London Design Festival 2016: British design writer Max Fraser has been named as the curator of this year’s 100% Norway exhibition, which will return to the London Design Festival in September (+ slideshow). (more…)
Svartifoss by hauxon The 20m high Svartifoss a great place to pay a visit if you’re travelling the south-east part of Iceland. It’s located inside the Skaftafell national park and the 2.5 km hike is up a gentle slope shouldn’t be too hard for most people, just make shure you’ve got spikes/crampons if you’re there during winter. The columnar lava rock formations make the waterfall and surroundings very scenic and they have been inspiration to Icelandic architects when designing buildings including Reykjavik’s Hallgrímskirkja church and the Icelandic national theater. Last weekend there was not much water in it but the giant icicles made up for it! 🙂 http://flic.kr/p/BFo2rm
From the architect. This project is located in a tropical dry forest ecosystem, with an average annual temperature of 28 degrees Celsius that is uniform throughout the year, a feature Cauca River Valley. Because of this, bioclimatic factors such as the generation of shadow or the use of natural ventilation were decisive in the design.
TOPOGRAPHY
This house adapts to the topographical conditions of a lot that was modified earlier: a sloping hillside was cut to produce a flat area and a large rear slope. Given this condition the house makes use of the flat area, but try to restore the profile of the mountain locating the high areas with two levels to the back, and the low areas shaded to the front. In section, we define a low corridor to the landscape and rooms with two levels towards the slope, connected through an inclined reinforced concrete roof that leads the passage of the wind currents from the low to the high areas.
MODULES
In plan the house is defined by four modules coiled around a tree and the distant landscape of the Cauca River. The first module contains the master bedroom, the second and fourth modules contain two guest bedrooms each, and the third has the social and services areas. These modules connected by a corridor define a concave exterior space where the pool and recreation areas are located. Fragmentation in modules and angle changes allow the house to increases its facade area exposed to natural air currents and thereby increase its permeability.
CORRIDOR
In this case, as in the traditional architecture of the region, the corridor acts as an open, elongated shadow area to hang hammocks and watch the distant landscape; To control the sun and to close this area in some cases, large sliding metal doors were designed with a pattern of 60% perforation, allowing natural ventilation even at times when the space is not open. The house has been located so that the corridor remains shaded almost all year.
New Ludgate, a retail and commercial development located two blocks east of St. Paul’s Cathedral in downtown London, has been named the City of London Building of the Year 2016. The complex consists of two new buildings, One New Ludgate by Fletcher Priest Architects and Two New Ludgate by Sauerbruch Hutton. The award was given in recognition of “the buildings that support the ambitions of the City of London in delivering a world-class working environment, by evaluating both the quality of the architectural design and the impact the building has had on the city street scene.”
Additionally, a new award, the Livery Award, was created to commend the new Leathersellers’ Hall designed by Eric Parry Architects and the renovated Livery Hall for the Salters’ Company by dMFK by London Wall Place.
Jury chair Paul Finch, program director of the World Architecture Festival, said about the winning project, “The judges felt that an area of the city where you would not have wished to walk or linger has been transformed. An eyesore had been removed and a destination created, which through the skillful deployment of colour lifted both the eye and the spirit.”
New Ludgate was selected from a shortlist of projects including:
The City of London Building of the Year is organized by Worshipful Company of Chartered Architects (WCCA), and allows members of the public to nominate buildings they believe to be extraordinary examples of contemporary architecture throughout city.
Park Associati has revealed their plans for a new landmark business center in central Milan. A series of differentiated volumes make up the complex, one of which rises far higher and has been articulated as a “lantern,” illuminating the skyline. The plan for the Pharo Business Center focuses on visibility and accessibility, taking advantage of the site’s prominent position.
The new office building is situated on the cusp of multiple urban conditions, with up-and-coming districts such as Citylife and Portello at its doorstep, and two arterial access paths to the city center bounding it on either side. To capitalize on this site, Park Associati have focused on fostering “visibility and recognizability,” creating a building which is memorable at all scales, from approaching pedestrian to airplanes flying overhead.
Whilst the uppermost lantern is visible across the city illuminating both day and night, another lit volume at the first level provides a warm entrance and bathes the surrounding streets in light. The series of volumes are composed in a way as to not overbear the surroundings, with some angled facades slicing up the regularity. Slim metal fins emphasize the building’s verticality, breaking down the visual bulk and creating a streamlined look.
The building is afforded with street frontages to all four sides, with the main access route through the front of the building at via Gattamelata. A centrally located piazza, designed as an access route and meeting place, connects from via Gattamelata to Piazza Tur and via Teodorico. The walkthrough zone touches the communal areas at the ground floor of the building and distributes pedestrians to the vertical circulation areas in the main lobby. By enabling the horizontal flow of pedestrians, overall permeability of the site is highly increased.
News via Park Associati
The A-frame roof, one of the oldest forms in construction, is back in vogue and pointier than ever. Here are 10 of the best examples that show why gabled roofs are the new flat roofs. (more…)
A group of micro holiday homes for stressed-out city dwellers (pictured), the six buildings shortlisted for this year’s Stirling Prize, and augmented-reality gaming phenomenon Pokémon GO all feature in this week’s edition of Dezeen Mail.
Read Dezeen Mail issue 314 | Subscribe to Dezeen Mail
The Rosewood Beach Development projects integrates four new buildings into Rosewood Park’s splendid beachfront by blending them into a canonical waterside element—a 1,500ft-long boardwalk that hugs the bottom of the bluff, connecting access points at each end and opening to Lake Michigan along its east side. Program elements are housed in simple, small-scale, low-profile units strung out along the boardwalk like kiosks or pavilions. Building elements are long, low and thin, largely transparent in the north-south direction, and topped with boardwalk planks so that all views up and down the beach and from the park above are fully preserved. At the north, the environmental education pavilion is a large, open space, backed up by a thin service bar containing restrooms and storage. The pavilion’s north and south walls are sliding glass doors which open to decks outside, fully connecting it to the boardwalk and allowing views right through the pavilion. Its east wall is mullionless glass, giving an unimpeded view of the lake.
Walking south, park users pass tree-shaded benches to reach the welcome pavilion (and life guard office), then move on to an outdoor dining area with seating and tables defined by the refreshment pavilion and the beach restroom pavilion.
Materials are natural, simple, durable, easily maintainable, “beachy”: Local stone was quarried from southern Wisconsin to clad the buildings, blending them into the natural habitat of the bluff beyond. Ipe decking and cedar siding form the boardwalk and cladding of the individual pavilions and large quantities of operable glass blend interior and exterior and allow for panoramic views of the lake. The glazing on the project is provided with a micro ceramic frit, invisible to the human eye, but able to be seen by birds and reducing bird strikes to a minimum.
Sig Nordal 