Last week, RIBA announced the first two homes shortlisted for this year’s House of the Year Award: Antsy Plum by Coppin Dockray and Outhouse by Loyn & Co Architects. Antsy Plum is a 1960s modernist house located in Antsy, Wiltshire, renovated to reduce carbon emissions by 80 percent; Outhouse, located in Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, is a partly subterranean concrete structure on a sloped site.
Since 2001, the RIBAHouse of the Year Award has recognized the best new house designed by a UK architect annually and is sponsored by Hiscox Home Insurance and Paint and Paper Library. RIBA plans to name seven houses in total to its shortlist and name the 2016 House of the Year on December 15.
The inaugural show at the new LondonDesign Museum, Fear and Love, presents a collection of “reactions to a complex world.” Featuring eleven specially-commissioned installations designed by the likes of OMA/AMO, Hussein Chalayan, Andrés Jaque and Metahaven, the spatial context which frames them is the work of Sam Jacob Studio.
According to the architect, the design “plays on the ambiguity at the heart of the exhibition, creating a curving ‘soft baroque’ plan.” A single 190 meter-long curtain winds its way through the gallery to create “a variety of opposing spatial sensations […] with a controlled consistency.”
It forms rooms, loose enclosures and alcoves that shift between open and closed, inside and outside, small and large, dark and light.
“Materially, the design uses a simple palette of curtains to create a visual language that is not easily placed. A dark grey translucent PVC gives a futuristic and industrial feel, while its sharp and sinuous folds suggest a sense of luxury. This is contrasted with a Kvadrat felt curtain that gives sensations of warmth and texture. The combination of these materials creates rich and varying effects of translucency and enclosure.”
“At the entrance to the gallery a striking neon and two way mirror totem advertises the exhibition to the foyer of the museum while acting as an atmospheric introduction. The totem appears at first as a blank mirrored box, then as the neon sequence lights up, appears as a deep infinity reflection.”
Signage and communication was developed with graphic designers OK-RM. Fear and Love runs from 24th November 2016 to 23rd April 2017.
Our clients have been living in their ground floor flat for several years, before deciding to renovate it. The existing flat had a very old glass conservatory, which was freezing cold in winter and overheated in summer. It was blocking the light to the inner sitting room and the whole space was laid out in a very dysfunctional way.
The flat had enormous potential being a conversion of a large Victorian villa it had grand dimensions and a very wide back façade. Initially the brief felt a contradictory. On one end our clients were after a modern open extension, which brings plenty of natural light to the living room, but at the same time, they wanted to respect the original proportions and separation of the spaces.
The design process and feedback from our clients together with discussion with planners on this propsal within conservation are in hackney, resulted in this unique design. A largely glazed timber (sustainably sourced) clad extension houses the kitchen and dining area and facing the garden. Further into the floor plan, the original back wall of the house remained intact with its windows and doors open, creating an internal balcony, and keeping the cosy and more private feel of the lounge.
Brew Box Pad is a private home located in Kreuzberg, Berlin, Germany. It was designed by Itay Friedman Architects in 2016. Brew Box Pad by Itay Friedman Architects: “Reinventing a space, demolishing the old and to approach the clients needs and wishes nowadays always requires a innovative idea. A box can contain what you place in it, but most importantly can become what you brew of it. From this basic..
From the architect. The goal of this project was the profound modi cation of the school’s image. We proposed an organization based on users comfort. The children are considered as the project center by giving them a qualitative learning place. From a urban scale, la Place de l’Enfance is refurbished and become a new public space and a land- mark for the neighbourhood.
The urban façade unifies all parts of the school in a coherent project. Each part (infant school, primary school, leisure center…) remains independent but reunited in a whole renewed identity. The vegetated roof in wooden structure on the first floor connects and uni es the three emergences of existing and refurbished parts. Each volume has its function : infant school on East, primary school on West, leisure centers and common parts on central zone. The roof and light façades, all in wooden structure allowed to lead works with less nuisances in different in an occupied site. The parts were pre-fabricated in workshop to be pieced together quickly and following a dry implementation.
The building façades present high thermic efficiency, acoustic insulation and airtightness which is mandatory for a low consumption project. Our proposition, with its smooth and flexible geometry allows future evolutions of use while preserving the original concept.
“Fun-ctional” Box is a residential project completed by K.O.T Project in 2016. It is located in Tel Aviv, Israel. “Fun-ctional” Box by K.O.T Project: “What happens at the junction of a design rich aesthetic from the 50s through the 70s and the “cleanliness” of current design? When minimalist, utilitarian carpentry meets crafted objects and Oriental inspiration? What sparks when urbanity and nature loving coalesced? This intersection of worlds is found..
Located in a residential neighborhood next to the Tianhe district in central Guangzhou, Atelier Peter Fong by Lukstudio revives an empty corner lot into both an office and a cafe. Through a series of clean white volumes, the design purifies the existing chaotic site to create a calm yet inviting atmosphere.
From the outside, a floating aluminum canopy connects the volumes together, while delineating between the old and the new. Three boxes stick out from the interior, composing a coherent façade while creating areas in-between like urban alleys that draw people in from the street. Each box contains a distinct program; café, brainstorming area, meeting room and a break-out lounge. In contrast to the pristine forms, the voids are painted gray and left with the original structural ceiling.
Following a process of meticulous spatial carving, openings and niches are shaped within the volumes. Large cut-outs connect the café to the exterior and frame the surrounding greenery. On the inside, white ceiling pockets and wooden niches create a sense of intimacy. The office entry is also carved at its edge to feature a peaceful Zen garden, which becomes a focal point and visually connects the different parts of the office together.
The selection of materials further enhances the pure definition of the spaces. Smooth surfaces such as white walls and terrazzo flooring dominate the main space, serving as a canvas to capture light and shadow. The brainstorming box is lined with polycarbonate panels that form a subtle visual connection between the café and the workplace. Intimate areas are characterized by organic elements; such as continuous timber panels in the brainstorming zone and remnants of an existing brick wall in the lounge.
Combining artisanal café culture with a collaborative co-working space, Atelier Peter Fong adapts a contemporary social model to a local Chinese neighborhood. The complete transformation of a forgotten site into a destination demonstrates how architectural interventions can activate the streetscape and enhance nearby communities.
From the architect. The Residence that located in Sunter area take a concept of resort that combined with modern geometric shapes but still regarding aspects of the locality.
With a limited size of the site, the Architect tried to bring a Courtyard concept into the house as a central mass of the building, so the courtyard become a source of light and natural air circulation. Every room in this house have an orientation to the courtyard, so the house become more healthy and energy saving. Furthermore the concept resort is also felt in the foyer area where we’ve been “entered” into the house, but still seem to be outdoors because of the courtyard / open space that creating the impression of there is no boundary between outer space and the inside space. The Architects also applied a sloping roof in this house and used a local material likes exposed karawang stone that intended to bring a locality of Indonesia in this house.
The Religious side of home owner also inspired the Architects to translate that essence into the design in more modern context. The shape of triangle that resemble of a Chapel combined with box shape create a contemporary looks that makes this residence unique among its surrounding. Another interesting design is how to process the facade of the building by combining massive and transparent form that obtain from arrangement of the hollow steel to give a modern looks.
Section
The Facade of the building is dominated by the white color to give a simple and clean looks also to create a spacious effect. The used of white color also because it produces a soothing atmosphere not only to the owner but also the surrounding.
Just like the exterior, the interior of the residence also features an abstract white color is combined with a touch of natural colors likes brown wood color and terracotta to create a resort looks alike but displayed in more contemporary ambiance. The interior is designed to be simple with the used of built-in furniture to give the impression of compact and integrated with the building. This can be seen on the floor of the reading room where the owners desire to have a reading room accommodated in the form of a built bookcase and attic area which also used as a reading lounge.
Interior and landscape area designed connected with the architectural design concept that brings contemporary tropical shades. Landscape design is more simple and modest like dry garden that mixed with some easy maintenance trees so that more clean and give a modern looks.
A: 900mm high concrete base, which can protect the wood from the rain and water. B: wood bent structure with 3.6 meters distance. C: two way folded roof with skylight.
Structure system
The wood columns take the vertical load, and a solid concrete core takes the horizontal load. The core is operated as a precise machine: carve the solid volume by the circulation, function and the view.
We also combine the different functions with the concrete baseaccording to the locations: can be a showcase, cabinet, coffee bar or even a sofa lounge.
In two corners where the roof goes to the ground there is double height space. We put Electric skylight above ,whichallows light into these spaces and also improve the ventilation.
The whole building is a wood pavilion with a clear logic, thus we treat the interior design in a simple way: expose the original concrete, wood, steel materials and the joint as much as possible. Only hide the lights and equipments.
This house is in Osaka city, the back of the Karahori shopping district. This site of the only 66 square meters is located in the place where entered 30m the alley from the road.
Site is a corner lot in contact with the crank. On the south side of the site, there is stone wall exceeds the height 4m and 2 or 3-story house has been built on it. Also other three sides of the site has surrounded by a three-story building.
Standing on the site, I felt like being in the bottom of a well. First, I tried to capture the stone walls in the house.
Floor Plans + Elevations
But it was rejected to the client. Because they’re not good at small animals and insects. So, direction of the design was headed to the Urban Housing that is completely contained inside.
But I wanted to be left a little relationship with the surroundings. I was allowed to extend the alley in this house and placed glass-walled entrance, glass-walled light garden and glass-walled sanitary space ahead of the approach (the wall mirror has emphasized the depth).
Private space spacious has adopted the light from three light yard provided inside of the outer wall.
Sections
Although especially large fixed window is facing the service Terrace, I chose the abstract light (rather than show a embodying, such as the laundry) by paste the Japanese paper in the window over the entire surface.
In the night, the silhouette of bamboo planted outside is reflected on this screen.
There is a square window on top of the light garden next the entrance, also this window is affixed Japanese paper to hide the outside view. The traditional materials of Japan “Japanese paper” has created an abstract and modern space. As not “Shoji Joinery” but “Shoji Screen”
Sig Nordal 