Recently, we shared Unsangdong Architects’Life & Power Press Cultural Topography, an interesting project that mixed programmatic elements with a crisp aesthetic. The architects just shared their proposal for the Thematic Pavilion of Yeosu 2012, entitled Ocean Imagination, which was awarded honorable mention (check out other proposals previously featured here). The proposal is an eye-catching proposal combines nature and the imagination in an effort to create the “best use of the infinite possibility of nature.” More images and more about the competition entry after the break.
Trahan Architects have shared their plans to completely transform an existing Municipal Dock into a mixed-use development. The dock is nestled between LSU and Downtown Baton Rouge – an emerging pedestrian thoroughfare that is full of potential for future public infrastructure developments – and Trahan’s vision will further activate the growing connection between these urban areas in Louisiana.
More images, great diagrams and more about the project after the break.
Check out the latest video of Santiago Calatrava’s transit hub at the World Trade Center site, courtesy of the Wall Street Journal and funded by Brookfield Properties. Back in 2004, Calatrava first unveiled his vision for the transportation hub – a “mega-station” which will include PATH services and 12 subway lines – and it seems that we’ll still have to wait until 2014 for the project to be fully completed. Although certain aspects of the design have been modified since 2004, the overall vision embodies Calatrava’s original conceptual ideas. At $3.2 billion dollars, the station is an expensive, but vital, component of the new WTC complex. Millions of commuters, tourists, and residents pass through the station every day, filtering in and out of one of the most powerful financial districts in the world. The video’s alluring imagery of the main concourse piques our interest as Calatrava has opened the roof to allow natural light to flood the interior. This strategy creates a more transparent and open space, which is unusual for a New York subway station, that can also be enjoyed from above as people in the towers look down upon the hub. We are anxious to wait on the sleek platforms and walk down the commercial connection between the hub and the Winter Garden, but we’ll just have to patiently wait to see the final result!
Although we’ve featured dozens of projects that incorporate vertical or roof gardens, we just couldn’t stop looking at this beautiful six story tall green wall by architect Jose Maria Chofre that we spotted at Urbanarbolismo. The articulated design, teamed with the variety of foliage, adds a great texture and personality to the building, a new children’s library in eastern Spain.
More images and more about the green wall after the break.
Tonkin Zulaikha Greer Architects’ Glasshouse is Port Macquarie’s newest cultural center. Comprised of a 600-seat performing arts theater, a 600m2 Regional Art Gallery, a studio theatre, conference facilities and a community workshop, the design activates the growing city, encouraging the public to experience or participate in a variety of activities.
More about the project, including more images after the break.
In the center of Berlin, an amazing institution known as the Temporäre Kunsthalle is a great venue for contemporary art as exhibits are housed not only within Adolf Krischanitz’s free plan interior, but also on the exterior. As each new artist brings his own personality to the building’s exterior, the 11 meter high building, which covers a ground surface of 20 by 56.25 meters, becomes the artist’s blank canvas, patiently waiting for its new treatment. The most recent exterior exhibition, autoR by Carsten Nicolai, is the third project to be realized on the façade.
More images and more about the exhibit after the break.
Earlier last week, the City Council of New York City decided to move forward with Rafael Viñoly Architects’ master plan for the New Domino in Brooklyn. While the historic sugar refinery complex, with its familiar yellow signage, has achieved landmark status and will be preserved, the 11.2 acre-site will be outfitted with 2,200 new apartments – 660 of which are affordable housing – and four acres of public park space including a riverfront esplanade along the East River in Brooklyn.
Throughout this decade, we’ve experienced and endured quite a few severe natural disasters. Whether it be earthquakes in Chile or Haiti, a hurricane in New Orleans, or a tsunami in Ao Nang, Thailand, these powerful natural forces illustrate the amazing, yet catastrophic, side of nature. Currently, Pakistan is suffering greatly from floods and mudslides that have resulted from monsoons. As CNN reports, an estimated 1,100 people have already been killed and thousands more are stranded on rooftops trying to escape the rising waters. The monsoons have destroyed twenty five bridges, washed away 58 kilometers of road, and damaged thousands of acres of crops. Plus, weather officials predict more monsoon rains today.
When Chile battled the 8.5 quake, the country greatly benefited from strict building codes. Yet, we know that many countries do not implement the same kinds of construction guidelines nor adequate flood control systems, plus the poverty levels in countries leave the less fortunate even more vulnerable. Jackie Craven’s architecture blog for About.com shows different strategies designed by architects and civil engineers to control flood water in their low-lying countries.
Take a look at some of the solutions. Would any of these solutions work in Pakistan?
New York will be the recipient of another Steven Holl project – a new library at the Queens West Development at Hunters Point. Envisioned as a contemporary “urban forum”, the project will shape public space and create new connections across the Queens West Development, Hunter Points South, and the existing neighborhood of Hunters Point. Steven Holl states, “We are very pleased with this great commission for an addition to the growing community. We envision a building hovering and porous, open to the public park. A luminous form of opportunity for knowledge, standing on its own reflection in the east river.”
We’ve seen tons of glitzy and glamorous renderings that immediately attract our attention. You know the kind we mean – a picturesque snapshot where the weather is absolutely perfect, the sunlight is bursting through the glass facade magnificently, and people are laughing and strolling hand in hand. And, sometimes, the rendering style speaks louder than the actual architecture – convincing clients and jurors, or perhaps misleading them, to invest in the project. Of course, we love seeing the variety of presentation styles and how firms market their work, but we also enjoy seeing construction shots and finished photography to see if the realized project lives up to the idealized renderings.
The Boston Society of Architects shared the four winning projects for the 2010 Unbuilt Awards with us. Each year, the BSA sponsors this award program to honor and promote excellent design. Any project typology can be submitted for review, as long as the project is either purely theoretical or an unbuilt client sponsored project. The four winners show the diversity of the award as the projects vary in program, materiality and, of course, their design strategy. The winning projects and teams include: Land of Giants by Choi & Shine Architects, Playcloud by Nameless Architecture, Retreat House by Hutker Architects and Putting the Farm Back in Farmington by University of Arkansas Community Design Center.
HOK, along with Beck Group, has designed a new museum to house the works of Salvador Dalí in St. Petersburg, Florida. The architecture, greatly inspired by the great surrealist, “combines elements of the classical and the fantastical,” according to the director of the museum. The design speaks to the essence of Dalí while incorporating functional elements to combat Florida’s tough weather.
More images and more about the museum after the break.
Our friends at Abitare published several works by Italian firm Buratti + Battiston, an architect and engineer, respectively. With a strong grasp of aesthetics as their foundation for creating spaces, their Vetreria Airoldi Office + Showroom works with the characteristics of colored glass to form a contemporary working space.
More images and more about the project after the break.
Studio Shift’s Stadt Krone proposal is one of twelve that offers a conceptual solution for the densification of Milano. The proposals were required to inject 25,000 inhabitants into the existing urban fabric of Milano, and Studio Shift’s proposal addresses the strain that this increase will have on the existing infrastructure and the social and economic well-being of the population. Their comprehensive strategy creates “a self-sustaining community and one that seeks to integrate programmatically and physically with the existing city.”
More images and more about the project after the break.
About a year ago, we shared one of our favorite Plasma Studio designs with you – an International Horticultural Fair Complex. The project is a large master plan that blends architecture, landscape and circulation into one system using a network of organic paths. Four major buildings and a range of smaller interventions are scattered within the landscape. The studio has shared recent construction photos with us, and more renderings, that we’ll share more with you after the break.
What do you think of this TED talk by Mitchell Joachim and his discussion about growing homes? The strategy he proposes for creating “green villages”, pleaching – which is where vegetation is fused together to then create desired geometries – makes an architecture that is the landscape. We could potentially “pre-grow” a community, as Joachim puts it, providing homes for millions of people that instead of harming the environment, will just eliminate carbon from the air. Things get even more interesting when Joachim shares how his own studio is growing extracellular matrix from pigs, and can print geometries to make objects. Check out his new wall section idea for a meat house which replaces standard wall construction with fatty cells for insulation and cilia for tackling wind loads. Joachim is doing some interesting things in his studio and we want to know what you think of his ideas.
Plasma Studio’snewest project in China, a bold angular set of towers, speaks to the firm’s geometric obsession. The project was recently awarded first prize in an invited competition in Datong, Shanxi province. The mix-use complex, measuring of 70,000 m2, will include a hotel in one tower and offices in the other. Running along a highly trafficked street, the towers create a strong presence along the streetscape and are pulled away just enough from the site’s edge to provide places for pedestrians and greenery.
Recently awarded first prize,Woods Bagot’s vision for the Shijiazhuang International Exhibition and Convention Center will be manifested in a sleek faceted glass tower that rises from smaller geometric exhibition halls. The master plan is designed to uplift the city’s coastal area, which is currently underdeveloped, by attracting tourists and locals to the entire complex for different programmatic activities.
More images and more about the master plan after the break.
