From the architect. A contemporary apartment, with a clear connection to the modern design of collective housing in the beginning of Brasíliadz. That was the guidance, which our clients gave us at the time, today our dearest friends, in the beginning of the architectonic design to remodel the apartment, located in middle of Brasília. Once establish the concept of the design, the intentions were to reach out to a solution that appease the dynamic of modern life and the peculiar way of living in the residential scale of Brasília, idealized by Lúcio Costa.
With the free view, spatial generosities that make the DzUrbsdz of Brasília what it is, are a few characteristics that are impregnated in the design of the Estúdio MRGB in Brasília. Clearly appears more or less, depending on the theme that the architects face during the exercise of the daily job. As for the apartment MA the fluidity, permeability and spatial generosity are there clearly in the social spaces such as living room, dining room and work space. All the spaces are fully integrated, and the boundaries are configured subtlety, protected each and every one there functions. The view has no obstacles, all rooms allow their full comprehension, clear and objective of the socialization spaces. The esteem of our clients and ours of the Estúdio MRGB, for the design of the 60’s are insured by the furniture that has an important role, and creates the perfect and intended atmosphere. The pieces that integrate the spaces were designed by the greatest masters, architect Sérgio Rodrigues and Paulo Mendes da Rocha.
Florence Knoll a Charles Ray Eames contributes equally, bringing the spaces the perfect harmony with the contemporary furniture, concepts of the new and promising generation of Brazilian designers, Jader Almeida and Fernando Prado. The borderline between the master bedroom and social area, are defined by a wooden panel, located in the back of the dining room. Integrated into the large wooden panel a door to the master bedroom, which blends with the vertical wood strips of the panel. Those elements grant privacy, comfort and the necessary wellbeing for the perfect use of the spaces intimate and social. On the opposite side of the panel is located a gallery carefully design to enhance the beauty of the art collected by the couple. The narrow relation to the city, a panel of personalized tiles with geometric forms was designed by Estúdio MRGB in reference to the great artist Athos Bulcão, which can be seen in the main buildings of the city of Brasília, became a reference for all architects, artist a citizen of Brasília.
Foster + Partners has released plans for a connected pair of skyscrapers that will provide 660 new luxury condos in the Miami’s Brickell neighborhood. Taking advantage of updated height limit regulations, “The Towers” will top out at 1,049 feet (320 meters), becoming one of 5 new buildings that will share the title of Miami’s tallest tower.
Historically, building heights in Miami have been restricted due to proximity to the Miami International Airport.
A majority of the required parking has been moved underground, opening up 56,800 square feet of public open space that will feature a “signature through-block arcade.”
“The design of these high-rise towers frees up space on the ground to create a pedestrian plaza, with shops, restaurants and art galleries that will serve the local community as well as the new residents in the tower,” said Norman Foster.
“The base of the building continues the axis of Southeast 12th Terrace, drawing life back to the bay. It is a civic response to the city’s enlightened vision, and will make an important contribution to Miami’s public spaces.”
From the architect. The Retoños house belongs to a large extended family made up of several smaller families. The clients, Alvaro and María, wanted a house in which to bring together their 16 family members, including children and grandchildren. As a close-knit family, they get together very often. Until now, this took place in a small apartment in Quito, so they were looking for a quieter place far from the noise and drab environment of the city.
The piece of land is located in the suburbs, right across from one of the city’s metropolitan parks. For the first time, they are now able to enjoy their own garden within a large enough space in which to come together. The project had two purposes in mind: to take advantage of the natural surroundings, and to build a place large enough in which to congregate a large multi-generational family.
The design consists of a large two-story vertical bar that takes up a small portion of the land—a house surrounded by nature. The house stands back from the boundaries and has been placed in such a way to allow two big gardens to grow both in front and in the back. At the center of the bar, an interior garden passage joins the two side recesses with two wide folding doors. When opened, the doors allow double access to the house, so that circulation between the gardens and the house flows naturally.
Ground Plan
Top Floor
The wooden structure acts as a portico covering the whole width of the house, reducing the number of interior walls. The result is a constant communication between the inside and outside, going from the main entrance all the way to the back garden. Unnecessary circulation and isolated spaces are avoided. Service areas such as bathrooms, laundry room, and staircase are distributed along one side of the bar.
The architectural program prioritized the common areas; the private spaces were reduced to a single master bedroom. The rest of the project is a big living space with no barriers. On the second floor, the open space can function both as a living room or closed off as a private room, with a folding door and cushions on the floor. The two levels are connected by the two-story high interior garden. A net hangs from one of these spaces, acting like a hammock.
Isometric Scheme
Finally, the interior and exterior walls were constructed of dry panels. All the measurements were adjusted and distributed according to the standards of the panels, aiming at minimizing waste. On the outside, cement panels with socket joints were used to protect the wooden structure. On the inside OSB panels are used in the common areas and cement panels were used in the wet zones. The panels were used “as is” and any other finish was avoided to make the construction more efficient.
In this latest set of illustrations from Federico Babina, the artist envisions set designs in the styles of 27 of history’s greatest architects, using signature elements from some of their most notable works to “stage [architecture] as if it were an architectural play.”
“In these illustrations I try to transform some famous architects in set designer of his own work,” explains Babina. “I imagine spaces set up for a performance of a show that relates the architects’ work. Stage machinery that simulate architectural illusions, which draw from the language of the characters to represent an architectural metaphor. The architecture dress up, wears makeup and is transformed to play herself in a show where the volumes and forms write the dramaturgy and relating stories.”
Babina likens the set to “a virtual theater where the scenography, the architecture, the light, the shapes and the objects create a tiny show to make a short trip with the imagination and fantasy through an aesthetic universe inspired by architecture and some of its protagonists.”
Located in Xomalli street 153, in the town of San Lorenzo Huipulco , the xomali house it develops through two floors and a mezzanine on a plot of land of just 35.64 m2, each program element is accurate within the project settings , with the intention of re think the minimum dwelling space. The scheme has a commercial ground floor , the first floor contains the public spaces consists of the kitchen, living room, service area and a double-height study; the third floor has a mezzanine that contains the master bedroom as the most private core.
Axonometric
The location of the house on the street facing has made a distinction in urban silhouette, proposing a reconfiguration in integration into the context, becoming an urban reference.
In terms of program, the project is a single room with trading floor; but our goal was to solve the complexity of living in community. So we seek the independence of the individual, through the quality of space:
An interaction place was respected in the center of the field: a courtyard as consequence to the location of the earlier buildings and the proposed new space, an interaction space for members of the three families occupying the same land.
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Ownership of the building, in obedience to individual complexity. In a double access, alternating a dual identity that responds to be in family, and the identity needed to be independent.
The “low cost” that does not compromise the quality. The greatness of space focuses on attention to the detail. A materiality without presumption, frank and is no stranger to the individual. Sensory appropriation of space through the correct handling of light also was one of the resources used.
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House Xomali is a contribution to the imaginary of emergency social architecture in Mexico City. Through this exercise we reinforce the identity of a family, and support the emancipation of the individual, making easy a community life, which is a feature -and not an obstacle- of Latin American society.
Collaborators: Carlos Domingo (Structure), Ingeniería Torné (Instalations), Juan Pedro Fuentes (Technical Architect), María Roda (Instalations), técnicos del Departamento de Política Territorial, Justicia e Interior (Luis Faci, Alejandro Rincón y Sergio Sebastián)
The building follows a specific scheme in order to host the Provincial Court offices. It is developed in two different volumes that are mainly defined by a large vitrine. The first volume, with a rather strict geometry, comprises the judiciary facilities and both the Prosecution and Provincial Court Presidency Offices. The second one, the ground floor, has a more organic nature and it hosts the courtrooms and the most public spaces of the building. These formal and constructive solutions respond to the requirements of each volume and the way they are used.
The ground floor structure is made of exposed concrete with some openings. The upper floors, however, have a double aluminum panel and a curtain wall on the east-west orientation. The north-south orientation is completed with exposed concrete walls.
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Our solution maximizes the useful surface of these floors by placing the air conditioning system between the slats and the façade, granting a simpler and more effective maintenance. The building incorporates other energy use systems, such as façades with solar control based on their orientation and photovoltaic panels.
The building’s main entrance is an urban space located on the ground floor. The other independent entrance gives access to the Summary Court and will be used when the remaining courtrooms are closed.
The courtrooms and the main hall, used as entrance hall and waiting room, take up a big part of the ground floor. The Civil Register, the Police Court, the offices and a multipurpose room for conferences, weddings and public ceremonies are located on the remaining space of the building.
Somatic Collaborative has unveiled its design for Neapolitan Housing and Co-working Complex, a new urban block typology located in Gravatai, Brazil, that contrasts the traditional landscape of repetitive housing types that dominate the urban peripheries of Latin American cities. Like a Neapolitan ice cream, the project’s buildings will be layered, housing a variety of residential units and co-working space.
In a drastic shift from typical low-rise residential enclaves, gates, and walled compounds, the project will create high-density urban blocks “that engage the street as a source of urban life” through porous borders that encourage new city centralities. A semi-porous perimeter block with retail and commercial space will allow the project to better interact with its surroundings while designating the distinction between public, semipublic, and private space through the buildings’ masses.
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
Through mixed-use commercial programming on the first floor, the project will additionally provide direct sources of employment on site. An 8,000 square meters of multipurpose co-working space for the textile and clothing industry will be incorporated here, thanks to a partnership with Plataformadamoda.com.br, a digital platform that links clothing manufacturers to retailers nationwide in order to cut production prices.
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
A diverse array of residential units ranging from micro-studios to two-bedroom units will occupy the upper floors of the buildings, allowing for a broad range of ages and family structures to thrive. “This plurality of unit types is an incredible asset to the project,” said Roberto Carvalho Dias, CEO of Self-Sustaining Urban Development Fund (SUD-F), and developer for the project. “We are constantly getting extended nuclear families who want to move in with parents, in-laws, etc. but they cannot afford to buy two houses, the idea of combining a two bedroom apartment with a smaller studio apartment addresses this issue perfectly.”
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
Taking advantage of the steep topography, a series of gardens and open spaces merge the perimeter envelope and the bar into a composite hybrid that makes up the block. A vehicular and pedestrian passageway cuts across the east – west axis of the project, flowing with the topography of the site. Parking is then hidden in the middle of the block. This central spine organizes a series of public, collective and private open spaces that adapt to the topography and minimize earth-work explained Felipe Correa, the lead designer for Somatic Collaborative in a press release.
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
Courtesy of Somatic Collaborative
The initial phase of the project will consist of three urban blocks, which will be a mix of perimeter blocks that accommodate co-working space, and a series of residential bars that promote cross ventilation in hot, humid climates.
A real-time synthetic environments screen grab of the reception area at St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust in St Helens, UK. Image Courtesy of Arup
Evaluating the user performance of a particular building design is obviously a good way for clients and architects to gauge whether their design was successful—or could have been better.
There’s even an entire academic discipline called post-occupancy evaluation (POE) devoted to this concept, and Arup is tapping into it with a network of 22 industry partners using the Building Use Studies (BUS) methodology. Too few designers tap into POE, but with gamified simulations done before projects are built, that could change.
Admiralty station screen capture. Image Courtesy of Arup
“Basically, you design the thing, you use the thing, and then you evaluate the thing,” says Alvise Simondetti, global leader of Digital Environments NeXt_work at Arup. “That process generates concrete ideas for improvement. Everyone in architecture and design acknowledges that post-occupancy evaluation is important so that we don’t keep making the same mistakes. But in practice, it’s not done as often as we would like.”
Two reasons why POE isn’t a regular practice in architecture is because fees are often not built into projects for Post Occupancy work, and there is some reluctance from the industry to engage. POE has to take place when a building is, well, occupied. And studying the effectiveness of intensively used buildings like stations, airports, or hospitals can be difficult in terms of engaging numerous users who are going about their daily business. “It’s sometimes a challenge,” Simondetti says.
And there’s at least one more factor—a psychological one that tends to suppress wider use of POE: The process can be perceived as being about detecting design mistakes when its intention is really to evaluate the positive attributes of a facility and optimize operations for a better building.
Simondetti is leading a movement that directly confronts these frustrating challenges by pioneering an evaluation discipline he cheerfully (and somewhat oxymoronically) calls post-occupancy evaluation preconstruction (POEPC).
Three-monitor wide screen capture of the Admiralty station environment. Image Courtesy of Arup
One POEPC project he led was the expansion of Hong Kong’s Admiralty railroad station, the city’s busiest stop. Arup was hired to design two more train lines in Admiralty, which doubled the number of train platforms and increased the number of possible journeys to more than 50.
Simondetti used 3D-design models of the station and a video-game engine to create a realistic station environment complete with contextual sounds, accurate signage and visual cues, and hordes of avatars milling about to simulate crowded conditions. He then installed a system that allowed users to “joystick” an avatar through the station. The experience simulates walking, with head-height visual feedback projected on three monitors that fill the user’s peripheral vision.
In this case, Arup was evaluating proposed signage and wayfinding schemes—an important thing to test in a station already serving one million passengers daily. By asking users to navigate from point to point through the modeled station and measuring their speed as they passed various digital checkpoints, Simondetti was able to gather crucial information on how well proposed wayfinding structure worked in actual conditions. Thus, he was doing post-occupancy evaluation in an accurately modeled environment in the preconstruction phase, before any signage was physically installed.
A designer explores crowd-sourced design feedback of the Admiralty station gathered from a public-exhibition wayfinding session. Image Courtesy of Arup
This way, Arup was able to crowdsource the wayfinding-design process, and the virtual testing and analysis returned extremely practical results. For example, testing by hundreds of users revealed a persistent bottleneck at the bottom of one four-story escalator.
“Looking at the signage in this area in 2D, everything was fine,” Simondetti explains. “But when our virtual users joysticked through this area and down the escalator, it turned out that important signage was obscured during part of the escalator ride, and users tended to stop in confusion at the bottom. Without the virtual analysis, we wouldn’t have discovered the problem until after real users had created an actual bottleneck.”
Ultimately, Simondetti’s use of this real-time synthetic environment identified 235 potential problems with the 970 proposed new signs. The projected efficiency gains are hard to quantify, but the POEPC process certainly saved Hong Kong commuters hundreds of thousands of hours of confusion.
But Admiralty is not the only POEPC project to create a better experience for users. POEPC is something Simondetti and his team has been experimenting with for years—and in different contexts. “Hospitals are similar to train stations, in that they are used by large amounts of people that make many daily trips from point to point, so they are suitable for this kind of analysis,” he says. “Arup applied an earlier qualitative version of POEPC for VINCI Construction UK Ltd and the St Helens and Knowsley NHS Trust during design more than 10 years ago. The hospitals were some of the first to be built new in the UK using the POEPC process, are operational now, and are widely considered to be a great success.”
Here, design models and the gaming engine were again used to create a highly realistic hospital environment. But instead of random users, the joystick was turned over to the experts who would be actually working in the new hospital. One notable breakthrough came when nurses were asked to “use” a proposed surgical theater.
A wayfinding session of the Admiralty station environment at a public exhibition. Image Courtesy of Arup
“The nurses seemed to be the most interested of all the stakeholders we asked to review our designs, and watching them joystick around the theater really raised their confidence, and ours, in our design,” Simondetti says. “One of the first things they asked was, ‘Where’s the bathroom?’ It turns out that, since operations can last for hours, surgical teams need bathrooms that are near, but not actually in, the theater. Making that change in the design phase saved a lot of trouble for everyone.”
POEPC continues to evolve as a discipline. Simondetti has already tested variations to the process: networking multiple users, equipment-interface design (for things like elevator panels), A/B testing (performance evaluation of multiple designs), and introducing sounds and other feedback triggered by specific user actions. Currently, Simondetti’s team is working on new wayfinding projects that are going through RFP.
But even with initial versions of the technology, results are literally game-changing—no more bottlenecks of people at the end of escalators or nurses running down the hall at breakneck speed to the bathroom.
Using concrete and bricks made of raw mud, architects Solanito Benitez, Solano Benitez, Gloria Cabral, Maria Rovea and Ricardo Sargiotti built a wall able to be constructed by the two materials working in tandem. Once the concrete dries, the bricks are washed away, returning the mud back to its natural state, leaving spaces in the lines of concrete, like a kind of negative.
This artistic intervention arose from an invitation to participate in an art exhibition in Unquillo MUVA, Cordoba, Argentina from April 11 to May 3, 2014.
More information and images below.
Description by the Architects. We needed an open space close to the largest exhibition hall where we could come and go easily, which is how we ended up at the stable. It’s a building that had fortunately not been well maintained and still showed traces of time on its walls: fallen plaster and sunken mortar and bricks in all their splendor. A raised walkway 1.30 meters high separates the path from the imposing side wall.
Courtesy of Ricardo Sargiotti
We built a wall 17 meters long on the platform, with a mesh front facing the public and a zigzagging side (to avoid having to make reinforcements or adding any anti-seismic components) which faced the stable.
Courtesy of Ricardo Sargiotti
The wall was built with unfired bricks, in their airing out stage, and were laid on a layer of mortar made of sand and lime that was 3cm thick. After four days, the original bricks were pushed out with pressure washers along with any other tool that could break through the thick mud bricks.
Courtesy of Ricardo Sargiotti
Like a mirror image of the aging stable walls, here it’s the mortar that stayed behind, working as fibers, in the best way they know how. “Taken away” lies in a sequence (that time could only have done), and returns to the earth to in its original state. It is a brick wall forever missing its bricks.
Architects: Solanito Benítez, Solano Benítez, Gloria Cabral, María Rovea, Ricardo Sargiotti Colaborators: Juan Camps, Santiago Ruiz, Emiliano Sánchez, Kevin Vitale
The campus of University of Pau et Pays de l’Adour (UPPA), bearing the hallmark of its architect André Grésy, is immersed in wooded grounds and has a strong relationship with its environment. In order to comply with the project developed by the university, to coordinate the different activities, and to upgrade – in terms of quantity and quality – the material means and real estate, the building of the Faculté de Droit, Economie et Gestion – Faculty of Law, Economics & Management – and of the Institut d’Administration des Entreprises – Institute of Business Administration – is reorganized, and an extension of the research centre is created.
Inside, the entrance lobby is considerably enlarged. Orientation is facilitated. Circulation flows are separated. New vertical circulation routes allow better connections between floor levels, and it will be possible to create future extensions by adapting them. These strongly-marked architectural spaces make it easy for users to find their bearings and create favourable conditions for communication. On the south, an extension with full-height glazing is added onto the existing longitudinal building, extending the developed architecture into the grounds, to accommodate functions of the programme. A wide central stairway winds around a void bathed in overhead lighting. The stairway is a real sculptural work in white concrete, and is the spinal column of the scheme, set in a stairwell of red concrete, which gives it its force and allows all users to immediately find their bearings. It is accessible from communal areas for research teachers, seminars and thesis presentations, and from the administration offices of the doctoral school, and it leads to the upper floor levels, at the junction of the documentation areas and the research centres’ offices.
Outside, the façade is revised and modernised. The horizontal bands of tiled canopies, which characterise the initial architecture, are adapted. A random mix of 5 colours of roof tiles, both enamelled and non-enamelled, livens up the façades of the new building, facilitating identification. These new tiled canopies cover housings for retractable tilting sun-shade louvers, which allow personalised control of daylight admission and optimal thermal control of solar gain.
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The use of bio-sourced ecologically responsible materials – external and internal wood joinery, including parquet wood strip flooring, wood wool external insulation, and terracotta tiles – helps to limit the new building’s carbon footprint. Other active devices and measures complement the work on the environmental approach: energy recovery from all air handling units, additional night-time ventilation, a BMS – building management system – and double flow ventilation to reduce energy consumption, and optimised natural daylighting.
Terracotta tile -A revised, modernised façade with terracotta roof tiles
The existing architecture is strongly marked by the horizontal bands of timber support frames covered with flammé red terracotta flat tiles. They provide protection from the sun and natural shade in the internal spaces which suffer from a lack of natural daylighting. To make up for this deficit and to improve the penetration of daylight, the extension’s new façades meet the aim of reinterpreting the existing architecture, while improving it and modernising its image.
A random mix of these 5 colours livens up the façades of the new building and allows their identification. Each of the 25,500 made-to-measure 10 cm x 20 cm terracotta flat tiles is clipped to the metal frames. All the frames, measuring 3 m x 2.15 m, are placed according to the façade grid of the timber window frames (1 m x 2 m) while maintaining the inclination and alignment on the existing canopies. According to the varying exposure, a play of solids and voids enlivens the façades of the new parts. The sun-shields are gradually perforated, depending on how close they are to the existing building: they are more dense on the north-east and north-west to link to the existing building, and less dense on the south to highlight and enhance the new research centres.
With this perforation, daylight enters the reading rooms more abundantly in the spring, autumn and winter. On the west and east façades of offices located around the perimeter, retractable tilting sun-shade louvers are fastened to the structure of the canopies. They filter sunlight and allow personalised control of daylight admissions, according to the sun’s course.
All facings on the new façades are in a variety of colours:
5 colours of flat roof tiles,
3 colours of bakelized wood,
3 colours on retractable external blinds,
3 colours of lasure surface coating applied to the timber window frames.
These colour combinations of façade materials, which can be seen by everyone from the campus, create the new image of the university.
Sig Nordal 