A+Awards: Belgian design office Five AM overhauled a tiny caravan to create this studio on wheels, which is next up in our showcase of this year’s Architizer A+Awards winners. Read more
Triangular facets of stone and shimmering glass provide the irregular form of Coop Himmelb(l)au‘s Museum of Contemporary Art and Planning Exhibition, which is now complete in Shenzhen. Read more
Patrik Schumacher’s vision for a deregulated and privatised city is nothing more than a rehash of failed establishment ideas, and we shouldn’t pay any attention, argues Phineas Harper in his latest Opinion column. Read more
Our job of the day from Dezeen Jobs is for a senior architect at MAD, which is currently working on designs for a George Lucas Museum in both San Francisco and Los Angeles. Read more stories about MAD or browse more architecture and design opportunities on Dezeen Jobs.
Danish studio EFFEKT has completed a brick-clad apartment block in Copenhagen with a tapered profile that reflects the roof shape of an adjacent church. Read more
From the architect. The nest of Yellow Owl : Mum.
Paju Book City District 2 is a great place where architects can experiment varied designs.
The District 1 in which numerous buildings come together and define spaces is created as a culture & arts complex for publishing/music industry whereas the District 2 is planned by solving various problems found in the District 1 and arranged to accommodate even more companies. And there, inspired by the atmosphere of this culture & amp; arts complex, many companies have built their own buildings displaying all sorts of unique characters.
Located in District 2 block 9, Mum is an English education company having a logo where an owl with big black eyes appears on a yellow background. The logo has a story of the adventure, challenge and passion of a yellow owl Mu; which sets out to search for the 13th planet of the solar system. the last uncharted planet M.Impressed by the logo, the architect, in the early stage of design, suggested a nest-shape building as he wanted to introduce a space where the owl can rest comfortably. However, in the end, the building is finalized in the form of a stump looking naturally settled down on the ground.
Entirely covered with black brick, the building has a twisted rectangular shape, and its entrance defined by the incised surface of the distorted structure makes it difficult to distinguish between the front and the back. In contrast to the torn entrance, 2m×2m large windows are installed as openings in order to enhance the sense of openness on the lower floors. To block out the excessive light flowing into the upper floors, the architect designed lintels to be closed gradually rather than installing smaller windows on those floors. And by using the twisted form and repetitive wall pattern, the architect gave a sense of rhythm to the black building which can look plain.
As the Paju Book City area except for its reserved building construction sites is well arranged systematically, and considering that the area’s cold climate condition, the building is designed as introverted rather than as extroverted. In the atrium of the building, a vertical circulation which runs throughout the whole building and a terraced vertical garden meet at right angles. The building’s exterior is formed in a rectangular shape whereas its interior is composed with a T-shape atrium and ㄷ-shape office area. This specific solution enables the light from the outside to come deep inside through the atrium and so bright up the whole area. The atrium garden allows people to enjoy a brief rest without going outside, and the vertical circulation encourages communication among them and so ends up making the building more lively.
From the architect. The brick house occupies a land parcel of 800 sq. on the suburban edge of Pune – with a reserve forest on the rear and a dense urban housing on the access road to the front. So, the site creates an interesting opportunity to flip a typical suburban house condition and open up the major public areas to the backyard garden looking towards the forest beyond. Instead of the mundane suburban street the strategy here is to evoke a feeling of living in a hinterland.
The house is conceived as an introvert form with a solid mass of brick which stands still and bold from outside. The dynamic play of light and volumes is revealed only when one enters and walks through different spaces inside.
The living with its large volume is designed as a public node surrounded by built spaces which opens up to the backyard verandah allowing a seamless view of the lawn and forest beyond. The east-west orientation of the living space welcomes the warm morning sun and some migrating birds and peacocks from the forest occasionally. The cooking, dining and sleeping areas are aligned to the south and west of the site to protect the living areas from direct heat.
Each bedroom is designed considering the intuitive usage of space with inbuilt seating and furniture to go beyond the normative idea of formal living spaces. Each bedroom has got three different types of windows, one for seating -to enjoy interior courts, another small window for cross ventilation and the third is a balcony to go out and enjoy the distant landscapes.
The space is composed of all natural and earthy materials like the Black Granite floor – a reference to the monolithic basalt plinth of typical historic temples and forts in the region. The exposed brick walls constructed using Racking Monk bond – resembles the traditional Indian weaving patterns and adds a different value to the most conventional material like brick, the wood veneered ceiling which floats above the public areas with pergolas at the edges and the center of it, creating an ever changing pattern of light throughout the day, making it a unique experience to be in the space at different times of the day and finally, the grey-green cement box windows with operable louvered teak windows frame the views of the surrounding garden and distant forest.
This house is an attempt to create a level of privacy within the urban environment, where the users could interact with each other and nature as playfully as possible. Keeping all the formal layers of life aside and take a pause from the busy life of the city.
Product Description. The exposed brick walls constructed using Racking Monk bond resembles the traditional Indian weaving patterns which creates a play in the volumes.
“I think that cars today are almost the exact equivalent of the great Gothic cathedrals; I mean the supreme creation of an era, conceived with passion by unknown artists, and consumed in image if not in usage by a whole population which appropriates them as a purely magical object.” –Roland Barthes, Mythologies
In a city of 26 million inhabitants and 7 million vehicles, being trapped in a car in Beijing’s notorious traffic is a compulsory experience in the capital city. Neri&Hu’s approach to the architectural renovation and interior design of an Automobile Service Center in Beijing attempts to recapture the allure and magic that was once associated with cars. Along with a café and offices, the project as a whole is conceived as a workshop space, partly raw and partly refined, it is activated throughout with the energy and spirit of the industrial era.
Architecturally, the former missile manufacturing factory is largely kept intact; three of its four brick walls remain untouched. With the addition of a new steel frame structure, a third level is added to accommodate the client’s capacity needs. Demonstrating a certain tectonic candor, the tripartite of elements—existing brick building, steel structural frame, and inserted white volume—are visually distinct and legible on the façade. A series of black metal frames redefines the rhythmic window openings, while mirrored glass provides textural intrigue to the mostly monochromatic base. Raw steel edged glass garage doors at each of the vehicular entries are marked with custom graphics and signage to guide visitors to distinct areas along the building’s nearly 100m length.
Sitting within the white volume of the building shell at the west end are the main function spaces—office, café, and car lift—each expressed as modularized steel and mesh boxes, a subtly refined interpretation of industrial storage facilities. Mezzanine platforms, stairs, and walkways float amidst the mysterious black cages, such that cars and people are constantly circulating about. The café and the automobile workshop together, a somewhat surreal juxtaposition of functions, begins to generate moments of spectacle. Looking back down between the structural beams, peering through the layers of mesh and mirror, there is an allusion to the back stage of a theatrical set. Patrons of the café can voyeuristically steal glimpses of the cars and mechanics, marveling at their performance while enjoying a delightful refreshment.
While the brutality of the concrete and steel material palette, the unadorned authenticity of the metal assemblage, are inspired directly by the industrial approach, an additional layer of luxuriously textured materials—walnut timber and brushed bronze—provides a sense of hospitality. Custom furniture and lighting pieces adopt the efficient tectonic of wood plank and tubular steel construction, but their material richness and refined detailing also harken to the quality of craftsmanship found in antique cars. With this project, Neri&Hu attempts to break through common expectations of what some might consider a vulgar typology, to inject a sense of warmth into an industrial context, and to portray the seductive side of the ubiquitous modern machine.
To facilitate the efficiency of service in the repair shop, the strategy for the main signage reflects the bold and straightforward graphics of road signs. While the main signage is clear and direct, a second layer of signage augments the functional with the reflective. Meant to be slowly discovered, quotes are silkscreen-printed throughout the lounge and waiting area for customers to ruminate and take pause.
Filmmakers Ila Bêka and Louise Lemoine, creators of the Living Architectures seminal collection of films on architecture, will screen The Infinite Happiness—shot entirely in Copenhagen’s “8 House” designed by BIG—exclusively on ArchDaily from Friday, December 2 until Sunday, December 4.
Marking the forthcoming release of two DVD box-sets of their entire œuvre (which was acquired by New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in 2016) Bêka and Lemoine have, over the course of the Living Architectures project, developed films about and in collaboration with the likes of the Barbican in London, the Fondazione Prada, La Biennale di Venezia, Frank Gehry, Bjarke Ingels, the City of Bordeaux, the Arc en Rêve centre d’architecture, and more. Their goal in this has always been to “democratize the highbrow language of architectural criticism. […] Free speech on the topic of architecture,” Bêka has said, “is not the exclusive property of experts.” Their first film, Koolhaas Houselife (2008), has come to embody this unique approach.
The pair have, in the words of Veronique Vienne, talked to “concierges, cleaning ladies, repairmen, security-system installers, and house painters” alike – “but also residents, neighbors, dog walkers, and occasional tourists.” The result is a series of documentary films studying seminal buildings as seen through the eyes of everyday inhabitants, occupiers, and passers-by. “No talking heads, no voice-over, no off-camera commentaries – just the raw stuff of lives, whose relationship to the built environment is as much part of the architecture as the walls, the windows, or the roofs.”
Conceived as a personal video diary, The Infinite Happiness is an architectural experience. The film takes us to the heart of one of the contemporary housing development considered to be a new model of success. Inhabiting the giant “8 House”, built by Danish architect Bjarke Ingels in the suburbs of Copenhagen, Ila Bêka & Louise Lemoine recount their subjective experience of living inside this experiment of vertical village, named in 2011 as the world’s best residential building.
Just like a Lego tower, the film constructs a collection of life stories all interconnected through their personal relationships with the building. The film draws the lines of a human map which allows the viewer to discover the building through an internal and intimate point of view, while questioning the architecture’s ability to create collective happiness. What are the surprising results of this new type of social model designed for the 21st Century?
The Infinite Happiness will available to watch on ArchDaily from Friday, December 2 (1800GMT/1300EST/0200CST) until Sunday, December 4 (0800GMT/0300EST/1600CST). Return to this article during this timeframe to be linked to the screener. The full collection of Bêka and Lemoine’s films can be purchased and viewed on demand, here.
Sig Nordal 