. The app also allows for the space to be filled in with color, text labels, or numerical data.

Architects move between technical drawing and illustration all the time. This is our art—conceptualizing an idea, and then realizing it in the real world. We need tools that allow our thinking to move between concept and reality without hindrance. Reinforcing the creative process by providing a bit of intelligence to the fluidity of sketching has always been the goal of Trace.
-Toru Hasegawa, Morpholio Co-Founder.

Smart Fill can provide calculations for more than one area, adding additional regions to keep a running tab. The resulting chart can be copied into spreadsheet applications such as Excel, Sheets, and Notes. The software, therefore, allows for a merging of free-flowing imagination and informed mathematical constraints.

Smart Fill has been designed for a variety of applicable circumstances. Homeowners and contractors can calculate floorplans, home additions, or garden designs. Large-scale city planners can calculate building areas, roads, parks, or scaled maps of any site. The calculations can allow for deeper environmental or cost analysis at an early stage, such as material areas and energy calculations.

The only reason we draw is to communicate ideas. Anything that gets in the way of this communication weakens the whole process. Direct, clear line hand drawings remain the best way to communicate visually and Morpholio Trace is the best app out there for architects to get across their ideas fast and beautifully.
-Jim Keen, Architect and Illustrator

© Morpholio © Morpholio
© FOOD © FOOD

News via: Morpholio

Morpholio's Latest Trace App Update Streamlines Construction Administration Design Changes

Have you ever been on the construction site and had a problem arise that needed immediate attention? The answer to that question is almost guaranteed to be yes. The Construction Administration phase is not intended to be a time for big design decisions, but with unforeseen field conditions, contractor errors and never-ending client changes, your team can keep designing and problem-solving throughout CA.

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