WORK Architecture Company (WORKac) has won an international competition to design new Assembly Hall in Libreville – the capital city of Gabon – for the 2014 Summit of the African Union. The New York City firm impressed the jury with their proposal L’Assemblée Radieuse, which offers a self-shading, circular structure that maximizes active and passive design while incorporating the vibrant ecology of the Gabonese Republic.
The new landmark is scheduled to break ground in February 2013 and will be completed in June 2014. Continue reading for the architects’ description.
SCI-Arc Masters of Architecture graduates Liz and Kyle von Hasseln have been awarded the inaugural Gehry Prize for developing an interruptible 3D printing method, dubbed Phantom Geometry, that allows designers to make alterations to the design while it is being printed. The Phantom Geometry method is a convenient alternative to the conventional, static 3D printing systems available today. The system’s main components includes a UV light projector, a special photo-sensitive resin, and controlled robotic arms from SCI-Arc’s Robot House.
Architects: COOKFOX Client: Bank of America at One Bryant Park, LLP, a joint venture between The Durst Organization and Bank of America Location: New York, NY Completion: 2009 Size: 50,000 SF
On November 15th-17th leading architects, artists, scholars, and industry leaders from all over the Globe will meet up in Aarhus, Denmark to shape the media architecture of the future and discuss how media architecture is about to change our cities.
What happens when heat sensitive concrete ‘freezes’ the shadows of passers-by, or when a façade turns into a screen by means of thousands of tiny LED lights? What happens to architecture, people, and cities, when buildings turn into a type of digital media and allows citizens to communicate with each other in completely new ways?
Questions like these are increasingly relevant, as media architecture gains ground in cities all over the World. And they will be top of the agenda when these media architecture experts meet up in Aarhus in November.
“Media Architecture is changing the way we relate to traditional architecture,” General Chair of the biennale, Dr. Martin Brynskov, said. ”It is a field in rapid development, and we’re very much looking forward to hearing top experts’ take on how media architecture affects our perception of buildings and cities.”
Designed by architects Ângelo Lopes, Helena Gomes, and Lara Plácido, the CASALATA (Tin House) project started with a short film in Mindelo, Cape Verde. The film focuses on the issue of the shortage of housing and on the problems that cause suffering in the tin house neighborhoods. The CASALATA film then evolved into a wider project with the intention of providing a viable strategy to improve the housing problems of Cape Verde. The result is an architectural proposal with the potential for effective implementation. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Our friends from UNStudio shared their latest completed residential project, a villa nestled on the outskirts of Stuttgart that offers amazing vistas over country vineyards which are juxtaposed with cityscape panoramas. The sinuous curves of Haus am Weinberg are governed by the idea of creating a “twist” which organizes the programmatic flow of the residence. Ben van Berkel explained, “The Haus am Weinberg adopts a stereovisual spatial effect, acting almost as an optical instrument, whereby not a parallax view, but a parallax experience is created. Moments of parity with the surrounding landscape from inside the house form a constant experiential connection and awareness of its immediate context.”
More after the break, including a great photography set by Iwan Baan.
As part of the Sukkahville Design Competition in Toronto, organized by the Kehilla Residential Programme, Craig Deebank and Gina Gallaugher were selected as one of the finalists for his ‘Embryonic Canopy’ exhibition. The project re-images the Sukkah as both a temporary shelter and permanent fixture within the agricultural ecosystem. It challenges the notion of the traditional static Sukkah while creating a sense of wonder, intrigue and connection to the natural environment. More images and designers’ description after the break.
Designed by Mjölk Architekti, a high seat was installed on the main square in České Budějovice where it stayed for a month. It is situated high up so that it does not interfere with everyday life on the ground and offers sufficient privacy to its occupants. Over the month of the exhibition, this space with a floor area of 6.25 m2 hosted several inspiring personalities, the so-called “urban hunters”. They are the masters of their time and space. All the necessities needed for comfortable living are provided. More images and architects’ description after the break.
As an entry for the Land Art Generator Initiative Competition 2012 – Freshkill Park New York, ‘Wind Fountain’ is based on an adaptation of the piezoelectric effect – a well known property of certain materials to produce electrical power when they undergo strain and stress. Designed by Gembong Reksa Kawula, the project is shaped as an artificial tree, with each unit consist of 450 flexible thread 30 meters high made of carbon fiber reinforced resin pole that will sway in the wind. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Last September 25th, at Bartlett School of Architecture, the Graduate Program Exhibition was inaugurated. The same day, Peter Cook gave by himself the “Multicoloured Ear”, (the physical icon coming from the fact that exhibition was taking place at the former Ear Hospital building) for the Special Peter Cook Prize of this year, to the postgraduate student Maj Plemenitas with his research project 10⁻⁹ ]LINK[ 10⁹.
MenoMenoPiu Architectshave shared their submission for the Daegu Gosan Public Library Competition in Daegu, Korea. This project focuses on creating a community with Daegu’s Metropolitan Center with consideration for urban flows and social trends. Join us after the break for more.
ArchDaily’s previous coverage of Herzog & de Meuron‘s 56 Leonard Street was around the time when construction was just about to begin. Now four years later, construction seems about ready to restart, according to bdOnline. Join us after the break for more details.
King’s Grove, an elegant new house squeezed behind two Victorian terraces in Peckham, has been awarded the Royal Institute of British Architects’ (RIBA) Stephen Lawrence Prize 2012 – an architecture award that recognizes “fresh talent and smaller construction budgets”. The project, designed by London-based practice Duggan Morris Architects, was selected over four other contenders and was awarded last week, along with the 2012 Stirling Prize-winner, in Manchester. As you may remember, Duggan Morris Architects won last year’s RIBA Manser Medal.
Building: Inside Studio Gang Architects, is the first solo exhibition dedicated to the work of Studio Gang, which will be on view at the Art Institute of Chicago until February 24, 2013. The show immerses visitors in the energy of the studio’s creative process and the stream of ideas that connects its growing body of work. More images and information on the exhibition after the break.
The first prize winning ‘e(CO)stratègia’ proposal for the ‘Les 16 portes de Collserola, porta 13′ Competition weaves biological and urban flows in order to improve society and ecosystem together as a whole. Designed by Sau Taller d’Arquitectura, their concept aims to define the edge between the city and the mountains as a surface, a space occupied by domesticated fields, a place between nature and city where you can find community vegetable gardens, and open air green spaces. Therefore, this domesticates nature between the concrete sense of the city and the wildness aspect of the natural park. For images and architects’ description after the break.
Nemetschek Vectorworks, Inc. recently launched The Vectorworks Young Architects Student Scholarship, which will provide a $2,500 award to an outstanding student who is pursuing either an undergraduate or graduate degree in architecture in the U.S. This new scholarship will be paid directly to the recipient’s educational institution, and can be used to pay for tuition and fees. Their goal is to engage and encourage more students to pursue architecture and apply their skills to push this field into new and exciting directions. The application deadline is November 30 and the winner will be revealed on Friday, December 14. For more information, please visit here.
Team innergy, composed of Frank Marcus, Pieter Wackers, Gerben Pennings, Gertjan Rohaan, Chris Van Der Zwet, recently won the first prize in the Energetic City 2050, competition about the sustainable future of the city of Arnhem, Netherlands. The jury felt that the vision of Innergy was “hopeful, with a strong belief in humanity & technology”, “focusing on individuals, for the city of the future will be the people themselves” and that “housing subscriptions and building material plazas will turn the city into a fluid place full of creativity “. More images and architects’ description after the break.
The program is intended to engage students and recent graduates, working individually or in teams to imagine the repurposing of our existing cities with buildings that are made from renewable resources, offer expedient affordable construction, innovate with new and old wooden materials, and provide healthy living / working environments.
The story of the Zachary House, designed byStephen Atkinson Architecture, is one of idealism of the profession and faith to the design. In three iterations, the house that was originally designed for Atkinson’s own parents went from being the incarnation of the architect’s own ideal image, revered by both modernists and traditionalists, to a highly protected “manuscript” of an architectural vision. The house was originally built in the 90′s in Zachary, Louisiana, where it gained a substantial amount of attention from other residents and the media for its blend of the “dog trot” and “shotgun” style homes. The house, now in its third life, was built under specific conditions that maintained every element of its distinctive design.
Architects: twelveplus Location: Ljubljana, Slovenia Architect In Charge: Kieran Donnellan Project Year: 2012 Photographs: Courtesy of Water Temple Workshop
In their second prize winning design in the international competition, ZA Architects aimed at developing a few new principles of hotel organization. Instead of separating visitors from the environment, the architects intends to embed peoples’ lives in local city life. For this reason, there is no hotel building itself, instead they propose hotel rooms placed in existing buildings (offices, residential) connected with web of hung pathways. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Taking place now until January 13 at the Carnegie Museum of Art, the ‘White Cube, Green Maze: New Art Landscapes’ exhibition consists of a worldwide survey of art sites that break open the “white cube” gallery space. These sites typically mix old and new, featuring collaborative plans by several designers and encouraging exploration outdoors as a new type of museum is emerging — one that fuses inventive architecture and landscape design with radical conceptual and installation art. More images and information on the exhibition after the break.
