© Yuya Hoshino

• Architects: B.L.U.E. Architecture Studio
• Location: Guo Zi Jian Jie, Dongcheng Qu, Beijing Shi, China, 100007
• Architects In Charge: Shuhei Aoyama, Yoko Fujii, Jingjing Tang, Lingzi Liu
• Area: 120.0 m2
• Project Year: 2016
• Photographs: Yuya Hoshino

© Yuya Hoshino

From the architect. This project is a store renovation for the furniture brand “Lost and Found” located in Guozijian  Street, a historic district in Beijing. As nowadays, more and more people tends to live alone, the concept of a traditional family gradually disintegrated, and the city’s public space is  becoming another “home” for people. Under such contexts, the renovation intends to  bring the sense of “home” into the store, and to introduce a new vision for the future commercial space that connects people with urban public space.

© Yuya Hoshino

By adding an alc, the traditional single-storey siheyuan building is transformed to a loK while most of the original wooden structure were retained. The indoor garden in the centre of the building divides the whole space into four independent areas living room, dining room, bedroom and a study. Since all the rooms open up to indoor courtyard, each space benefits from the sunlight that coming through the large skylight above and gets a view of the indoor garden.

© Yuya Hoshino

Plan 1

© Yuya Hoshino

Natural materials are used in all areas such as terrazzo floor, diatom mud wall paint, and wooden furniture. The rough texture and the plain look bring a warm and friendly feeling to people, waking up people’s initial memories and senses of home and family.

© Yuya Hoshino

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Courtesy of ArchSD

• Architects: ArchSD
• Location: Muk Hung St, Kai Tak, Hong Kong
• Architects In Charge: Alice Yeung, Thomas Wan, Tuesday Li
• Area: 11150.0 m2
• Project Year: 2015
• Photographs: Courtesy of ArchSD

Courtesy of ArchSD

From the architect. A school is a community: a micro-society, a mini city within a city. It is an oasis yet has a direct relationship with the city at large. Our idea is simple; the spatial concept for the Kai Tak Primary School is to bring the students and teachers together with the playground and other spaces and activities, to encourage interactions. Breaking away from the typical densely built 8-storey school building in Hong Kong with the ball court on the ground, this school adopts a low-rise 4-storey design, with the basketball court raised on the first floor, sited in the middle of the school campus, creating a focus, pulling together spaces and activities.

Courtesy of ArchSD

Axonometric

Courtesy of ArchSD

From the school entrance plaza, students follow a staircase route to encounter the covered playground, central ball court and library roof garden, creating a sense of discovery of spaces, to stimulate the passion for self-discovery. This staircase path connects the three major open spaces of the school, setting the orientation of the campus. 

Courtesy of ArchSD

The old tradition of Hong Kong’s walled village is re-interpreted in the design of the school.  In similar way as a village’s ancestral hall, houses, square and lanes would be strategically laid out within the village wall.  Within the wall of the School campus, the assembly hall which reads as the town hall of the school complex, the library and the classrooms are arranged in different blocks around the central ball court, with link bridges, courtyards, street and colonnades, shaping the school as a micro polis, conceived as a whole by using major urban design elements of a city. Courtyards, streetscapes and overlooking terraces bring closer the different spaces and activities, encouraging interactions. 

Courtesy of ArchSD

Gardens and roof gardens are arranged on different levels throughout the campus to provide green scenery for the interiors and attract communications between the indoor and the open spaces. Gardens and vertical greening together with fair-faced concrete, metal and timber screens compose a variety of spatial experiences to be discovered, to stimulate learning. The selection of materials and generous use of greening also create an oasis in the city.

Courtesy of ArchSD

Product Description. Metal screen of weaved mild steel plates was used as window screen of the classroom block close to the main entrance of the school.  Mild steel, along with other natural materials such as fair-faced concrete, timber and vertical greening, creates a variety of spatial experiences to be discovered.  The language of the weaved screen was inspired by the Chinese traditional screen, a common element for windows and partitions in traditional houses of walled-villages in Hong Kong.  By incorporating screens that mediate the outdoor and indoor environments, the design re-interprets the tradition in a contemporary way.

Courtesy of ArchSD

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© Katherine Lu

• Architects: Bijl Architecture
• Location: Mosman NSW 2088, Australia
• Architect In Charge: Melonie Bayl-Smith
• Interior Designer: Vanessa Tang-Lee
• Area: 285.0 m2
• Project Year: 2016
• Photographs: Katherine Lu

• Builder: Langridge Constructions
• Structural Engineer : Partridge
• Stormwater Engineer: Partridge
• Arboriculturalist : Tree Talk
• Pool Builder: Premier Pools

© Katherine Lu

Set on the edge of a national park, the Burrawong House has undergone a transformation that establishes compelling links between the dwelling and its bushland surrounds, providing opportunities for serenity and retreat. Bijl Architecture was engaged by the owners from the very conception of the project, assisting with identifying an ideal site that captured both tranquillity and suburban amenity.  

© Katherine Lu

Through careful manipulation, alteration and augmentation of the original 1970s brick dwelling, the scheme interacts with its bush surroundings in an interplay of light and shadow. The simple form of the original 1970s dwelling required specific formal responses, with the new additions designed to nestle under and into the existing building form. 

© Katherine Lu

Key design elements such as large picture windows, clerestories, raking ceilings and internal/external spatial flows have been leveraged so as to compete with the shading of the extensive foliage and deal with the difficult bush fire zoning. Utilising this design approach, an equilibrium of spaces come together, making the house work vertically as well as horizontally. 

Floor Plan

A series of careful insertions – under the house to create a music studio, at the side of the house to create a magnificent lap pool that juts into the bush – translates into a multiplicity of soft or transitional spaces for escape and relaxation. The result is a house that bows to the bush, that makes the most of its original, modest form by offering a flexible family home focused on quiet beauty.

© Katherine Lu

Product Description. As the property is in the highest level bushfire planning zone, any new external materials needed to consider not only the aesthetic and form of the original 1970s brick dwelling, but also the ability to withstand stressful bushfire conditions. We also considered how any additions to the existing dwelling would best blend with the highly textured and coloured brickwork as well as the dense bushland surrounds. Thinking about these various parameters, we decided to preserve the original long line of the existing dwelling by placing a ‘pop-out’ addition on the street façade, accommodating a modest extension to the ground floor plane. This addition is clad in Terracade panels, made by Austral Bricks – the terracotta panels comply with the bushfire requirements and allow an efficient wall thickness to be achieved. The panels allow the new addition to make a contemporary reference to the brick ‘units’ of the existing dwelling, while contributing to a slick rectilinear aesthetic. Overall, the box form and its clean, grid-like surface complements the existing building fabric whilst making its own statement as the new street-facing element.

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© João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

• Architects: Tavares Duayer Arquitetura
• Location: Olho d’Água do Casado – AL, Brazil
• Architects In Charge: João Duayer, Thiago Tavares
• Area: 124.0 m2
• Project Year: 2016
• Photographs: João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

• Collaborators: Diego Curcio, Fred Gomes, Mariana Amoedo e Nathalie Ventura.
• Landscape Designer: Rafael Costa Bastos
• Construction: Equipe Caldeirão do Huck

© João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

From the architect. The scenery is the backwoods of Alagoas, Brazil, a place so atypical of great beauty and simplicity. It helped us understand that the kickoff should be to enhance local culture by using regional techniques on the design and construction of a home and its interior. The result is a cozy, clear and light environment.

© João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

Thermal comfort was a priority in the project. We created cross ventilation and holes in the roof so that the hot air could be exhausted, while the cold air was coming in. Translucent roofing tiles and perforated bricks also helped to bring ventilation and natural light to the house interior, almost absent previously.

First Floor Plan

Neutral colored furniture highlighted local craft objects. Works of art from natives as well as the reuse of typical objects in the interior design were some of the actions that nurtured the design.

© João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

Kitchen has a special treatment in the house, since there is a cook in the family that helps many community institutions. The dining room is integrated to the kitchen in a way that this space is shared intensely by the family. At the rooms, studying was the focus.

© João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

At the facade, we decided to use mostly white paint so as to talk with the light colours of the local architecture, while the green, the blue and the vegetation in strategic places give life to the project.

© João Duayer & Nathalie Ventura

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