Andre Kikoski has designed a new restaurant, The Wright, for the Guggenheim Museum in New York that transforms Wright’s familiar geometries into a new dining experience. “It was both an incredible honor and an exhilarating challenge to work within Wright’s iconic building,” says Kikoski. “Every time we visit, we see a new subtlety in it that deepens our appreciation of its sophistication. We sought to create a work that is both contemporary and complementary.”
With a shopping center already under construction, ROW Studiowas asked to design the facade for the center in Zona Esmeralda, in Mexico City. The clients asked for an interesting, and almost contradictory mix of requirements: the façade must be both dynamic and eye-catching, while still blending into the surrounding forest line.
More images and more about the facade after the break.
As the trend of “going green” takes over society, concerns about carbon emission is constantly growing, making both architects and those not in the profession aware of the implications of their actions. With their new installation, Alfio Bonanno and Christophe Cornubert have made a 27 foot cube of an actual ton of CO2. Dubbed the “CO2 Cube”, the piece is a representation of the amount of carbon dioxide emitted each month by the average person in an industrialized country, or in the case of the United States, every two weeks. The piece will create a strong visual impact on those passing by the Saint Jørgen Lake in front of the Copenhagen Planetarium.
More images and more about the cube after the break.
Kiyoshi Nakao of Coo Planningdesigned an apartment for four in Osaka Prefecture Sakai City. The cilents expressed the need for booksheleves to fit their expansive book collection. Quite different from a traditional house interior, this building is clad in wood from floor to ceiling to try and provide a “warm, lofty feeling.”
Chris Lee and Kapil Gupta from Serie Architects have converted a disused building from Mumbai’s colonial past into a banquet hall, restaurant and bar called ‘The Tote’. The site was covered with mature rain trees whose wide spread leaves shaded most of the spaces throughout the year, permitting almost the entire new program to occur outdoors.
More images and more about the project after the break.
UNStudio teamed with ARUP to win a competition held by the People’s Government of Yanqing County, Beijing Municipality and Beijing Institute of Architectural Design. The proposal is the design of a creative zone on the edge of the Beijing River that compresses open space and an economic zone by weaving nature with the urban fabric. The open spaces will provide Beijing residents with the ability to enjoy the peace of the greenbelt while still being in proximity to the local stores and shops.
Upon first glance, MAD Architects’ latest project for Chongqing, China looks like an impossibility. The project, entitled Urban Forest, features a stacked set of floors that cantilever drastically from their central support. The floors are designed to bring more nature and open space into a densely compacted urban area.
More images and more about the project after the break.
KSP Jürgen Engel Architekten was awarded first prize for their proposal for the Beijing Patent Office. Located in downtown Beijing, the site is near a new subway line and sits opposite the entrance hall of Caishikou Station. The proposal integrates the Patent Office into the site’s sustainable traffic infrastructure. The building is divided into a central hall, towers, bridges, open spaces and spacious rooftop gardens that creates an interconnected, communicative structure. A surrounding strip embraces the individual parts of the building, extending from the roof to the façade, spanning open spaces, thereby giving the Beijing Patent Office a specific identity in the urban context.
More about the proposal and more images after the break.
Radical Craft was awarded third for their proposal Soms Atoll for the World Sustainability Center (one of the winning proposals by KOW was previously featured on AD). For the project, the architects questioned the possibility of the World Sustainability Centre in Friesland creating a new interpretation of the relationship between the man-made and the natural.
Randić & Turato shared their competition entry for the new Adris Group headquarters in Zagreb. The architects investigated corporate office typology and its ability to generate public space when designing the proposal. ”Instead of building a structure on the perimeter of the block, that creates a characteristic configuration with public street on the outside and enclosed private court on the inside, the concept raises the program in a structure that hovers over the existing block,” explained the architects. In this way, the ground floor is completely accessible to the public creating a covered square below the new office building. The structure is supported by our sets of large steel columns that hold the building’s independent geometries. Each of these “legs” are programmed with ground level activities while the offices are organized within a horizontal framing structure.
Visiondivisionshared their Eden Falls entry for a vertical zoo competition organized by Arquitectum with us. The design features a thunderous water curtain facade that offers a dramatic entry condition as visitors pass over a moat of crocodiles and into a free setting where monkeys and birds freely roam about the building, and a pool with fresh water dolphins rests on the roof.
Toya Designwas awarded first prize for their design of an Archaeological Reserve in Poland. The form and function of the building were determined by parameters of founded archaeological substance and historical, architectural and natural context in Ostrow Tumski in Poznan, Poland. In this way, the building aims to accurately complete the existing backdrop of the area.
More about the winning project and more images after the break.
NL Architects have designed a stepped volume for the office of SOZAWE (Welfare Department and Work Agency) in the city of Groningen. The design includes an open marketplace which supports the architects’ intentions of creating an “open, inviting and sustainable place.” This public square allows interaction between the department and its customers, and the terracing condition of the building creates cross relations between floors. Each of the nine office floors open to an individual terrace, allowing workers to enjoy fresh air and take in the view of the city.
The 160m long wave shaped roof frame for Zaha Hadid’s Aquatic Center has just been lifted and lowered into place, marking one of the most complex engineering and construction challenges of the Olympic Park for the London 2012 games. Weighing in at over 3,000 tons, the gigantic steel trusses rest on a mere three concrete supports to provide open space for the facility’s large racing and diving pools. The roof is also designed to stretch, twist and contract in response to the effects of snow, wind and changing temperatures.
More about the construction and a video to follow.
Coop Himmelb(l)au has designed a temporary mobile performance space for the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Germany. The pavilion will house performances during the annual Opera Festival in 2010, and once that festival is over, the pavilion will be reassembled in various locations. Designed to “give the impression of a quieter environment,” the pavilion reduces the apparent noise to create a ‘zone of silence’ where visitors can sense a change in the soundscape.
More images and more about the pavilion after the break.
Situated on the southern bank of the Han River, Gimpo is a city in the process of transforming from an agricultural economy toward a consumer-based economy. Seoul architects G.Lab*’s, of Gansam Partners, proposal for the Gimpo Art Hall embraces the fact that the city is emerging as a contemporary regional hub and the design also reflects upon the region’s history.
More about the project and more images after the break.
G.Lab*, a department of Gansam Partners in Seoul, was awarded first prize for their design of a Navy Museum in Korea. The design reflects “the turbulent history of the Korean Navy and the unwavering spirit of the men and women who serve this branch.” Inspired by the unpredictability of the ocean, G.Lab*’s form for the museum is an undulating mass that folds. On the interior, the volume creates a circulation path which weaves and intersects in multiple spaces.
More images and more about the museum after the break.
ProjektStudiohas designed a multifunctional townhouse at the corner of Dlouhá a Zámecká in Moravian Ostrava. The townhouse includes commercial spaces on the lower levels while the upper floors can be rented for residential or office purposes. For the design of the townhouse, the architects have mixed the historical forms of the area with a contemporary expression. Inspired by the historical horizontal emphasis of the facade treatment, the architects have shifted the facade to creating an irregular textured effect across the building. This triangulated facade creates a new dramatic effect and provides a break from rows of traditional building faces in that area. The historical regular window ordering as been modified as windows rotate and combine to form new rhythms in the fenestration. “Dramatic effect by the view at the proposed new-building is reached with the minimum of devices but all at once in the classical way so that the new building is fresh and progressive, but at the same time it is accepting character of its neighbourhood,” explained the architects.
