Sep 16, 2011

Temporal Architecture



Project: Big Mountain Music Festival
Architect/ Designer: Pitupong Chaowakul/ Supermachine Studio



This is a temporary structure project but a simple response to defining an invisible boundary for human interaction. The use of natural materials such as bamboo for structure support and fabric as a covering skin from the elements lends a very local flavor. The fabric pattern is repetitive and arranged in a grid module, but its the alternating colors that makes the surface striking. Freedom is given to the traders to set up stall at any location and the passerby walks around them. (to find out more..)



Reference & images: http://supermachine.wordpress.com/category/event-design/

ling

Aug 28, 2011

Ground and Above Roof House - SPACESPACE


Taking note of the site's open atmosphere, the design features a transparent street facade with a vertically extended communal space that continues the sense of expansiveness to the interior. Situated on the corner of an intersection in a neighbourhood populated with long-term residents, the design aims to maintain a friendly level of communication with the street.

In addition, the site is characterized by an unchanged zoning regulation which enabled the architects to build slightly higher than the adjacent structure to the south. Taking advantage of this ability, the house stands much taller than a conventional two-storey building, placing its second level above an exceptionally open communal ground floor. (to find out more..)




Yokohama Apartment, ON design partners


Japanese architecture practice ON design partners has sent us images of 'Yokohama Apartment', a two-storey residential complex for young artists in Kanagawa, Japan. Located in an area populated with wooden houses and narrow roads, the design elevates the living units to sit above a semi public courtyard which serves as a multifunctional place for exhibitions, work, and socializing.


Conceived as the main communal space, the courtyard is loosely defined by four, triangular volumes that pinwheel around the center. An outdoor kitchen complete with a sink and stove allows the inhabitants to congregate in this area for a variety of functions. A washroom and storage closets are accommodated at the ground level of the four pillars, ensuring efficient organization of the second storey. Access to
the elevated living space above is gained by a series of exterior staircases that wrap around the courtyard. The landings serve as small outdoor terraces that provide visual connection to both the street and communal area below.
(to find out more)




Akio Hirata’s Exhibition of Hats - Nendo


“Akio Hirata’s Exhibition of Hats”

The graphic and exhibition design for the first major Japanese retrospective of internationally-known milliner Hirata Akio’s seventy years of work. For the exhibition space, we wanted to make Hirata’s hats stand out.

The mass-produced non-woven fabric hats we created for the space are the antithesis of Hirata’s carefully handmade hats, and bring them into sharp relief through dramatic contrast.




Hirata oversaw the shape of these hats, which float and stream through the exhibition like ghosts or shells of the real hats exhibited. Some are exhibition stands; others become walls, ceilings and diffusers to scatter light through the space. Flooded with roughly 4000 of these ‘ghost hats’ as though shrouded in a cloud, the exhibition space softly invites visitors inside. There, they find not clear-cut paths to follow but an environment in which they can wander and discover Hirata’s creations as they like, as a way of physically experiencing the creative freedom that underlies Hirata’s work. (to find out more..) (& here)



Jul 30, 2011

Peter Zumthor on Serpentine Pavilion 2011 - Dezeen

Interview: Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2011 by Peter Zumthor from Dezeen on Vimeo.

Swiss architect Peter Zumthor explains his design for this year's Serpentine Gallery Pavilion in this movie filmed by Dezeen at the preview in Kensington Gardens, London.

The pavilion is open to the public from 1 July to 16 October 2011.

afterrabbit

Studio East - Carmody Groake


Built within a live construction site, 35m atop Westfield Stratford City development, the pavilion provides the first views across London’s Olympic Stadium, and Zaha Hadid’s 2012 Aquatics Centre, forming a commanding presence on London’s skyline.
A fast build with a life span of just 3 weeks, the primary structure, weighing 70 tons, is constructed from hired materials borrowed from the existing construction site, including: 2000 scaffolding boards, 3500 scaffolding poles, and reclaimed timber, used to create the walls and floors of the 800 square metre dining space.
(to find out more..)




afterrabbit

Ghost-like Architecture - Shingo Masuda+Katsuhisa Otsubo

The site is a threshold of house, street, garden, and neighbor.
We judged that it would be effective to design a boundary that could constantly renew and rewrite the interpretation in our consciousness each time they involve the site, of a garden being a house, a house being a neighbor, a garden being a street and so on - without restricting sites.
We tried to create an inconsistence between physical and visual experience of "boundary" to individuals, according to the state, by constructing an ambivalent "ghost-like architecture" that emerge and dissolve simultaneously. The boundary, which creates the interpretation of the scene or the crossing of awareness, becomes the new borderline that circulates inside the consciousness, which will not belong to any or all domains.
(to find out more..)







afterrabbit

Jun 19, 2011

Go Hasegawa - Pilotis in a Forest



Japanese studio Go Hasegawa has designed 'Pilotis in a Forest', a weekend house located three hours outside of Tokyo, Japan. Situated among a forest of mature trees, the structure aims to co-exist with the natural landscape that surrounds it. Propped 6.5 meters into the air through a series of stilts and cross braces, the dwelling provides views above the treetops and on to the mountains in the distance. An open plaza below is sheltered by trees that encircle the structure like walls. (to find out more)

Floor 0
Floor 1




afterrabbit

Jun 18, 2011

Cedric Price - Think the Unthinkable



Date: 31 Mar 2011 - 3 Sep 2011
Location: Gallery 2, level 2, The Lighthouse, Glasgow


The questions posed by Cedric Price (1934 – 2003) are still potentially revolutionary. Is architecture doing as much for people as comfortable shoes? Do we need buildings, and if so what for?

This exhibition looks at the ideas which underlay Price’s celebrated projects, exploring their continuing power to inspire and challenge, and the strong parallels between Price’s vision of a technology-rich, communications-driven future and the reality of contemporary life in Britain. The exhibition draws on Price’s archive, bringing his projects to life with new graphic technologies which Price would undoubtedly have enthusiastically embraced had he lived.

Projects by architecture students from Strathclyde University and the Mackintosh School of Architecture, and by fine art and photography students from the Glasgow School of Art are presented. Based on Price’s ideas on public space, these add a contemporary layer to the exhibition.



afterrabbit

Jun 12, 2011

Garden of 10,000 Bridges / 万桥园 - West 8



Gardens tell a story. They combine poetry and narrative. The Garden of 10,000 Bridges represents the human life; the path of people’s lifetime, which is a route of uncertainty and burden, but also of highlights and elation. The garden design takes you on this walk of life as a meandering, winding trail – continuous and like a labyrinth. It lets you find your way through nature and takes you over 10,000 bridges.


每座园林都有一个故事。它们是诗,在诉说。
我们的园林讲述的是生命的故事,人的生命之路。
这条路跌宕起伏,忍辱负重,
讲述了忧愁河上的众桥。
在这座园林中,生命是一条绵延不绝的蜿蜒小路,更恍如一座迷宫。
这条小路深入茫茫自然,带你去渡万座桥。


Sad to say, there're only 5 bridges, not 10,000.


For the 2011 Xi'an International Horticulture Exhibition, West 8 designed a Master Landscape Architect Garden, that plays with the limits and the sensation of surprise.
The Xi'an International Horticulture Exhibition 2011 is open until 22 October 2011.


afterrabbit

Apr 29, 2011

On Tree

Very often, we see a tree put alongside a building as a complimentary object, but rarely have we thought about comparing them, and sometimes don't even think they're related.

Ito was one who explicitly took the motive of trees on the street as the facade of his Tod's Omotesando building, despite rather superficially in my opinion, one can see from here the fact that there're times when a building and a tree would have similar scales and proportions. This much is probably as good as it needs to establish some sort of connection.

The thing is - subjectively speaking from my personal imagination - while sharing similar scale and proportions, one feels comfortable and relaxed under the tree but not so much when under/out by the building. Perhaps it is too hard to put the two into a direct comparison. Instead, I would like to talk about a few things on 'Tree' only, hoping at the end some hints to building-making can possibly come into view.

1. Coherent

A tree does not have a facade. Its outer layer is just where the entire figure stops growing and expanding. Being away from, under or up on the tree has a rather similar sensation in that its expression does not change drastically. In order words, it is a smooth, gradual and continuous transition of space that never completely cuts away from one another.

2. Porous and Transparent

A tree is probably one of the most porous being under earth's elements. Sunlight, wind, rain, insects and animals gently and freely pass through it. Within or under a tree exists a micro environment that is at once individual while highly in-sync with the greater natural environment. The porosity also enables good visual extension into or out from the tree, which I thought is simply intriguing and interesting.

3. Green and Differed

Being largely green in colour makes a tree simply the most eye-soothing and relaxing thing to look at. Besides, like human being, no two trees share identical look and form. I personally find it interesting on how each trees gives different, suggestive images that intrigue our imaginations much more than the solidity of buildings blocks.

4. Ordinary

'Tree' is one of the first terms we learn as a child and hence it almost never occur as a strange existence to us. Tree seems so ordinary (and kind) to us that sentiments toward it easily born into our minds. Hence, there're many who thought of certain trees as important aspects of their respective (childhood) memories.

5. A Link to the Environment

Many times, we look at the tree to find out if it's raining, windy or sunny outside. A tree reacts to the environmental conditions throughout each day, each season. Without noticing, we always casually relate to the natural environment through the tree right outside our windows, visually and mentally. Buildings, on the other hand, tends to distinct themselves from the nature.

I’ve thus far managed to come up with the ‘5 points of a Tree’ (high 5! Le Corb) that seem to have been only describing a tree, but probably a relationship or idea can sometimes be best found in the least obvious ways and the least forceful references.

One can try to achieve the quality of a tree in a building in many ways, and probably there have been quite some a of examples already, especially amongst the so-called sustainable architecture. But looking at my points one should understand that I tend to contemplate a tree not in its functionality, but its spatiality. A completed example I would most appreciate currently is the Tama Art Library in Tokyo, again by Ito which I feel, has certain qualities of a ‘tree’ far more implicit & effective than that of the Tod’s mentioned at the start.

afterrabbit

Apr 28, 2011

Jun Igarashi Architects: Layered House


'Layered House' by Japanese practice Jun Igarashi Architects is a two-storey dwelling for a family of four located east of Hokkaido in the old city district of Saroma-cho. The design designates long slices of the floor plan to separate programs, creating with a linear compilation a house that is literally layered from one end to the other.

The site is surrounded by a heavily-used street to the north, a co-op farm to the east, a warehouse to the west, and the house of the clients' parents to the south. Taking these conditions as a point of departure, the design pins its directionality to the south where a small garden is placed and creates a closed-door atmosphere for the rest of the house, creating a sense of ease and comfort for the inhabitants. The north, east, and west faces are limited in windows while a large opening to the south places natural light at the center of focus. (to find out more)




afterrabbit

Aldo Cibic: Rural Urbanism at Rethinking Happiness

'Rethinking happiness' is a research project showing 4 different new possible communities on a total suface of 40mq.

Curated by Italian architect and designer Aldo Cibic, the model is presented at the 12th Venice Architecture Biennale under the theme 'people meet in architecture' curated by Kazuyo Seijima.

Rural Urbanism
The city enters the countryside, the country enters the city.

One hour from Shanghai, a large rural territory with an ancient agricultural tradition is crushed between a growing industrial zone and a new city.

The idea is to create an agricultural park of 4 sq km inhabited by 8000 persons with low-density residential structures, preserving the agriculture and offering green spaces for the inhabitants. The project calls for a group of elevated buildings on the streets, to create a perpendicular grid that floats over the countryside.

In the middle of this 'agricultural central park' there are specialized farms that produce crops for the sustainable, profitable development of the countryside. The challenge is to create a new community with shared services, new activities and relationships, in tune with the territory. (to find out more)




afterrabbit

Feb 28, 2011

Good design communicates meaning. Good design communicates effectively. Good design communicates in a way that words simply can’t. Good design communicates & motivates; it does not merely decorate. Good design communicates an idea & equally considers function & form. Good design communicates the message to the desired audience & inspires the best possible results. Good design communicates a clear message to the desired audience, & serves the needs of the clients, not the whims of the designer.

Good design communicates well.*

* All tag lines taken from different graphic design, web design & advertising agencies that promote their service by referring to this specific design rule.

ling

 

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