Nouveau Stade de Bordeaux Architects: Herzog & de MeuronLocation: Bordeaux, France Competition 2010-2011, project 2011-2012, realization 2013-2015Site Area: 186′910sqm / 2′011′883sqftGross Floor Area: 77′090sqm / 829′790sqftNumber of Levels: 5Footprint: 45′480sqm / 489′543sqftBuilding Dimensions: Length 233m / 764ft; Width: 210m / 689ft; Height: 37m / 121ftImage courtesy of nouveau stade bordeaux

A Stadium for Bordeaux
The new Bordeaux stadium appears light and open; it is elegant, if such a term can be used for a building of this size. Its purity and geometrical clarity inspires a sense of monumentality and gracefulness. One might be tempted to draw a comparison with a classical temple, but unlike the elevated plinth of a temple, the grand stairs of the stadium blur the boundaries between inside and outside. Countless columns standing on the stairs accompany the visitors on their way in and out of the stadium. The fusion of stairs and columns forms a gesture of openness and accessibility.

Special attention was paid to the integration of the structure into the grand landscape of Bordeaux. The meticulous geometrical arrangement of bowl structure and columns reflects the pattern created by trees and paths in the surrounding landscape. This stadium is made for this specific place – an open, flat landscape in immediate proximity to the Bordeaux Exhibition Centre stretching along the lakefront. “Elegance” has become a depreciated term when describing architecture, but wrongly so when one looks at Bordeaux’ urban and architectural legacy. We were never looking for inspiration in the historical part of Bordeaux with its breathtakingly beautiful buildings and monuments all made out of typical limestone. Much of what we perceive as elegance in Bordeaux results from its unity and homogeneity of scale and materiality and from its precision and purity of form. We could not copy this, but we certainly learned from it.

A bowl for 42′000 people
Seating a maximum of 42,000 people, the bowl embraces the game area, its geometry affording optimal visibility for all, along with the maximum flexibility in terms of capacity and usage. The stadium is multifunctional and conceived to welcome a rich and diversified program: not only rugby and soccer matches but also shows, concerts, and corporate events.

The bowl consists of two superposed tiers divided into four sectors and protected from the elements by the roof. The underside of the visually uniform roof guides the eye onto the playing field while allowing sunlight to pass through. Its structure does not show through on the inside of the stadium, to avoid distracting the spectators’ attention.

Raising the bowl above ground level is a compact base housing all the programmatic functions in a uniform and symmetrical volume. This plinth includes the VIP spaces evenly distributed east and west, and media areas adjacent to the spaces dedicated to players. The architectural simplicity and pure lines of the bowl and its base ensure smooth spectator flows and ease of orientation.

Plinth, Bowl and Roof
The bowl rests on a plinth, covered by a sharp-edged rectangular roof. The choice of this pure and almost abstract form responds clearly and efficiently to the site’s natural conditions and to the main flow of spectators from east to west.

This white rectangle seems projected earthwards thanks to the multiplicity of slender columns that shower down. A ribbon of food stalls and restrooms undulates through this forest of columns, brought alive by the movement of the crowd. At once dense and light, this structure creates an evanescent rectangular volume from which the sculpted and organic outline of the bowl emerges.

This architectural concept gives a specific identity to the new Bordeaux stadium. The diaphanous volume opens up to the surrounding landscape while the grand stairs express openness and accessibility for everyone. Its transparency reveals all the energy and activities that will transform this piece of land into a new and vibrant part of Bordeaux.
Herzog & de Meuron, May 2015

Architects: de Jong Gortemaker Algra
Location: Bielsstraat 1, Utrecht, Netherlands
Project Team: Maurits Algra, Tycho Saariste, Karen Glandrup, Franke van den Broek, Mike Zelke
Area: 4480.0 sqm
Year: 2015
Photographs: Christian Richters

Client: ProRail Facility Management
General Contarctor: Visser & Smit Bouw
Project Management: Arcadis B.V.
Project Leadership : Humanagement
Steel Construction: Bentstaal

ProRail’s new train control centre in Utrecht is the dynamic heart of ProRail’s train services in and around Utrecht. The design by dJGA has specifically focussed on users; the main aim is to allow them to do their jobs as effectively as possible.

The train control centre has been given an identity that makes it immediately recognisable as a dedicated railway operation structure. Horizontal lines in the outer façade mimic the horizontal lines of the railway tracks and overhead wires. The dynamics of the railway yard are echoed by the exterior. The use of COR-TEN steel and glass results in an industrial and robust look & feel. The custom-made louvres give the building a completely unique appearance.

The shape of these louvres varies with the orientation. On the north side, where shading is not required, the louvres have a narrow and almost horizontal profile, gradually changing into a broad and steeply slanted profile on the south side, where intense direct sunlight during the summer is blocked and heat is reflected. This gradual change of shape creates a dynamic effect. Viewed from a passing train the façade appears to be moving.

The interior design is a contemporary reference to ProRail’s historical context. For example, the load-bearing structure of the building is exposed just like that of a classical railway bridge. The focus of the design is on the 100 employees who work at the train control centre. They must be able to perform their tasks as accurately as possible. The train control centre includes a signalling room measuring approximately 1,000 m². This is a large open space from which all employees have a view of the railway tracks and the surrounding area. A technical floor for ICT equipment is constructed below the signalling room. This approach ensures optimum operational flexibility as work can continue in the signalling room during maintenance and when modifications are implemented.

The interior climate control is based on sustainable principles. The orientation of the signalling room, the design of the outer façade, triple glazing, hybrid cooling machines and an “Energyroof+” (solar energy collector system in the roof) contribute to creating a comfortable working environment with a generous amount of daylight.

Architects: OMA

Location: Gorky Central Park of Culture and Leisure, ulitsa Krymskiy Val, 9, Moskva, Russia, 119049

Partner In Charge: Rem Koolhaas

Project Architect: Ekaterina Golovatyuk

Area: 5400.0 sqm

Project Year: 2015

Photographs: ilya ivanov

Project Team: Giacomo Cantoni, Nathan Friedman, Cristian Mare, John Paul Pacelli, Cecilia del Pozo, Timur Shabaev, Chris van Duijn

Additional Project Team: Yashin Kemal, Timur Karimullin, Federico Pompignoli, Marek Chytil, Salome Nikuradze, Boris Tikvarski

Local Architects: Form Bureau (concept phase), Buromoscow (construction phase)

Engineering: Werner Sobek

Scenography: dUCKS, Les Éclaireurs

Garage Museum of Contemporary Art is a renovation of the 1960s Vremena Goda (Seasons of the Year) restaurant, a prefabricated concrete pavilion which has been derelict for more than two decades. OMA’s design for the 5,400 m2 building includes exhibition galleries on two levels, a creative center for children, shop, café, auditorium, offices, and roof terrace. The design preserves original Soviet-era elements, including a mosaic wall, tiles, and brick, while incorporating a range of innovative architectural and curatorial devices.

Garage Museum of Contemporary Art was founded in 2008 at the Konstantin Melnikov designed Bakhmetievsky Bus Garage. Relocating from a semi-industrial neighborhood in the north of Moscow to one of the city’s best known public spaces (Gorky Park), Garage will address a much larger and diversified audience. 

Exposed to snow, rain, and sun since it was abandoned in the 1990s, the former Vremena Goda restaurant – once a popular destination in Gorky Park – has become a ruin without facades. Even as a ruin it preserves the “collective” aura of the Soviet era: it is a sober public space adorned with tiles, mosaics and bricks.

The building offers two levels of unobstructed open space that will be dedicated to exhibitions, organized around two circulation and service cores. museum programs occupy three levels, adapting to spatial and structural possibilities of the existing structure. The more fragmented spaces in the North Eastern part of the pavilion surrounding the main core primarily accommodate education and research programs. The large open spaces in the South Western part are dedicated to exhibitions, projects and events.

The building offers a wide range of interior conditions for the exhibition of art beyond the ubiquitous “white cube” and provides innovative curatorial possibilities, such as hinged white walls that can be folded down from the ceiling. They provide an instant white cube when an exhibition demands a more neutral environment, while the existing walls retain their brick and green tile cladding.

A 9×11-metre opening in the floor of the upper level creates a double height space (10 metres) for the lobby, allowing extra-large sculptures to be displayed. A public loop on the lower level will connect the bookshop, mediatheque, auditorium and a café, which is envisioned as an informal living room with Soviet era furniture.

The existing concrete structure is enclosed with a new translucent double layer polycarbonate façade that will accommodate a large portion of the building’s ventilation equipment, allowing the exhibition spaces to remain free. The facade is lifted 2.25 metres from the ground in order to visually reconnect the pavilion’s interior to the park.

The entrance to Garage Gorky Park is marked by two large facade panels that slide upwards to frame the art in the lobby’s double height space and provide a view through the building from the park. 

Architects: SAMYN and PARTNERS

Location: Avenue Jean Monnet, 1348 Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium

Project Year: 2014

Photographs: Simon Schmitt, Serge Brison, Marie-Françoise Plissart, Jan Bruggemans, Ghislain André (SAMYN and PARTNERS), Van Roey, Jean-Michel Byl

Design Partner: Dr Ir Philippe Samyn

Administrative Partner: Ghislain Andre

Design Associate: Bernard Van Damme

Administrative Associate: Ir Olivier Jottard

Collaborators: Karim Ammor, Mariuca Calin, Blandine Capelle, Jan De Coninck, Alfonso Di Mascio, Sarah El Mann, Dikran Gundes, Elodie Noorbergen, Fransesca Stroppa, Monika Studzinska, Gaofei Tan, Lien Vancoppenolle, Brecht Van Lerberghe, Emilie Willain

Structure: SAMYN and PARTNERS

Building Physics & Acoustics: Daidalos Peutz

Landscape: Erik Dhont

General Contractor: Van Roey

Landscape approach

The building follows the route of the N4 highway, respecting the natural landforms. The building is standing on stilts and floating above the rolling landscape. This gives a better view from the E411 motorway and the N4. Its orientation is slightly off-kilter in terms of cardinal points (15°) although this guarantees an excellent amount of sunshine. Pedestrian and automobile pathways enter from opposite ends of the grounds but come together again south of the building where the glazed entrance hall welcomes AGC staff and visitors.

Slipped under the offices following the natural gentle slope (1,5-2,5%), the parking area is discreetly positioned under the building, preserving the surrounding landscape which is covered with greenery (mown lawns and meadows of flowers) and a scattering of fine oaks.

Natural light

The internal office layout, which is evenly plotted onto a square plan with sides of 81 m, is determined by the natural light and the quality of the views. The duality between compactness (energy performances) and layout (visual comfort and well- being in the workplace) has resulted in the division of the plan into four wings, arranged around large exterior patios enlivened by wind, rain or sun. 84 % of workstations are positioned less than 4 m from the walls; 95 % enjoy an unobstructed outside view and 100 % of meeting rooms have both these features.

Peripheral glass facades are equipped with glass sun shades which automatically turn towards the sun. The light filtration provided by these slides is possible because their surfaces have been treated and printed with alternate bands of white, allowing the passage of diffused natural light. All other openings are equipped with removable blinds consisted of bamboo wood. The coating for lightweight opaque spandrel glass, which has been well-insulated, maximises heat reflection through glass panels etched (on the outside) and enamelled (on the inside).

The gallery

Crosswise to the office wings, a gallery (or atrium) provides an obligatory route for everyone in the building; all of the services in the building converge at this point.

The generous size of the gallery – 10 m high, 13.5 m wide and 83.7 m long – makes it a ideal venue for various events: informal employee meetings, launch parties for the latest glass products, conferences at the foot of the great staircase (on tiered seats), external events etc. The gallery provides access to all the useful areas in the building: the reception desk and associated services, the restaurant with its terraces to the west, the conference centre and each of the eight office wings (to which access is controlled). Consisted with the environmental approach that prefers stairs to elevators, the new head office is spread over two levels. Movement between interstages is comfortable and the elevator is rarely used.

The workplace

The floor deck covers 12.120 m2 for 575 members of staff. The departmental organisation at AGC Glass is flexible and its interior design can keep pace with changes through open-plan areas, closed offices or separate wings if necessary. The same flexibility applies to meeting areas and restaurants where the space is divided up as stipulated in the blueprint, by using movable, acoustic partition walls.

It is possible to extend the new office by prolonging each office or meeting wing. On the other hand, the maximum possible subdivision would be eight autonomous, secure wings of between 575 and 800 m2, still linked by and accessible from the gallery. In the interests of user-friendliness in the workplace, the preference is to have open-plan areas to be on the south elevation. The shared spaces and meeting areas are strategically centralized or situated near a staircase or next to a terrace or patio with a particular view.

The conference centre brings together all the meeting rooms which can be independently managed and by this are available for other users than AGC. Each room is fitted with audiovisual equipment and enjoys natural light and outdoor views. The restaurant area stretches along the western elevation and opens up to the outdoors by large terraces. The room can comfortably accommodate 180 people and has a lounge bar. The kitchen, stocked with professional equipment, receives deliveries from a separate service lift and can cater simultaneously to the restaurant, the conference centre and the gallery (cocktail parties, standing buffets etc.). The decor gives each area a unique ambiance and character.

While the materials used on the outer facade are glass and metal, the interior is fitted out mainly in wood (floor, partition walls, furniture etc.).

AGC products

The project demonstrates numerous uses of glass- based products (vision glasses, enamelled and sand spandrel glass, LED glass, screen-printed glass, photovoltaic panels etc.) in a bid to showcase the AGC products as well as possible. The entrance to the building, in particular, is signposted by a large sculpture in glass.

The park

Given the hilly nature of Wallonia, the impact on the landscape is subtle. Vehicle access is a long a hollow path, dug into the landscape. The site is fenced in by hawthorn hedges that are impenetrable despite their modest height (1.5 m) and do not compromise the view of the AGC office. The main entrance is on the Avenue Jean Monnet side of the building and two further entrances are planned for pedestrians and cyclists arriving a long the public transport and from the town centre.

A variety of types of oak trees (quercus robur, petraea and pubescens) are particularly suited to the environment, which benefits from their reflected glory. The roofs of the patios are intensivly planted with evergreens (luzula sylvatica). The car park skylights make it possible to plant trees with light foliage at the heart of the building (prunus avium or tilia cordata). The evacuation of rain water is realised by some buffer zones whom ensure to reduce and regulate the discharges.

Near Zero Energy Building

In terms of energy performance, the aim for the building is to achieve zero energy. Energy saving, throughout (natural light, insulation etc.) the use of efficient materials (energy-saving circulation, regulation etc.) and reliance on renewable energy (photovoltaic panels, ground probes, heat pumps etc.) made it possible to do so. It has been certified by VALIDEO and/or BREEAM.

Architects: Neostudio Architekci

Location: Poznań, Poland

Design Team: Bartosz Jarosz, Pawel Swierkowski, Agata Dziemianczyk, Miroslaw Wojcieszak, Bartosz Wojciechowski, Maciej Witczak, Agata Superczynska.

Area: 2098.0 sqm

Project Year: 2013

Photographs: Courtesy of Neostudio Architekci

Client: Academy of Physical Education in Poznan

Site Area: 49 576 m2

Architects: Neostudio Architekci

Location: Poznań, Poland

Design Team: Bartosz Jarosz, Pawel Swierkowski, Agata Dziemianczyk, Miroslaw Wojcieszak, Bartosz Wojciechowski, Maciej Witczak, Agata Superczynska.

Area: 2098.0 sqm

Project Year: 2013

Photographs: Courtesy of Neostudio Architekci

Client: Academy of Physical Education in Poznan

Site Area: 49 576 m2

The idea of form is based on the light (its ubiquity through-clock, variable lighting conditions) and the clarity of assumptions – referring to the bright, noble side of sports and competitive sports. Achieved through strong in expression, characteristic building.

The idea of space for the newly designed structure was to respect the existing situation of land through efficient handling of a form of expression and build it into a strong volume of the main building AWF.

The building structure was located based on the system of communication initiated by the teaching building perpendicular to building brand Leykam. Spatial design brief is the aim, in spite of extensive and diverse application program, to respect the urban assumptions campus while stressing the formal completion.

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Image © Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Photo: Courtesy Moreau Kusunoki Architectes

Project: Guggenheim Helsinki
Architect: Moreau Kusunoki Architects
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Winning competition: 2015
Budget: 130 000 000 €
Building area: 11 053 m²
Team: Tomoyo Arimoto (associated architect, competition stage 1); HLP (Loca architect); ARUP (Engineering); BOGNER.CC ( museum consultant); A insinoorit ( Cost estimate); KK paloconsultti (fire consultant); Theatrer projects ( Scenographer, acoustic); Franck Boutte ( environment consultant, competition stage 1)
Client: Solomon R.Guggenheim Foundation and the city of Helsinki
Environmental approach: charred wood facade, wood structure, dual-flow ventilation, insulation from the outside, triple glazing

Design concept:

“The design of the Guggenheim Helsinki and its woven landscape are based upon a sensitive and sympathetic approach to the context and nature of Helsinki. The design encourages people to flow within a new cultural core that is linked to the rest of the city, through the port promenade and the pedestrian footbridge to the Observatory Park. This flexible access welcomes not only the visitors but also serves as a key cultural destination for the community. 

The museum skyline is composed by independent volumes, highlighted by a landmark tower. These fragmented art exhibition spaces allow strong integration with outdoor display and events, while the lighthouse offers a new perspective over the city. This new museum concept together with the charred timber façade echoes the process of regeneration that occurs when forests burn and then grow back stronger.”

Moreau Kusunoki Architectes was founded by husband-and-wife team Nicolas Moreau and Hiroko Kusunoki in Paris in 2011. Kusunoki earned her architecture degree from the Shibaura Institute of Technology in Tokyo and began her professional career in the studio of Pritzker Prize laureate Shigeru Ban. Moreau studied at the Ecole Nationale d’Architecture de Belleville in Paris and worked in the studios of SANAA and Kengo Kuma. In 2008, Kusunoki and Moreau left Tokyo together and made the one-way trip to Europe so that Moreau could open Kengo Kuma’s office in France.

Although Moreau Kusunoki Architectes has been around for only a few years, the firm has a growing roster of projects. Their notable works include the Théâtre de Beauvaisis in Beauvais, the House of Cultures and Memories in Cayenne, the Polytechnic School of Engineering in Bourget-du-Lac, and the plaza for the Renzo Piano-designed Paris District Court at the Porte de Clichy.

Architect: Heatherwick Studio
Location: in West Yorkshire, England
Year: 2015
all image: Heatherwick Studio

Architect: Heatherwick Studio
Location: in West Yorkshire, England
Year: 2015
all image: Heatherwick Studio

One of Europe’s largest cancer hospitals, the St James’s Institute of Oncology, opened in Leeds in 2007. Maggie’s, an organisation which provides free support for people living with cancer, invited the studio to design a new centre within the hospital campus.

Although this is one of the largest centres to be built, the brief was to create a space that feels informal and domestic.

At the same time as being a quiet domestic space for its users on the inside, there was an opportunity for the building’s exterior to offer something positive and hopeful to people passing by.

Surrounded by the huge and complex medical machine for healing we wanted to capture the positive and therapeutic experience of plants and see if it could be possible to make a whole building out of a garden.

We wondered if we could make a building from containers, each holding a piece of garden. The design formed itself as a collection of garden pots defining a building by enclosing a series of spaces between them.

The individual pots and planting are of differing proportions bringing the planting into and over the building itself. The most private spaces are created within the containers themselves. Between them are only the minimum flat sheets of glass necessary to weather protect and enclose the internal space.

Architects: Felipe Assadi , Francisca Pulido 
Location: Los Vilos, Los Vilos, Coquimbo Region, Chile
Collaborator: Alejandra Araya
Project Year: 2014
Photographs: Fernando Alda

Architects: Felipe Assadi , Francisca Pulido 
Location: Los Vilos, Los Vilos, Coquimbo Region, Chile
Collaborator: Alejandra Araya
Project Year: 2014
Photographs: Fernando Alda

The house in Bahía Azul is a stance towards designing on a slope. 

Or rather, it is the synthesis of such a stance, a pavilion that is slanted to take in the slope of the hillside where it is located, with the program developed on several semi-levels that are internally related – horizontally, of course – taking into account that the house has two opposing readings: the interior, where life happens in a more or less conventional space, in which the views are arranged by a series of openings on an external wall to the enclosure of the house. 

And the exterior, in which the synthetic, abstract object, builds the place from the tension produced by the diagonal opposite to the irrevocable horizontality of the sea. The openings, from afar, acquire a different relevance than they would as mere windows.

They deform the object, turning it into a sort of ruin, without detail, accessories or further developments after the initial synthesis.

Source: Felipe Assadi , Francisca Pulido / Fernando Alda
m i l i m e t d e s i g n – W h e r e   t h e   c o n v e r g e n c e   o f   u n i q u e   c r e a t i v e s

Architects: OSA architettura e paesaggio

Location: Basilicata, Italy

Architects in Charge: Massimo Acito, Marco Burrascano, Luca Catalano, Annalisa Metta, Luca Reale, Caterina Aurora Rogai

Area: 630.0 sqm

Project Year: 2013

Photographs: Piermario Ruggeri, Pierluigi Barile

Collaborators: Francesco D’Ippolito, Ori Warshai, Marta Spadaro

Construction Site Manager: Valentina Silipo, Massimo Acito

Coordination: Astudio S.r.l.

Structure: Giovanni Ventura

Systems: Gennaro Loperfido, Mariapia Colella, Paolo Acquasanta

Consultant Interior Designer: Collezioni Design S.r.l.

Manager: Essentis Properties Group

Contractor: LP Matera Srl

The house is situated along the north-eastern slope of a hill that separates the Bradano and Basento rivers and slopes gently down to the lake of S. Giuliano covering a total area of 630 sqm on a plot of 7 hectares.

The quality of the context suggested the idea of preserving the orographic profile with volumes above ground following the natural contour of the slope, creating a timeless architecture in the rural landscape.

The site plan consists of a sequence of terraced areas and courtyards, in a spatial continuum between internal and external spaces. In the downhill terracing area two accommodations for guests are placed.

The strict geometries of the plant give rise to warm, inner domestic spaces; the volumes of services (bathrooms, storerooms, kitchen, laundry) define the rooms of the house that are arranged in succession along a linear path. All rooms enjoy a panoramic view over the lake below.

The distribution spaces are articulated in the rear area, mediating the relationship with the courtyards. Wide windows frame the landscape alternating with blind walls.

The concrete roof, ostentatiously exhibited soffit, rests on “bearing boxes” and serves as ordering element in the changing and articulated perspectives. The vegetation that covers it merges with the surrounding land reducing the visual impact until it is completely cancelled in the view from the top.

The correct exposure of the environment, the control of ventilation and daylight, the collection and reuse of rainwater, solar panels and the green roof help isolating and mitigating the internal microclimate ensuring sustainability aspects.

Architects: Bernard Tschumi Architects

Location: Rolle, Switzerland

Area: 10000.0 sqm

Project Year: 2014

Photographs: Iwan Baan

Design Team: Bernard Tschumi, Kate Scott, Joel Rutten, Christopher Lee, Jocelyn Froimovich, Bart-Jan Polman, Jerome Haferd, Paul-Arthur Heller, Clinton Peterson, Emmanuel Desmazières, Nianlai Zhong, Olga Jitariouk, Colin Spoelman, Kim Starr, Grégoire Giot, Dustin Brugmann, Taylor Burgess, Sheena Garcia, Sung Yu, Pierre-Yves Kuhn, Alison McIlvride, Jessica Myers

Local Architect : Fehlmann Architectes (Serge Fehlmann, Nicolas Engel, Christophe Faini, Julio Rodriguez, Julien Camandona, Jean-Jacques le Mao, Victor Goncalves)

Engineers (Schematic Design, Design Development): ARUP (Ray Quinn)

Mechanical and Plumbing, Structure : David Farnsworth, Michelle Roelofs

Acoustics: D’Silence Acoustique SA / Facades – Biff SA

Audiovisual, Lighting, Theater, Facades/ Envelopes Swiss Consultants (Execution):Mechanical, Plumbing Engineers – Sorane SA

Structural Engineers : Alberti Ingénieurs SA

Electric, Security, Fire Engineers: Scherler SA

Wood Conceptor / Engineer, Concert Hall : Schwab System SA

Site Surveyor Engineers : Bureau d’études D. Belotti

Geotechnical Engineer : Karakas et Français SA

Ground Engineers : Impact-Concept SA

The new building infuses the campus with a contemporary architectural image while nevertheless maintaining the qualities that have made the school a revered institution. How can it remain sufficiently abstract to avoid being caught in a formal battle with the existing surroundings? A further question pertains to the program requirements—a concert hall, music conservatory, art studios, learning center, black-box theater, library, offices, guest rooms, and so on. Should you scatter them around the site or will you find a common denominator among them?

We felt the various aspects of the program should intersect in one single place, and proposed a low-lying, flat dome—a metal envelope that seems to emerge from out of the landscape, shining by day and reflecting ambient campus light by night.

From the air, the dome appears as a distinctive object, but at ground level its curvature fits into the landscape. In plan, its shape recalls a rose or rosette—a fitting allusion for Le Rosey.

The aim of the distribution of activities is clarity and legibility. On arrival, the visitor encounters the main concert or performance hall, the conference rooms, and the black- box theater. To the left are ground-floor educational spaces. To the right is access to the learning center and the restaurant, which also has an independent entrance located near its terrace. A series of side openings articulates the periphery. A forecourt to the main entrance and the concert hall is located along the west facade.

Figure-ground studies in plan and section show the role played by solids and voids, objects in space, or spaces within objects in Carnal Dome.

Located at the center of a semi-spherical void, a complex solid object contains four rectangular voids: the concert hall, black-box theater, music rehearsal room, and library. The void between the dome and this central object is a dynamic space of movement and fluent exchange. In contrast, the four voids inside the central object are intentionally static.

The architectural concept articulates the building into three parts: first, the dome with its steel structure and stainless-steel outer envelope; second, the base with two carefully detailed concrete levels accommodating art studios, practice rooms, learning center, backstage, and all offices; and third, the wooden core containing the concert hall, black-box theater, music rehearsal room, and library.

Materials played a role in conceptualizing the project: the most important part of the program, the concert hall, fits under the dome and is clad inside and outside in pressed chipboard wood (OSB) panels to contrast with the metal outer envelope. This double- envelope strategy also helps isolate the concert hall acoustically, so as to mitigate noise from nearby rail lines.

Each material is expressed and detailed specifically to reinforce the concept of the wooden box under a steel dome. Glass is present only as a vertical separation between exterior and interior or public and private and (in alternatively transparent or reflective forms) as a screen.

Architects: SANAA

Location: 365 Lukes Wood Rd, New Canaan, CT 06840, USA

Architect in Charge: Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa

Design Team: Shohei Yoshida, Takayuki Hasegawa, Tommy Haddock

Area: 83000.0 ft2

Project Year: 2015

Photographs: Iwan Baan, Dean Kaufman

© Dean Kaufman

© Iwan Baan
© Iwan Baan

© Iwan Baan
© Iwan Baan

© Iwan Baan
Site Plan

Floor Plan
© SANAA

© SANAA
© SANAA

© SANAA
© SANAA

© SANAA
© SANAA

© SANAA

© SANAA

Landscape Architects: OLIN

Executive Architect: Handel Architects

Project Manager: Paratus Group

MEP Engineer and Lighting: Buro Happold

Structural Engineer: Robert Silman Associates

Civil Engineer: McChord Engineering

Sustainability Consultant: Transsolar

Building Envelope: Front

Glazing: Roschmann Steel & Glass

Roofing: Zahner

Acoustics: Harvey Marshall Berling Associates, Nagata Acoustics

Geotechnical Engineer: Langan Engineering

Geothermal Designer: Alderson Engineering

Meadow Consultant: Larry Weaver Landscape

Soils and Wetlands: Environmental Planning Services

Conservation Planning and Herpetologist: Michael W. Klemens LLC

Graphics: Pentagram

Project Description

Creation of a multipurpose building and landscape design for Grace Farms, an 80-acre natural environment in New Canaan, Connecticut that the non-profit Grace Farms Foundation is preserving as a gift of open space for people to experience nature, encounter the arts, pursue justice, foster community and explore faith. The facilities of the building will be made available by the Foundation to Grace Community Church and other select nonprofit and community groups, and will be the site for pub- lic amenities and programs ranging from coffee and tea service, discussions, intimate concerts and family-friendly art classes and athletics to a curated, multi-disciplinary series of cultural projects and events.

Landscape

Approximately 77 of the 80 acres of Grace Farms are being retained in perpetuity as open meadows, woods, wetlands and ponds. OLIN’s design preserves and enhances the existing habitat for native flora and fauna while integrating a community garden, athletic fields and a SANAA-designed playground and trails. Trees that were cleared for construction are being milled on site to construct the furniture for Grace Farms, including 18- foot-long community tables. Fifty-five 500-foot-deep geothermal wells have been drilled on the property for heating and cooling. Seventy percent of mowed areas will be returned to natural meadows by Larry Weaner Landscape Associates.

Architectural Directive

In its architectural brief, the Foundation asked for a venue of “cultural interest and curiosity via open space, architecture, art and design in order to provide people with an opportunity to:

1. Experience Nature: Our aim is to draw people into this beautiful landscape, to enhance one’s experience of nature through all five senses, and to allow nature itself to inspire in us an experience of awe.
2. Foster Community: We hope to provide a warm, welcoming environment that fosters personal relationships through passive and active, social and artistic activities.
3. Pursue Justice: We will offer resources and feature opportunities to improve lives by helping others, showing mercy and advancing justice together.
4. Explore Faith: We aspire to create an environment for reflection, study, discussion and worship.”

Architectural Concept

SANAA’s goal was to make the architecture of the River become part of the landscape without drawing attention to itself, or even feeling like a building, with the hope that those who are on the property will have a greater enjoyment of the beautiful environment and changing seasons through the spaces and experience created by the River.

Design Highlights

Nestled into the rolling landscape of Grace Farms, the River begins on a knoll and then flows down the long, gentle slope (a change in grade of 43 ft – 9 in) in a series of bends, forming pondlike spaces on its journey. Structurally, the building of glass, concrete, steel and wood is in essence a single long roof, which seems to float above the surface of the ground as it twists and turns across the landscape. The walkways, courtyards and glasswrapped volumes that form beneath the roof are remarkably transparent and invite people to engage with the expansive natural surroundings.

ARCHITECT: – Steven Holl Architects
Steven Holl (design architect)
Noah Yaffe (partner in charge)
Roberto Bannura (project director)
Xi Chen, Yu-Ju Lin (project architect)
George Grieves, Jing Han, Yun Shi, Wenying Sun, Yan Zhang (project team)
LOCATION: Shenzhen, China
SIZE: 428,447 sq ft
PROGRAM: art museum, library, public plazas
STATUS: competition

PROJECT TEXT
SITE STRATEGY: FORM PUBLIC SPACE
The design competition was for a new public library and museum on a site in a developing section of Shenzhen. Rectangular condominium towers already surround the site, which is next to a tram stop.

Our aim was to shape public space with two buildings connected below the plaza level.

CONCEPT: A THREE PART REMOVAL
The massing concept is a three part removal—the optimal museum typology for light and circulation is horizontal. From this horizontal mass we subtracted the volume of the library, forming a central courtyard for the museum and a figural shape for the library.

Subtracted from the central body of the library, the mechanical book block leaves a clear glass void cut marking the double front entrances facing east and west.

PHILOSOPHY OF SUBTRACTION
The museum experience is one of the visual and spatial richness of modern painting and sculpture. Here, the body moves through space; one takes in a long view, a middle view, and close up material views.

The library experience of reading a book in depth or studying multiple digital connections is a sit-down experience
of concentration. This subtractive form from the museum (A) has a depth relation to text as a form of knowledge in the library’s form (B).

The mechanically retrieved book stack has a similar depth of relation in the knowledge packed into the dense space of books. Therefore its figure (C) is subtracted from (B) and forms a public reading garden adjacent to the clear glass cut of its figural removal.

CONNECTION TO LINGNAN ARCHITECTURE CULTURE
The library shape is like the “Pot-ear“ Walls of Lingnan architecture.
A relationship with the sky and ground—an up and down curved profile that celebrates the sky—marks the library as a public building in contrast to the surrounding rectangular neighborhood.

Along the plaza edge of the museum is a polychrome arcade. Local granite stone pavers surround the reflecting pools which have laminated glass skylights that bring natural light to the spaces below the plaza.

CLIMATE / ENERGY
The solar photovoltaic cells on the museum’s roof tilt at an optimal angle facing due south collecting ninety-percent of the energy needed to operate the buildings. As the solar photovoltaic cells and their spacing are translucent, the
entire top floor galleries of the museum have a soft, filtered natural light.

The museum and library’s roof rainwater is collected in the recycled water of the plaza’s pools and is recirculated in the pools’ fountains. Geothermal cooling and radiant floors bring the entire complex a LEED Platinum rating.

The material of the museum is sanded marine aluminum with clear and Okalux glass providing soft light and only eighteen percent light transmission. The book block “T”s are of foamed aluminum.

Alejandro Aravena

Chicago, IL (January 13, 2016) — Alejandro Aravena of Chile has been selected as the 2016 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate, Tom Pritzker announced today. Mr. Pritzker is Chairman and President of The Hyatt Foundation, which sponsors the prize. The formal award ceremony for what has come to be known internationally as architecture’s highest honor will be at United Nations Headquarters in New York on April 4, 2016.

 UC Innovation Center – Anacleto Angelini, 2014, San Joaquín Campus, Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile. Photo by Nina Vidic.
Ale­jan­dro Ara­ve­na: Innovation and knowledge creation requires on the one hand, to increase the encounters among people, so openness is a desired attribute for its architecture; on the other hand, developments and inventions have to be protected, so security and ability to close and segregate are appreciated architectural conditions as well. We proposed a rather opaque construction towards the outside, which is also efficient for the Santiago weather and then have a very permeable architecture inside. Having the structure and the shafts on the perimeter of the building reverts the typical curtain wall building layout and concentrates openings in a very specific points in the form of elevated squares.

 UC Innovation Center – Anacleto Angelini, 2014, San Joaquín Campus, Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile. Photo by Nina Vidic.

 Novartis Office Building, 2015 (under construction), Shanghai, China. Photo by ELEMENTAL.
Ale­jan­dro Ara­ve­na: The office building in the Novartis Campus Shanghai seeks to provide spaces that encourage knowledge creation. The office spaces are designed to accommodate the different modes of work — individual, collective, formal and informal — and foster interaction between the users. Around a forest of Metasequoias, the ground floor accommodates the Fitness and Be Healthy Center which are part of the campus public level where users from the different buildings meet. The outside of the building responds to the local climate with a solid facade of reclaimed brick facing south, east and west. On the north facade, the building is open to let indirect light get inside the open office spaces.

Arauco Vivero. Nuevo Horcones, Chile 2015. Image © ELEMENTAL

Siamese Towers, 2005, San Joaquín Campus, Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile, University classrooms and offices. Photo by Cristobal Palma.
Ale­jan­dro Ara­ve­na: We were asked to do a glass tower. Glass is very inappropriate for Santiago’s climate, because it generates green house effect, even though it’s a nice material to resist rain, pollution and aging. So we thought of using glass for what it’s good, on the outside, then do another building inside with efficient energy performance and allow air to flow in between the two. Convection of hot air creates a vertical wind which is accelerated by the “waists” of the building by Venturi effect, eliminating undesired heat gains before they reach the second building inside.

St. Edward’s University Dorms, 2008, Austin, Texas, USA. Photo by Cristobal Palma.
Alejandro Aravena: We needed to accommodate 300 beds, some social areas and some services for the whole campus in a narrow lot. We thought of creating a plinth with the more public facilities to activate the ground floor, then the social areas carving the volume’s core and finally articulate the perimeter of the building as much as possible, increasing the linear meters of façade in order to guarantee views and natural light to each room. To be able to resist a tough environment we opted for a sequence of skins that are hard and rough in the outer layer and become softer and more delicate while moving towards the core.

 St Edward’s University Dorms. Austin, Texas, USA 2008. Image © Cristobal Palma

 Villa Verde Housing, 2013, Constitución, Chile. Photos by ELEMENTAL.
Alejandro Aravena: Arauco Forest Company asked us to develop a plan to support their employees and contractors so they could have access to home ownership, in the context of Chilean housing policies. This allowed us to work for the first time with the high end of housing policy. Given the greater availability of resources, instead of taking one of our less expensive housing units and delivering it more finished, we applied again the same principle of incremental housing, but with an initial and final growth scenario of a higher standard: these houses begin with an initial area of 57 m² and can grow up to 85 m².

  Monterrey Housing. Monterrey, Mexico 2010. Image © Ramiro Ramirez

 Medical School, Universidad Católica de Chile. Santiago, Chile 2004. Image © Roland Halbe

Constitución Cultural Center. Constitución, Chile 2014. Image © Felipe Diaz

 Mathematics School, Universidad Católica de Chile. Santiago, Chile 1999. Image © Tadeuz Jalocha

 Constitución Seaside Promenade. Constitución, Chile 2014. Image © Felipe Diaz

 Parque Museo “Humano.” Santiago, Chile 2014 – ongoing. Image © ELEMENTAL

Ocho Quebradas House, 2013 – ongoing, Los Vilos, Chile. Rendering by ELEMENTAL.
Alejandro Aravena: A weekend house is ultimately a kind of retreat where people allow themselves to suspend the conventions of life and go back to more essential living. … As architects, we have been trying to be as primitive as possible lately; in an era where the hunger for novelty is threatening architecture to become immediately obsolete, we are looking for timelessness. … We expect these pieces to age as a stone, acquiring some of the brutality of the place but still being gentle for people to enjoy nature and life in general.

 Las Cruces Pilgrim Lookout Point. Jalisco, Mexico 2010. Image © Iwan Baan

 Quinta Monroy Housing, 2004, Iquique, Chile. Photos by Cristobal Palma.
Top: Middle-class standard achieved by the residents themselves. 
Bottom: “Half of a good house” financed with public money.

 Bicentennial Children’s Park, 2012, Santiago, Chile. Photo by Cristobal Palma.
Ale­jan­dro Ara­ve­na: A four-hectare Children’s Park on a hillside, part of a program to celebrate the bicentennial of Chile.

 Ayelén School. Rancagua, Chile 2015. Image © ELEMENTAL

 Architecture School, Universidad Católica de Chile. Santiago, Chile 2004. Image © Martín Bravo

Writer’s Cabin, Jan Michalski Foundation. Montricher, Switzerland 2015. Image © +2 Architectes

Announcement

Alejandro Aravena of Chile receives the 2016 Pritzker Architecture Prize

He practices architecture as an artful endeavor in private commissions and in designs for the public realm and epitomizes the revival of a more socially engaged architect.


Chicago, IL (January 13, 2016) — Alejandro Aravena of Chile has been selected as the 2016 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate, Tom Pritzker announced today. Mr. Pritzker is Chairman and President of The Hyatt Foundation, which sponsors the prize. The formal award ceremony for what has come to be known internationally as architecture’s highest honor will be at United Nations Headquarters in New York on April 4, 2016.

The 48-year-old Aravena is an architect based in Santiago, Chile. He becomes the 41st laureate of the Pritzker Prize, the first Pritzker Laureate from Chile, and the fourth from Latin America, after Luis Barragán (1980), Oscar Niemeyer (1988), and Paulo Mendes da Rocha (2006).

Mr. Pritzker said, “The jury has selected an architect who deepens our understanding of what is truly great design. Alejandro Aravena has pioneered a collaborative practice that produces powerful works of architecture and also addresses key challenges of the 21st century. His built work gives economic opportunity to the less privileged, mitigates the effects of natural disasters, reduces energy consumption, and provides welcoming public space. Innovative and inspiring, he shows how architecture at its best can improve people’s lives.”

Aravena has completed remarkable buildings at the esteemed Universidad Católica de Chile in Santiago, including the UC Innovation Center – Anacleto Angelini (2014), the Siamese Towers (2005), Medical School (2004), School of Architecture (2004), and the Mathematics School (1999). These energy-efficient buildings respond to the local climate with innovative, efficient facades and floor plans and offer the users natural light and convivial meeting places. Currently under construction in Shanghai, China, is an office building for healthcare company Novartis, with office spaces designed to accommodate different modes of work — individual, collective, formal and informal. In the United States, Aravena has built St. Edward’s University Dorms (2008) in Austin, Texas.

Since 2001, Aravena has been executive director of the Santiago-based ELEMENTAL, a “Do Tank,” as opposed to a think tank, whose partners are Gonzalo Arteaga, Juan Cerda, Victor Oddó, and Diego Torres. ELEMENTAL focuses on projects of public interest and social impact, including housing, public space, infrastructure, and transportation. ELEMENTAL has designed more than 2,500 units of low-cost social housing. A hallmark of the firm is a participatory design process in which the architects work closely with the public and end users. ELEMENTAL is also known for designing social housing that they call “half of a good house,” in which the design leaves space for the residents to complete their houses themselves and thus raise themselves up to a middle-class standard of living. This innovative approach, called “incremental housing,” allows for social housing to be built on more expensive land closer to economic opportunity and gives residents a sense of accomplishment and personal investment.

In response to being named the 2016 Laureate of the Pritzker Architecture Prize, Mr. Aravena emailed: “Looking backwards, we feel deeply thankful. No achievement is individual. Architecture is a collective discipline. So we think, with gratitude, of all the people who contributed to give form to a huge diversity of forces at play. Looking into the future we anticipate Freedom! The prestige, the reach, the gravitas of the prize is such that we hope to use its momentum to explore new territories, face new challenges, and walk into new fields of action. After such a peak, the path is unwritten. So our plan is not to have a plan, face the uncertain, be open to the unexpected. Finally, looking at the present, we are just overwhelmed, ecstatic, happy. It’s time to celebrate and share our joy with as many people as possible.”

The 2016 Pritzker Architecture Prize Jury Citation states in part, “Alejandro Aravena has delivered works of architectural excellence in the fields of private, public and educational commissions both in his home country and abroad…. He has undertaken projects of different scales from single-family houses to large institutional buildings…. He understands materials and construction, but also the importance of poetry and the power of architecture to communicate on many levels.”

Aravena and ELEMENTAL have designed the Metropolitan Promenade (1997 – ongoing) and Bicentennial Children’s Park (2012), both in Santiago. After the 2010 earthquake and tsunami that hit Chile, ELEMENTAL was called to work on the reconstruction of the city of Constitución; their work there includes emergency relief work, a master plan, Villa Verde (incremental housing, 2013), and the Constitución Cultural Center (2014). Other works include a Montessori School (2001) in Santiago, Chile; “Chairless” furniture (2010) for Vitra in Weil am Rhein, Germany; Monterrey Housing (incremental housing, 2010) in Monterrey, Mexico; Las Cruces Pilgrim Lookout Point (2010) in Jalisco, Mexico; Calama PLUS master plan (2012 – ongoing) in Calama, Chile; Writer’s Cabin for the Jan Michalski Foundation (2015) in Montricher, Switzerland; and Ayelén School (2015) in Rancagua, Chile.

Alejandro Aravena is the Director of the Venice Architecture Biennale 2016, titled “Reporting from the Front,” set to open in May 2016.

The Chair of the Jury of the Pritzker Architecture Prize, Lord Peter Palumbo, said that, as the jury visited Aravena’s projects, they felt a sense of wonder and revelation; they understood that his is an innovative way of creating great architecture, with the best yet to come. Referencing John Keats’ poem “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer,” Lord Palumbo said, “Stout Cortez stared at the Pacific with eagle eyes, whilst the Pritzker jury felt like some watcher of the skies when a new planet swims into his ken: And although not silent upon a peak in Darien, they looked at each other with a wild surmise, captivated, stunned, and overwhelmed by the work of Alejandro Aravena and the promise of a golden future.”

Biography

Alejandro Aravena was born on June 22, 1967, in Santiago, Chile. He graduated as an architect from the Universidad Católica de Chile in 1992. In 1994, he established his own practice, Alejandro Aravena Architects. Since 2001 he has been leading ELEMENTAL, a “Do Tank” focusing on projects of public interest and social impact, including housing, public space, infrastructure, and transportation.

ELEMENTAL has built work in Chile, The United States, Mexico, China and Switzerland. After the 2010 earthquake and tsunami that hit Chile, ELEMENTAL was called to work on the reconstruction of the city of Constitucion, Chile. Aravena’s partners in ELEMENTAL are Gonzalo Arteaga, Juan Cerda, Victor Oddó and Diego Torres.

Alejandro Aravena is the Director of the Venice Architecture Biennale 2016. He was a speaker at TEDGlobal in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 2014. He was a member of the Pritzker Architecture Prize Jury from 2009 to 2015.

In 2010 he was named International Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects and identified as one of the 20 new heroes of the world by Monocle magazine. He is a Board Member of the Cities Program of the London School of Economics since 2011; Regional Advisory Board Member of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies; Board Member of the Swiss Holcim Foundation since 2013; Foundational Member of the Chilean Public Policies Society; and Leader of the Helsinki Design Lab for SITRA, the Finnish Government Innovation Fund. He was one of the 100 personalities contributing to the Rio +20 Global Summit in 2012.

Aravena was a Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (2000 and 2005); and also taught at Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia (2005), Architectural Association in London (1999), and London School of Economics. He has held the ELEMENTAL Copec Chair at Universidad Católica de Chile since 2006.

Author of Los Hechos de la Arquitectura (Architectural Facts, 1999), El Lugar de la Arquitectura (The Place in/of Architecture, 2002) and Material de Arquitectura (Architecture Matters, 2003). His work has been published in more than 50 countries, Electa published the monograph Alejandro Aravena; progettare e costruire (Milan, 2007) and Toto published Alejandro Aravena; the Forces in Architecture (Tokyo, 2011). Hatje-Cantz published the first monograph dedicated to the social housing projects of ELEMENTAL:Incremental Housing and Participatory Design Manual (Berlin, 2012) launched at the 12th International Architecture Exhibition of la Biennale di Venezia.

Jury Citation

Alejandro Aravena is leading a new generation of architects that has a holistic understanding of the built environment and has clearly demonstrated the ability to connect social responsibility, economic demands, design of human habitat and the city. Few have risen to the demands of practicing architecture as an artful endeavor, as well as meeting today’s social and economic challenges. Aravena, from his native Chile, has achieved both, and in doing so has meaningfully expanded the role of the architect.

Born in 1967, and practicing since 1994, Aravena has consistently pursued architecture with a clarity of vision and great skill. Undertaking several buildings for his alma mater, the Universidad Católica de Chile, including the Mathematics School (1998), Medical School (2001), the renovation of the School of Architecture (2004), Siamese Towers (2005) and more recently the UC Innovation Center – Anacleto Angelini (2014). Each building shows an understanding of how people will use the facility, the thoughtful and appropriate use of materials, and a commitment to creating public spaces to benefit the larger community. In the Angelini Innovation Center, the maturity of this architect is apparent. A powerful structure from a distance, it is remarkably humane and inviting. Through a reversal of convention, the building is an opaque concrete structure on the exterior and has a light filled glass atrium inside. With the mass of the building at the perimeter, the energy consumption is minimal. The interior has many places for spontaneous encounters and transparency that enables viewing activity throughout. Aravena has created a rich environment of lively, interesting and welcoming spaces.

Alejandro Aravena has delivered works of architectural excellence in private, public and educational commissions both in his home country and abroad, including the United States — a residence and dining hall at St. Edward’s University in Austin, Texas — and as far away as Shanghai, China for the pharmaceutical company Novartis. He has undertaken projects of different scales from single-family houses to large institutional buildings. In all his works, he approaches the task with a freshness and ability to start without any predetermined idea or form. He understands materials and construction, but also the importance of poetry and the power of architecture to communicate on many levels.

What really sets Aravena apart is his commitment to social housing. Since 2000 and the founding of ELEMENTAL, he and his collaborators have consistently realized works with clear social goals. Calling the company a “Do Tank,” as opposed to a think tank, they have built more than 2,500 units using imaginative, flexible and direct architectural solutions for low cost social housing. The ELEMENTAL team participates in every phase of the complex process of providing dwellings for the underserved: engaging with politicians, lawyers, researchers, residents, local authorities, and builders, in order to obtain the best possible results for the benefit of the residents and society. An understanding of the importance of the aspirations of the inhabitants and their active participation and investment in a project, as well as good design, have contributed to the creation of new opportunities for those from underprivileged backgrounds. This inventive approach enlarges the traditional scope of the architect and transforms the professional into a universal figure with the aim of finding a truly collective solution for the built environment.

The younger generation of architects and designers who are looking for opportunities to affect change, can learn from the way Alejandro Aravena takes on multiple roles instead of the singular position of a designer to facilitate a housing project, and by doing so, discovers that such opportunities may be created by architects themselves. Through this approach, he gives the profession of architect a new dimension, which is necessary to respond to present demands and meet future challenges of the field.

Alejandro Aravena epitomizes the revival of a more socially engaged architect, especially in his long-term commitment to tackling the global housing crisis and fighting for a better urban environment for all. He has a deep understanding of both architecture and civil society, as is reflected in his writing, his activism and his designs. The role of the architect is now being challenged to serve greater social and humanitarian needs, and Alejandro Aravena has clearly, generously and fully responded to this challenge. For the inspiration he provides through his example and his contributions to architecture and humanity past and future, Alejandro Aravena is the recipient of the 2016 Pritzker Architecture Prize.

Architects: de Jong Gortemaker Algra
Location: Bielsstraat 1, Utrecht, Netherlands
Project Team: Maurits Algra, Tycho Saariste, Karen Glandrup, Franke van den Broek, Mike Zelke
Area: 4480.0 sqm
Year: 2015
Photographs: Christian Richters

Client: ProRail Facility Management
General Contarctor: Visser & Smit Bouw
Project Management: Arcadis B.V.
Project Leadership : Humanagement
Steel Construction: Bentstaal

ProRail’s new train control centre in Utrecht is the dynamic heart of ProRail’s train services in and around Utrecht. The design by dJGA has specifically focussed on users; the main aim is to allow them to do their jobs as effectively as possible.

The train control centre has been given an identity that makes it immediately recognisable as a dedicated railway operation structure. Horizontal lines in the outer façade mimic the horizontal lines of the railway tracks and overhead wires. The dynamics of the railway yard are echoed by the exterior. The use of COR-TEN steel and glass results in an industrial and robust look & feel. The custom-made louvres give the building a completely unique appearance.

The shape of these louvres varies with the orientation. On the north side, where shading is not required, the louvres have a narrow and almost horizontal profile, gradually changing into a broad and steeply slanted profile on the south side, where intense direct sunlight during the summer is blocked and heat is reflected. This gradual change of shape creates a dynamic effect. Viewed from a passing train the façade appears to be moving.

The interior design is a contemporary reference to ProRail’s historical context. For example, the load-bearing structure of the building is exposed just like that of a classical railway bridge. The focus of the design is on the 100 employees who work at the train control centre. They must be able to perform their tasks as accurately as possible. The train control centre includes a signalling room measuring approximately 1,000 m². This is a large open space from which all employees have a view of the railway tracks and the surrounding area. A technical floor for ICT equipment is constructed below the signalling room. This approach ensures optimum operational flexibility as work can continue in the signalling room during maintenance and when modifications are implemented.

The interior climate control is based on sustainable principles. The orientation of the signalling room, the design of the outer façade, triple glazing, hybrid cooling machines and an “Energyroof+” (solar energy collector system in the roof) contribute to creating a comfortable working environment with a generous amount of daylight.

Architects: OMA

Location: Gorky Central Park of Culture and Leisure, ulitsa Krymskiy Val, 9, Moskva, Russia, 119049

Partner In Charge: Rem Koolhaas

Project Architect: Ekaterina Golovatyuk

Area: 5400.0 sqm

Project Year: 2015

Photographs: ilya ivanov

Project Team: Giacomo Cantoni, Nathan Friedman, Cristian Mare, John Paul Pacelli, Cecilia del Pozo, Timur Shabaev, Chris van Duijn

Additional Project Team: Yashin Kemal, Timur Karimullin, Federico Pompignoli, Marek Chytil, Salome Nikuradze, Boris Tikvarski

Local Architects: Form Bureau (concept phase), Buromoscow (construction phase)

Engineering: Werner Sobek

Scenography: dUCKS, Les Éclaireurs

Garage Museum of Contemporary Art is a renovation of the 1960s Vremena Goda (Seasons of the Year) restaurant, a prefabricated concrete pavilion which has been derelict for more than two decades. OMA’s design for the 5,400 m2 building includes exhibition galleries on two levels, a creative center for children, shop, café, auditorium, offices, and roof terrace. The design preserves original Soviet-era elements, including a mosaic wall, tiles, and brick, while incorporating a range of innovative architectural and curatorial devices.

Garage Museum of Contemporary Art was founded in 2008 at the Konstantin Melnikov designed Bakhmetievsky Bus Garage. Relocating from a semi-industrial neighborhood in the north of Moscow to one of the city’s best known public spaces (Gorky Park), Garage will address a much larger and diversified audience. 

Exposed to snow, rain, and sun since it was abandoned in the 1990s, the former Vremena Goda restaurant – once a popular destination in Gorky Park – has become a ruin without facades. Even as a ruin it preserves the “collective” aura of the Soviet era: it is a sober public space adorned with tiles, mosaics and bricks.

The building offers two levels of unobstructed open space that will be dedicated to exhibitions, organized around two circulation and service cores. museum programs occupy three levels, adapting to spatial and structural possibilities of the existing structure. The more fragmented spaces in the North Eastern part of the pavilion surrounding the main core primarily accommodate education and research programs. The large open spaces in the South Western part are dedicated to exhibitions, projects and events.

The building offers a wide range of interior conditions for the exhibition of art beyond the ubiquitous “white cube” and provides innovative curatorial possibilities, such as hinged white walls that can be folded down from the ceiling. They provide an instant white cube when an exhibition demands a more neutral environment, while the existing walls retain their brick and green tile cladding.

A 9×11-metre opening in the floor of the upper level creates a double height space (10 metres) for the lobby, allowing extra-large sculptures to be displayed. A public loop on the lower level will connect the bookshop, mediatheque, auditorium and a café, which is envisioned as an informal living room with Soviet era furniture.

The existing concrete structure is enclosed with a new translucent double layer polycarbonate façade that will accommodate a large portion of the building’s ventilation equipment, allowing the exhibition spaces to remain free. The facade is lifted 2.25 metres from the ground in order to visually reconnect the pavilion’s interior to the park.

The entrance to Garage Gorky Park is marked by two large facade panels that slide upwards to frame the art in the lobby’s double height space and provide a view through the building from the park. 

• Architects: loci anima
• Location: Angoulême, France
• Project Year: 2015
• Architect in Charge: Françoise Raynaud
• Client: Community of Greater Angoulême Agglomeration
• Photographs: Philippe Le Roy
• Project Director: Jonathan Thornhill
• Project Manager: Xavier Maunoury
• Construction Manager: Marine Bichot
• Structural and HVAC engineers: Grontmij
• Facade Engineers: Van Santen & Associés
• Environmental Engineers: Alto
• Landscape Architect: Exit
• Acoustic Engineers: Avel
• Security Engineers: Casso & associés
• Quantity Surveyor & Siteworks Direction: Grontmij
• Building Controler: Alpes Controle
• Site Coordination: Ouest Coordination
• Site Security: Socotec
• Environmental Consultant: Addenda
• Cost: 13,8 M€

In a context of the increasing use of virtual media, loci anima has delivered theAngoulême Alpha media library. Built on the site of a former industrial area in the north-east of the city, the Alpha media library brings added value to the Houmeau district, which is being radically overhauled, improving the social and cultural life of people in this area.  Its direct proximity to the railway station means that it is easily linked to all of the communes of Greater Angoulême (in time, a footbridge will provide direct access), but also to the world as a whole. For example, it is only natural that the Alpha has become the cornerstone of the comic festival and plays host to the public and journalists from all walks of life.

Inspired by the Scandinavian model, this building is concrete evidence of a new generation of cultural spaces where citizens are able to meet, to exchange, to learn, to relax, these famous «third places». Neutral and open to all, making no distinction in terms of age, this type of space seeks to erase socio-cultural differences and blur the boundaries between the public and the private, the collective and the individual. The “third place”, an idea developed in the early 1980s by the urban sociology professor Ray Oldenburg, is different from the “ first place’, the home, and the “second place”, the workplace.

In answering this question, Françoise Raynaud, founding architect of loci anima, uses vocabulary associated with childhood and with colour. She then designs a building with multiple facades, a “rose of views”, facing the important landmarks of Angoulême and that face each other from the earth and from the sky. Made up of ve coloured parallelepipeds, cleverly stacked one on top of the other, the media library, viewed from the highpoint of the city, forms an A for Alpha and for Angoulême. Each of these ve “worlds” which make up the edi ce is scalable and identi able by the colour-material of the metal of the celestial body that is associated with it. So, the world of “creating” is anthracite in reference to Saturn and to lead. The world of “understanding” recalls the moon and silver. The world of “imagining” is represented by Jupiter and bronze. The sun and gold are to be found in the world “from one world to another”. Finally, the world “manufacture” is red copper, paying homage to Mars.

Connotations of the imaginary world of childhood are also seen in the design and the furniture which is geometrical, fun and functional, responding to the different uses that the media library offers. Wooden frames around individual desks isolate the reader in an atmosphere that lends itself to concentration that at the same time, opens a window to the outside. Massive naturally lit tables encourage exchanges during group work. Indoor and outdoor seats are in the shape of extra-large objects, for example a safety pin or a peg, providing seating that is fun, friendly and modulable. The architect has freed up the space under the ceiling in the entrance hall by placing the large East staircase in levitation, creating, as soon as one enters the building, a space that each individual can colonise and own. Additionally, the spaces are extended outside with terraces or gardens, for indoor/outdoor living,  to make the most of natural light everywhere and to open up or close off the spaces depending on the heat levels and mount of light necessary or desired.

Based on the observation that the city dweller is increasingly cut off from nature and finds in the elements of life and nature a rich source of dreams and of pleasure, loci anima has, here again, created this building as a space for the living. Sun, air, plants, water and metal are all materials used in the construction of the project. Over and above the real and intrinsic performances of the building on environmental aspects (low energy consumption buildings), this way of seeing, which is specific to loci anima, instils a symbolic and sensitive dimension to the project. 

Architect: Kengo Kuma and Associates
Location: Vancouver
project commissioned: westbank corporation and Peterson
Year: 2016
Image: Kengo Kuma and Associates; v2com

Kengo Kuma và Associates đã tiết lộ kế hoạch đầu tiên của văn phòng Bắc Mỹ nhà chọc trời, một tháp cao cấp sử dụng hỗn hợp trên một trang web tiếp giáp với công viên Stanley  ở  Vancouver . Được biết đến như ‘Alberni bởi Kuma,’ tháp 43 tầng kết hợp nhà ở 181 với không gian bán lẻ và nhà hàng trong một thể tích thẳng có dấu bởi “sốt dẻo” trên hai bên. Những cong là thuộc tính chính thức quan trọng nhất của tòa nhà, trong khi một vườn rêu tại căn cứ của tòa tháp là tính năng không gian quan trọng nhất của nó. Dự án này được tổ chức bởi Westbank và Peterson , và là một phần của một nhóm các dự án kiến trúc quan trọng được phát triển bởi các cặp ở thành phố bờ biển phía tây.

“I have always wanted to have a project in Canada because of its closeness to nature,” says Kengo Kuma. “Typologically, this is a large-scale project in North America, a dream for any foreign architect. We have done towers, but not to this scale and level of detail.”

The building’s facade is a combination of anodized aluminum and glass panels to reflect neighboring structures and the sky. Wood panels are visible on the underside of extruded floor plates – where the facade has been “scooped” – creating patio spaces meant to act as open gardens and personal urban spaces. Wooden planks are also used for the floors within the building, adding similarities to other signature works by Kengo Kuma and Associates.

“In Japanese space, boundaries are considered mutable and transient,” says the architect. “This is always an important part of my work. In this project, the minimal glazing details and the layered landscaping blurs conventional boundaries to enhance the sense of continuity. The design celebrates the presence of nature in Vancouver.”

Architects: Herzog & de Meuron
Location: Tate Modern, London SE1, United Kingdom
Project Year: 2016
Photographs: Iwan Baan & Herzog & de Meuron

Opening on 17 June 2016, the new Tate Modern will be a model for museums in the 21st century. Designed by internationally renowned architects Herzog & de Meuron, a spectacular new building will add 60% more space and will open up the museum to the area around it. It will be Britain’s most important new cultural building for almost 20 years, and will complete the site’s transformation into an accessible public forum.

Tate Modern changed London when it first opened in 2000. Herzog & de Meuron transformed the derelict Bankside Power Station into a home for the UK’s collection of international modern and contemporary art, sparking local regeneration and creating a new landmark on the Thames. The power station’s original Boiler House was converted into galleries, learning studios and social spaces, while its Turbine Hall was turned into a huge open space for special commissions and events. Tate Modern quickly became the world’s most popular museum of modern art, attracting around 5 million visitors each year – more than double the number for which it was designed – while its collection grew to encompass a huge variety of art from around the world.


2016 marks the next phase in Tate Modern’s evolution, with the opening of a new 10-storey building to the south of the Turbine Hall on the site of the power station’s former Switch House. The new Switch House building is rooted in the cylindrical underground Tanks, each measuring over 30 metres across and providing the world’s first museum spaces dedicated to live art, installation and film. They form the physical foundations of the Switch House and the conceptual starting point for it, offering new kinds of spaces for a new kind of museum. Above them are three additional floors of world-class galleries with a wide palette of volumes, from intimate small-scale environments to dramatic top-lit spaces. They are complemented by extensive areas dedicated to learning and interpretation, as well as a new restaurant, bar and Members Room, topped with a public terrace offering 360-degree panoramic views of London. A new bridge across the Turbine Hall joins the existing Boiler House galleries on Level 4 to the new Switch House galleries, uniting both sides with the Turbine Hall at its heart.

The Switch House arranges the new spaces into a unique pyramid-shaped tower, with its concrete structure folding into dramatic lines as it rises. Reinterpreting the power station’s brickwork in a radical new way, it is clad in a perforated lattice of 336,000 bricks. This unique façade allows light to filter in during the day and to glow out in the evening, transforming a solid, massive material into a veil that covers the concrete skeleton of the new building. Thin vertical windows in the new galleries echo those in the Boiler House, while also allowing visitors to look out over the landscape or across the Turbine Hall. As visitors journey up through the Switch House, long horizontal windows are also cut across the façade to offer new views and reveal details of the brickwork. The resulting exterior creates both an iconic addition to the skyline and a unified Tate Modern. It also puts environmental sustainability at the heart of its design, with a high thermal mass, natural ventilation, solar panels and new green spaces.


Reuniting the team who developed the original Tate Modern, Herzog & de Meuron have worked with Vogt Landscape Architects and designer Jasper Morrison. Two new public squares are being developed around the site, while the footprint of the Tanks is echoed in a large terrace opening out from the new southern entrance. Specially-selected furniture by Jasper Morrison will complete the interior of the building, responding to its varied architecture from the galleries and concourses to the restaurants and bars. Tate Modern will also host a free display of Morrison’s designs to mark the opening this summer, and a book about the building will be published this autumn, edited by Nicholas Serota and Chris Dercon and featuring interviews with Herzog & de Meuron, Günther Vogt and Jasper Morrison.

600 Collins Street, Melbourne from Zaha Hadid Architects on Vimeo.

Location: Melbourne, Australia
Client: Landream, Australia
Architect: Zaha Hadid Architects
GFA: approx. 70,075m2
Height: 54 storeys, 178 meters
This mixed-use building in
Melbourne’s Central Business
District incorporates retail,
commercial and residential
components with diverse
apartment typologies and
designs.
Design: Zaha Hadid & Patrik Schumacher
Project Director: Michele Pasca di Magliano
Project Team:
Johannes Elias
Hee Seung Lee
Cristina Capanna
Sam Mcheileh
Luca Ruggeri
Nhan Vo
Michael Rogers
Gaganjit Singh
Julia Hyoun Hee Na
Massimo Napoleoni
Ashwanth Govindaraji
Maria Tsironi
Kostantinos Psomas
Marius Cernica
Veronica Erspamer
Cyril Manyara
Megan Burke
Ahmed Hassan
Local Architect: PLUS Architecture
Structural Engineering: Robert Bird Group
Building Services Engineering
and Sustainability: ADP Consulting
Planning Consultant: URBIS
Quantity Surveyor: WT Partnership
Facade Consultant: AURECON
Landscape Designer: OCULUS
Wind Engineering: MEL Consultants
Traffic Engineer: RATIO
Building Surveyor: PLP
Fire Engine: OMNII
Pedestrian Modelling: ARUP
Acoustics: Acoustic Logic
Land Surveyor: Bosco Jonson
Visualizations: VA

Located on the western boundary of Melbourne’s Central Business District (CBD), at the nexus between Collins Street and the Docklands, within an area of the city that is evolving into a new commercial precinct in its own right.

The Collins Street façade is comprised of an colonnade of sculptural, curved columns that supports a unique façade system. These solid elements embody the traditions inherent within finest examples of historic architecture in Melbourne’s CBD, yet reinterpret them in a contemporary solution that is driven by the building’s structural integrity and the logical division of its overall volume.

Evolving from the city’s very distinct urban fabric, the arrangement of the proposed tower takes inspiration from its mixed­use program, converting the building’s overall volume into a series of smaller stacked ‘vases’. Central to the concept is the break­down of the vertical volume by the design team to establish a coherent relationship between tower, podium and surrounding streetscapes.

In addition to housing a different programmatic element, each ‘vase’ gently tapers inwards to offer additional communal space at its base, inviting the interaction fostered at a street level to continue inside the podium, where a public amenities, retail and commercial spaces, as well as easily accessible civic spaces have been included to promote public engagement. A significant proportion of the ground level is given over to public realm, with external areas dedicated as a new plaza accessible 24 hours a day

The design improves the flow of pedestrian traffic and increases connectivity with existing transport infrastructure, which includes the adjacent Southern Cross railway station and existing tram network that runs parallel to the site.

The creation of a new pedestrian route that connects Collins with Francis Street, further alleviating pressure at the Collins/Spencer Street junction. 350 bicycle parking spaces and bays for electric vehicles and shared car clubs are included within the design.

A delicate filigree envelops the building, including the Francis Street service areas to ensure there is no sense of “back of house” to the surrounding areas. Designed to use 50 per cent less energy than a conventional mixed­use tower, this filigreed façade contributes to a reduction in the direct solar gain of the building and emissions. High performance glazing system, high efficiency central cooling, high efficiency lighting and grey­water reuse systems will be incorporated to reduce consumption of resources and further lower the emissions.

Architects: Studio MK27 – Marcio Kogan + Samanta Cafardo
Location: Guarujá, SP, Brazil
Author: Marcio Kogan
Co-Author: Samanta Cafardo
Project Team: Carlos Costa, Eline Ostyn, Laura Guedes, Mariana Ruzante, Mariana Simas, Oswaldo Pessano, Fernanda Neiva
Area: 805.0 sqm
Project Year: 2015
Photographs: Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Manufacturers: Antonangeli Illuminazione, B&B Italia, Baxter, Estudio Campana, Eumenes, Gervasoni, Jason Miller – Roll & Hill, Knoll, Paola Lenti, R&R Company

The project is located on the paulista shore in the region of the Rain Forest and the land has a mountainous topography with dense vegetation. The introduction of this house to this landscape has the objective of optimizing the connection between architecture and nature, privileging the view looking out to the ocean and the incidence of sunlight in the internal spaces.  Furthermore, the positioning of the house on the site obeyed the previously-open area in the vegetation.   

The main volume of the house is elevated from the ground and seems built into the topography.  The house, therefore, projects itself out from the mountain. The contact elements between the slope and the construction – as for example the wooden decks – were shaped to respect the existing land, thereby creating an organic interaction between nature and the architectural elements. In the part that it comes out of the mountain, the structure touches the ground with only two pillars.  

The 3 floors of Jungle House create a clear programmatic division for the project: the ground floor houses a large covered wooden deck, connected to a small room for the children; on the first floor there are six bedrooms – five of them with small verandas with hammocks – and a tv room; the third and last floor is the social area of the house, including a swimming pool, a living room and the kitchen.    

Thus, the architecture defined an inverted vertical organization of the program when compared to what is usually done in single-family houses: while the pool and the social areas are on the roof, the bedrooms are located on the floor below. The deck is on the ground floor- protected by the projection of the house – is an ample and generous space that configures a shaded shelter for the children to play.  The utility rooms are also located on this story.      

From the wooden deck on the ground floor starts the stairs to access the house volume that “interrupts” the concrete slab. Before entering the closed space, one passes an intermediary space, enveloped by concrete and which houses a luminous work by the artist Olafur Eliasson.  The interiors project sought to create a modern atmosphere, offering a cozy feeling necessary to remain in this tropical environment. 

The landscape recomposes the native species.  When one is in the house, the relationship with the surrounding vegetation occurs not only through the view but also through the plants that surround the wooden decks.  On the ground floor, you can stroll in the midst of trees; on the first floor, light enters filtered through the tree-tops; and on the roof, there is the vegetation with the ocean in the background.  

The architecture of the house privileged the use of exposed concrete and wood, as much in the interior spaces as well as the exterior.  The bedrooms have wooden sun-screens, small brises-soleil, mounted as folding doors that can be manipulated by the users according to the climactic needs.  

In the Jungle House, the project began with a transversal cut which allowed for the positioning of the pool to be semi-built-in to the slab thereby not losing any area on the floor below.  Furthermore, the infinity pool as well as the raised border relative to the height of the deck makes it such that the view and the landscape serve as an extension of the pool waterline. To lessen the height of the top floor and thus get an external proportion more horizontal to this volume, the floor in the living room was lowered by 27 cm relative to the external wooden deck.   

This last floor offers a spatial sensation which synthesizes the principles of the house: on one side, there is a deck which houses the hot tub and the sauna – where there is an intense relation between the architecture and the mountain and its vegetation; on the other side, a ground fireplace and the pool; in the center – between these two free spaces – is the living room open to both sides and with cross-ventilation.  This social space has a radical relation with nature, by means of both the view of the ocean as well as the proximity to the forest in the mountain.