Hasta La Ideas

American firm Studio Gang has unveiled plans for a tower in Los Angeles with a curvy exterior evocative of a rolling wave.

The tower is planned for 643 North Spring Street in Chinatown, and is the first LA project for the firm.

Reaching 26 storeys, the series of floor plates are shaped to give the building its figure-eight footprint. Exteriors walls made from glass will curve diagonally across the floors.

In front of the glazing, a collection of terraces will wrap around the building and provide views of the city and mountains.

643 North Spring Street is designed to link Chinatown and the recently opened LA State Historic Park to Union Station and the El Pueblo neighbourhood.

“This project transforms a parking lot and commercial strip into an architecture that opens up the potential of the site to connect neighbourhoods,” said Studio Gang founder Jeanne Gang.

Public plazas are incorporated into the design with foliage and green pathways. They are planned to be along both Spring Street and New High Street.

“Responding to the growing needs of the city, we designed the footprint to enable new generous outdoor public space at ground level while simultaneously creating a curved upper volume to capture views, light, and air for the building’s inhabitants,” said Gang.

The mixed-use tower has a narrow footprint and is planned to be approximately 55 feet (17 metres) wide, taking up most of the property.

The LA project will include roughly 300 rental apartments, ranging from studios to three-bedroom apartments. All of the residences will share amenities with a 149-room hotel inside the building, including communal terraces on the second and third levels, along with a rooftop lounge.

Retail spaces will occupy the ground floor, on the north and east sides, while underground parking is also planned.

The mixed-use tower will be built in collaboration with a local development firm, Creative Space, as well as European brand MOB Hotel.

“MOB Hotel’s mission to encourage cooperative living, shared amenities include a gym, coworking spaces, rentable private offices, pop-up stores dedicated to young creators, a rooftop swimming pool and bar, and spaces for outdoor cooking and dining,” said a statement.

Studio Gang is an American architecture and urban design firm with offices in Chicago, New York, and San Francisco. Other projects designed by the studio include an angular glass tower near the High Line in New York City, as well as a high-rise for St Louis, Missouri with hundreds of cornered edges from its slanted exterior walls.

Studio Gang also revealed plans for a 51-storey residential tower in Brooklyn with a rippled concrete exterior earlier this week.

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A low-lying slender form, an overhanging roof and sliding glass doors are among the modernist-influenced features at this Indianapolis residence by architecture studio Deborah Berke Partners.

When designing North Penn House for a family, the New York-based firm form drew on elements found in modernist dwellings built in the surrounding area during the 1950s and 1960s.

The design also responds to the property’s secluded wooded setting at the top of a hill, which leads down at the back to a meadow.

“We conceived of the house as a long low volume with a big roof that would define the edge of the slope and allow the family to inhabit this overlook and feel intimately connected to the surrounding trees and meadow,” said Deborah Berke Partners principal Noah Biklen.

The simple, slender, single-storey form takes cues from its mid-century neighbours, while dark zinc cladding helps blend in with the hues of the surroundings. Floor-to-ceiling glass doors are slotted into the central portion, opening up views from the main living area to the outside.

At the rear, these doors slide open onto a terrace and the roof cantilevers above to offer shade. On the other side, it projects to rest on slim columns, commonly used in mid-century designs and known as pilotis. Rectangular openings puncture the roof to allow natural light to access a bed of plants underneath.

While the open-plan living, kitchen and dining room occupies the middle glazed section, private functions like bedrooms are placed in the areas either side. Windows from these rooms face the rear to maintain privacy.

“The design of the house balances literal transparency — where the public rooms of the house connect to the expansive landscape beyond — with privacy, so each of the bedrooms has a view to the outside that is quite focused,” said studio founder Deborah Berke.

In the living area, the architects inserted two volumes clad in locally-sourced pine. A fireplace is built into one of these and the other houses the kitchen, featuring white cabinets that contrast a blue tiled wall.

These boxes “bookend” the lounge and dining room, where limestone flooring extends from the inside to the patio outdoors.

Mid-century furniture is mixed with contemporary designs by Lindsey Adelman, Montis, BDDW, and Chadhaus, finishing the space in a warm palette of leather, wood and brass intended to reference the huses outside.

“The colours and materials of the interiors draw on the architecture and the environment,” said senior principal Caroline Wharton Ewing. “It’s an indoor-outdoor family house, and the living room is really the heart.”

The firm split the rest of the spaces to create separate areas for the parents and the children. The adult’s section occupies the northern end, and includes a master bedroom that opens onto a patio, two bathrooms, dressing rooms and offices. Three rooms and a den are set on the southern side in the children’s section.

Deborah Berke, who currently serves as dean of architecture at Yale University, set up the New York-based firm in 1982. The practice recently completed another residence in the Hamptons that has two workout areas.

Indianapolis is the capital of US state Indiana, which is a treasure trove for mid-century modern architecture. Both the cities of Columbus and Fort Wayne boast several notable examples of the style.

Photography is by Chris Cooper, Glint Studios and Kevin Miyazaki.

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MINI has teamed up with London architecture firm Studiomama to build a series of tiny, pastel-toned living spaces, each designed to suit a different character.

Installed inside a former factory for Milan design week, MINI Living – Built By All comprises four compact living spaces that are all tailored towards different lifestyles.

The aim is to show how even the most basic of homes could be adapted to better suit its owner.

“Today’s standardised housing market is limited in its ability to meet the requirements of the individual,” explained Oke Hauser, creative lead for MINI Living.

“We believe that ultimately the quality of a living space is determined by how well the residents identify with their home,” he said. “MINI Living – Built By All turns people into active creators and puts them at the heart of the design process.”

MINI Living is an initiative set up by the automotive company to explore the future of city living. MINI has previously worked with a range of architects and designers, including Asif Khan and Sam Jacob, to create experimental installations.

For this installation, the company asked Studiomama founder Nina Tolstrup to explore the “creative use of space”. The results are four capsule homes that match in size, but feature contrasting colours, layouts and furnishings.

A lemon-yellow unit features shelves lined with decorative objects and an assortment of plants, designed to suit a botanical illustrator, while the pink unit accommodates a studio for a pattern cutter, featuring ample storage for textiles and a functional workstation.

The blue unit is designed for a music producer, so features a sound-proof recording room and shelves that are perfectly sized to hold records. And the final unit, which is green, is adapted to accommodate a pottery collector.

The space also features a range of communal facilities, including a large turquoise kitchen and dining area, a gym and a cinema space.

MINI describes the installation as a “living micro-neighbourhood in an old factory hall”. The idea is that this type of setup could be created inside large unused buildings, to help alleviate the housing crisis affecting many of the world’s cities.

Each unit features curtains and screen with different levels of transparency, so occupants have control over their privacy.

“MINI Living provides creative solutions for collaborative urban living on a small footprint, but offering many possibilities and a high degree of flexibility,” said Esther Bahne, head of brand strategy and business innovation for MINI.

The exhibition also features a space called the Factory of Ideas, where visitors can make a model of their own miniature living space from colourful blocks.

MINI launched its MINI Living project in 2016 – and has since teamed up with Dezeen on a range of movies exploring the theme. This is the third installation the brand has created in Milan, following previous designs by SO-IL and On Design.

The brand’s first permanent project is currently being built in Shanghai.

MINI Living – Built By All is on show at Via Tortona 32 from 17 to 22 April for Milan design week.

Today, 20 April 2018, Dezeen will be hosting a panel discussion in the space with Nina Tolstrup and Oke Hauser, as well as Mario Minale of Minale-Maeda and Design Academy Eindhoven creative director Joseph Grima. It will be available to livestream via our Facebook page from 6pm.

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