An intricate three-dimensional lattice of narrow timber slats forms a cloud-like mass around the exterior of this pineapple cake shop in Tokyo by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma (+ slideshow).
Kengo Kuma and Associates was asked by cake brand SunnyHills to come up with a shop design that mirrors the careful preparation of the company’s trademark pineapple cakes, so the architects developed a volume modelled on a well-crafted bamboo basket.
Over 5000 metres of wooden strips were used to construct the precise 3D grid that wraps around around the outer walls and ceiling of the three-storey building. Some pieces were cut shorter than others, revealing multiple layers and reducing the overall linearity.
“Our aim was to create a forest in the busy city centre,” said Kengo Kuma. “We studied how lighting states would change in a day in the woods, and came up with a shape like a basket.”
The narrow slats are arranged at angles of 30 and 60 degrees, creating hundreds of diamond-shaped hollows, and were assembled by local Japanese craftsman.
“I consider that wood joints without glues or nails are the essence of Japanese architecture,” added Kuma. “What is characteristic about SunnyHills is the angle of the lattice; unlike the conventional 90 degrees, we tried 30 degrees and 60 degrees to combine the pieces.
“By designing with these varied angles, we were able to achieve a shape and a frame that evokes a forest,” he added.
An opening at one corner leads visitor into the shop, which occupies the two lower floors of the building. An assortment of differently sized staircase treads form a route between the two floors and are flanked by sprouting foliage.
Cork tiles provide flooring on the first floor, where the architects have also added a kitchen. The cork surface continues up to the level above, which houses a meeting room and staff office.
Here’s a project description from Kengo Kuma and Associates:
SunnyHills at Minami-Aoyama
This shop, specialised in selling pineapple cake (popular sweet in Taiwan), is in the shape of a bamboo basket. It is built on a joint system called “Jiigoku-Gumi”, traditional method used in Japanese wooden architecture (often observed in Shoji: vertical and cross pieces in the same width are entwined in each other to form a muntin grid). Normally the two pieces intersect in two dimensions, but here they are combined in 30 degrees in 3 dimensions (or in cubic), which came into a structure like a cloud. With this idea, the section size of each wood piece was reduced to as thin as 60mm×60mm.
As the building is located in middle of the residential area in Aoyama, we wanted to give some soft and subtle atmosphere to it, which is completely different from a concrete box. We expect that the street and the architecture could be in good chemistry.
Belgian studio Atelier Tom Vanhee has converted a former school building in the village of Woesten into a community centre and added a white gabled extension that appears to be sliding out of the original brick facade (+ slideshow).
Atelier Tom Vanhee was asked to transform the former school building into a community centre for the inhabitants of Woesten, and extended it to provide additional meeting rooms and storage space.
The architects retained a small recently built extension housing the toilets and built a new wooden structure around it, which has the same profile as the brick building it adjoins.
“The extension is a volume that is slid out of the building,” architect Tom Vanhee told Dezeen. “A volume with the same typology as the existing building, as a lot of houses, and as the blind facades of other buildings in the environment.”
Timber was chosen for the frame of the new addition because of its sustainable credentials, with vertical slatted wooden panels covering one facade continuing across the roof.
The gable ends of the extension are covered in white polycarbonate that accentuates the contrast between the new and old parts of the building.
“We chose to give the extension a different materialisation than the existing building to make it readable,” said Vanhee. “The polycarbonate gives a good expression of sliding out of the building.”
A larger staircase and entrance are incorporated into the new structure to improve the connection between the different spaces.
A skylight installed on the pitched roof of the brick building fills this space with natural light and internal windows allow it to reach the event space and meeting room on the ground floor.
Facilities in the earlier extension were updated to meet modern standards for insulation, fire safety and accessibility, and a new room in the enlarged attic now houses the building’s heating and ventilation services.
The slatted timber panelling from the facade recurs inside the extension, where it is used to clad the staircase. Original timber beams supporting the ceiling of the brick building have also been retained.
The original school hall has been enlarged by removing an existing stage, while new doors connect it to the landscaped outdoor spaces.
Paving extends along one side of the building to a small patio that is sheltered by the projecting facade of the extension.
Atelier Tom Vanhee, which recently changed its name from room&room, has also created a community centre in nearby Westvleteren by updating existing brick buildings using a contrasting modern brick.
The building is accessible by a central binding public domain, the playground of the former school (built in the 19th century). By opening some windows further down we reinforce the relationship between interior spaces and this square. By doing the same at the other site of the building, the back area is activated as a green semi-public space linked with the meeting hall. The closed functions, the storeroom, the technical areas and the sanitary facilities are grouped in a partially extended volume.
It is a rejuvenation of the building, where the recent sanitair extension gave rise to. This slider movement brings light in the heart of the meeting centre and gives more space at the central entrance hall. Internal windows overlook this hall and spread the light into the adjacent spaces. The other rooms have an open character, and can be used fully for the activities of the meeting centre: kitchen, meeting room, meeting hall, drawing Academy, concerts. The attic is elaborated for what is needed to use the building today. Further inside extension is still possible in the future.
Materials are chosen by the score at their circle of life analysis. The used wood is FSC-labelled: the structure of the extension (floors, walls and roof), the structure of the light interior walls, the windows, the façade coping and its structure, extra wooden bars for floors and for fixating, isolation. We used fibre boards for the interior walls, Celit and OSB for the extension.
The toilets are supplied with recycled rain water. The lights are energy efficient. The heating system recuperates the heat of the evacuating gases. The ventilation system recuperates the heat of the dirty removed air. We took care of better isolation : we changed all windows in high isolating glass, the roofs, floors and new walls are isolated. By the renovation, the building gets back a central role in the community It brings the public return the local authority was looking for.
Project: renovating a former school as a community centre Location: Woestendorp 44, 8640 Woesten Client: municipality Vleteren, province West-Vlaanderen Concept team: atelier tom vanhee met ontwerpgroep Study of stability: S.C.E.S., Brugge Bruto surface: 629 m² Concept: 2009 – 2010 Execution: 2011 – 2012
The brief asked designers to explore two options for the building: to retain it as a stand-alone library or to extend upwards and convert it into a mixed-use complex. The architects will now work together with library staff to decide the best approach.
“My dream is that people will start to love this building so much that they even bring their books from home to read in the library,” said Mecanoo principal Francine Houben, during the design presentation.
She continued: “We will pay respect to Mies van der Rohe and research what is possible to prepare this building for the library of the future. But most important is bringing out the values of Martin Luther King. My dream is to make this building to reflect his ideals.”
Ten architects were originally shortlisted for the project, including OMA and SOM, and the list was whittled down to three at the end of 2013.
The Rotsee rowing regatta takes place every summer on a lake outside Lucerne, Switzerland, and this wooden tower raised over the water accommodates the officials who observe, time and marshal each race (+ slideshow).
Designed by Swiss studio Andreas Fuhrimann Gabrielle Hächler Architekten, the Zielturm Rotsee, or “finishing tower”, is to be used for just three weeks of every year when Rotsee lake becomes the venue for the final leg of the World Rowing Cup.
The three-storey pine structure sits over a concrete pier that projects out across the still waters of the lake – nicknamed “Lake of Gods” by rowers in reference to the almost imperceptible current due to the protection of surrounding hills.
Wooden shutters fold and slide away from the facade to reveal windows and balconies that can be used as viewing platforms during races. The rest of the time they can be locked shut, turning the structure into an opaque wooden cuboid.
“[The building] usually remains closed and stands still on the reflecting water surface, transformed in an enigmatic sculpture-like house, with its shutters closed,” explained the architects.
The three storeys of the building are connected by staircases both inside and outside, and each floor is slightly offset from the one below.
“By subtle offsets of the three levels, the volume seems fragile and delicate, despite its considerable volume,” said the architects.
The building was prefabricated using a specially treated pine that will absorb less water, making the structure more stable and durable.
Zielturm Rotsee was used for the first time in 2013 and replaces another structure that had lasted for 50 years.
The topographical situation on the Rotsee-Delta is a unique landscape, embedded in between two hill chains the lake is very calm. Through its ideal character for rowing regattas the lake is called the “Lake of Gods” amongst rowers.
The requirements for the new finish tower were various and complex. Based on its function and the surrounding landscape the main aim was to create identity. By stacking the spacial units, the vertical volume achieves a point of reference on the wide horizontal plane of the Rotsee. By subtle offsets of the three levels, the volume seems fragile and delicate, despite its considerable volume.
The finish tower is part of the first phase of the Naturarena Rotsee area development. The opening of the rowing centre is scheduled for July 2016. The finish tower and the future rowing centre will form one architectural ensemble, perceivable by the mutual materialisation, constructive and aesthetic themes. The three-storey high, prefabricated wood construction is carried by a pillared concrete platform above the water level.
The statically active concrete platform provides access to the tower from the water and the shore. In combination with the stairway on the rear, but no less prominent facade of the building, the concrete structure anchors the building close to the lakeshore. This allegorises the hybrid character of the building, being a functional active building on one side and a sculpture in the lake on the other.
While the building is in use only during the rowing regattas, three weeks every summer, it usually remains closed and stands still on the reflecting water surface, transformed in an enigmatic sculpture-like house, with its shutters closed. This metamorphosis taking place every year was the ambitious challenge in designing the finish tower.
An architectural manifestation for this prominently situated finish tower in the picturesque landscape is necessary in order to find the balance between the practical functional and the sculptural-aesthetic requirements.
The aesthetic impression of the tower is emphasised once the building is closed and the sliding shutters are retracted. The large-sized sliding shutters give the facade a relief-like expression and let the tower appear plastic and house related.
Similar to a classical sculpture, the tower changes its appearance depending on the position of the observer and blends into the surrounding natural landscape, influenced by the constantly changing days and seasons. The intrinsic, however abstract form has a strong recognition value, and therefore conveys identity for the rowing sport; illustrating the function of the building, the context related access of the tower and the stacked units.
The functional units OK-FISA, Jury-Timing and Event-Speaker are axially arranged with the finish line, one above the other. Whilst the shorter facade is pointing towards the finish line, the longer facade is facing towards the finish area indicating the end of the sports ground.
The wooden construction of the finish tower consists of prefabricated elements, in order to build cost- and time-efficient. The wood used for the facade is a specially treated pinewood, from sustainable forests. A innovative method using pressure, heat and acetic acid brings the wood to reaction so that the ability of absorbing water can be reduced essentially, making the wood dimensionally stable and extremely durable.
Belgian studio Atelier Tom Vanhee has renovated and extended the brick buildings of a community centre in the village of Westvleteren using a contrasting contemporary brick (+ slideshow).
The site was originally occupied by a disparate cluster of buildings including a nineteenth century school building, a former town hall, a library and a youth club, which the local council asked Atelier Tom Vanhee to transform into a more practical space for community activities.
The poor condition of the facilities and lack of an obvious entrance or consistent elements unifying the buildings led the architect to propose a range of renovations, with brick acting as a common material.
“We used brick because the existing buildings were already a patchwork of different renovations from the past hundred years,” architect Tom Vanhee told Dezeen. “We thought it was beautiful and that we could strengthen this by adding a modern brick.”
The facade of the renovated activity hall shows evidence of former doors and windows that have been removed and filled in with new bricks. An extension made from the same brick replaces the building’s old gabled roof and incorporates new windows.
“The things we changed we filled in with bricks so you can see what we did,” Vanhee explained. “It also relates to the historical renovations that you can see elsewhere in the site.”
To create a more obvious and practical entrance for the community centre the architects removed a derelict storage building and extended the space housing a small concert hall to create a corner enclosing a courtyard that can be used for outdoor events.
A glass and steel box projecting from the brick wall signals the new entrance, which leads into a space that connects the previously separate facilities of the centre.
The windows running along the upper section of the white-painted activity room’s wall fill the space with light and provide views of the nearby church.
Materials throughout the interior were chosen based on their sustainable credentials, including FSC-certified timber used for the staircase and the highly insulated new windows.
The architects also added a green roof that reduces heat from solar gain in the summer and prevents any damage to the ceiling from heavy rainfall.
The meeting centre offers accommodation to various community activities. The complex of buildings consists of successive constructions, ranging from a 19th century school building and an old town hall to an industrial construction from the 1990s.
The dilapidated storage building makes place for enlargement of the meeting hall. That way the back yard becomes an outdoor space for the party room. The gabled roof is replaced by a single slope roof, making the room and space higher, and bringing a better acoustic sound in the hall. The high windows bring light and give views on the nearby church.
A central entrance in the armpit of the building complex offers the building an address. The entrance hall connects the different functions and spaces. The use of different types of bricks betray the successive renovations in the past. The new added walls in contemporary bricks build in the recent renovation strengthens the patchwork of different bricks. The meeting centre is so adapted to the modern requirements, with respect for the environment and the users, but also with a whimsical character.
A green roof keeps the meeting hall cool in summer, increases the sustainability of the epdm membrane of the roof, and constitutes a buffer for heavy rainfall. The new toilets are supplied with recycled rain water from the existing buildings.
Materials are chosen by the score at their circle of life analysis. The used wood is FSC-labelled : the structure of the light interior walls, the windows, extra wooden bars for floors and for fixating isolation. We used fibre boards. The lights are energy efficient. The heating system recuperates the heat of the evacuating gases. We took care of better isolation: we changed all windows in high isolating glass, the roofs or ceilings, the floors and new walls are isolated.
This concrete Second World War bunker in Hamburg has been converted into a renewable energy plant and visitor centre by urban development company IBA Hamburg (+ slideshow).
IBA Hamburg restored and expanded the 42-metre-high ruined concrete shell, which had remained unoccupied since the end of the war. Working with German energy firm Hamburg Energie, the company transformed the bunker into a plant that provides heat and electricity to the surrounding neighbourhood.
Photograph by Bernadette Grimmenstein
“After standing empty for more than sixty years, followed by a seven-year project development and construction phase, this war monument has been transformed into a sign of the dawn of a climate-friendly future,” said IBA director Uli Hellweg.
Photograph by Martin Kunze
The imposing structure is circled by a balcony towards the top, above which sits four cylindrical forms at each corner that are connected by the cantilevered ledge. A public cafe that spills out onto the balcony through a glass wall and an event space were also added on the upper level.
Photograph by Bernadette Grimmenstein
To make the building safe to occupy, concrete was sprayed onto the disintegrating facade to stabilise it and thermal insulation was added to keep the cafe warm. Inside, the bombed floor slabs were removed and replaced plus an elevator and staircases were added.
Photograph by Martin Kunze
A two-million-litre water reservoir sits at the centre of the structure, acting as large heat buffer. This is fed by heat from a biomass thermal power plant, a wood burning unit, a solar thermal system on the roof and waste heat from a nearby industrial facility. The heat is redistributed to surrounding buildings in the district.
Photograph by Martin Kunze
Rows of photovoltaic panels covering the south facade and a thermal power station feed power into the electricity grid. The cafe contains an interactive monitor that displays current energy production data and visitors can take guided tours around the plant.
Photograph by Bernadette Grimmenstein
The bunker has been supplying energy to Hamburg’s Reiherstieg district for a year and the public facilities opened six months ago.
Here’s some more information from IBA Hamburg:
Energy Bunker: World First in Heat and Electricity Supply
From a war memorial to a green power plant: the Energy Bunker in Hamburg-Wilhelmsburg, created by HAMBURG ENERGIE and the International Building Exhibition IBA Hamburg, is the first project of its kind in the world. For exactly a year the Energy Bunker has been supplying heat energy to the residential buildings in the surrounding area. Six months ago it opened to visitors and has become a major attraction. The development of this remarkable joint project is now complete and is being celebrated with an opening ceremony and the unveiling of two plaques.
Photograph by Bernadette Grimmenstein
“Today we are here to mark a project that encapsulates the philosophy of the IBA Hamburg more than any other,” said IBA director Uli Hellweg. “After standing empty for more than sixty years, followed by a seven-year project development and construction phase, this war monument has been transformed into a sign of the dawn of a climate-friendly future. Not only does it produce clean energy to supply the district, but also demonstrates how local resources can be used to produce and store heat. With its viewing platform, permanent exhibition, and café, the Energy Bunker also makes an appealing visitor attraction. Almost 100,000 people have visited the Energy Bunker so far.”
Photograph by Bernadette Grimmenstein
Dr Michael Beckereit, director of Hamburg Energie, said, “The Energy Bunker has been supplying heat energy since October 2012, and since March 2013 it has also been providing electricity. Its performance and network are gradually being extended. By the final stage of expansion we will be supplying 3,000 households with heat from the Bunker and generating over 2.5 million kilowatt-hours of electricity.”
Photograph by Bernadette Grimmenstein
At the heart of the project is a two-million-litre water reservoir that acts as a large heat buffer inside the Energy Bunker, and serves as the centre of a local heating network for the Reiherstieg district. The reservoir is fed by the heat from a biomass thermal power plant and a wood burning unit, as well as a solar thermal system on the roof. This is supplemented by the waste heat from a nearby industrial plant. By bringing these different sources of energy together in an effective way, the Energy Bunker is able to supply the adjacent Global Neighbourhood with heat, and in future will be capable of providing heat to most of the Reiherstieg district. At the same time it feeds into the public grid green electricity from the thermal power station and the photovoltaic unit fitted to the south façade.
Diagram of the Energiebunker
History of the Energy Bunker
The 42-metre-high flak bunker on Neuhöfer Strasse was built during World War II. After the end of the war this concrete behemoth could not be blown up without endangering nearby tenements, so the British Army restricted itself to destroying the interior. On the outside, however, the bunker remained more or less intact. From then on, the ruin stood in the middle of the residential area, largely unused and in danger of collapsing. In 2006 the conceptual planning for converting the building into an Energy Bunker began, and 2010 saw the first static tests carried out. Safety, restoration, and conversion tasks on the bunker could only begin in 2011. The total cost of the work amounted to €26.7 million. As a flagship project, it was funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Hamburg Climate Protection Concept.
The clients are the IBA Hamburg (restoration and expansion of the building) and HAMBURG ENERGY (energy supply). As part of a joint opening ceremony Uli Hellweg and Dr Michael Beckereit have now unveiled the IBA plaque and the ERDF sign.
The Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic Games get underway this Friday with an opening ceremony inside a Fabergé egg-inspired stadium by sports architecture firm Populous.
The Fisht Olympic Stadium is one of 11 new purpose-built venues designed for the 2014 winter games in Sochi, Russia, by Populous – the firm behind the London 2012 Olympic stadium – and it forms the centrepiece of the 200-hectare Olympic Park.
The building features a temporary shell-like roof based on the jewel-encrusted Fabergé eggs that have become an icon of Russian culture. Constructed from translucent polycarbonate, this roof will facilitate light projections during the games and is likened by the architects to the snow-covered peaks of the Caucasus Mountains.
The south side of the building was designed to shelter the stadium and spectators from the adjacent seafront, while longer elevations on the east and west sides open out to the plaza where the cauldron will be on show.
During the games the 40,000-seat stadium will be used to host the opening and closing ceremonies, but no sporting events. It will then be converted into a 45,000-seat football venue for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, before being downsized to a 25,000-seat club for a local football team.
Here are more details from Populous:
Fisht Olympic Stadium
Challenge
Russia’s bid for the 2014 Winter Olympics was part of a broader goal to step back onto the world stage as hosts of major sporting events (the country’s last event was the Moscow Summer Olympics back in 1980). The challenge was threefold: to convince the International Olympic Committee that Russia had both the vision and the infrastructure to host such a major event; to develop the popular summertime coastal resort of Sochi into a world class destination for winter sports, and to design a stadium flexible enough to facilitate the Olympic ceremonies, then act as a venue for FIFA World Cup matches and, finally, become the home venue for a local football team.
Innovation
For the first time, an Olympic Park has been designed as part of a Winter Games master plan. This unusual step guarantees a unique legacy for these Games, marking Sochi out as a winter destination for decades to come. Within the park, the main level of the stadium is raised on a landscaped mound, providing stunning views from within. The unique engineering systems will enable truly memorable opening and closing ceremonies while, post-Games, the in-built flexibility of the stadium’s design means its capacity can change over time to provide event configurations from 45,000 seats for FIFA World Cup matches to a compact, atmospheric 25,000 for local matches.
Impact
Winning the bid for the 2014 Winter Olympic Games has not only reinstated Russia’s reputation as a viable host for major events, but has transformed Sochi itself. The infrastructure that our work has helped create will regenerate the region, marking Sochi out as a year-round tourist destination and major new European winter sports centre.
Location: Sochi, Russia Client: Olympstroy Architect: Populous Capacity: 40,000 Events: Opening and Closing Ceremonies, 2018 FIFA World Cup (legacy mode)
London architecture office Make has designed a portable prefabricated kiosk with a folded aluminium shell that opens and closes like a paper fan (+ movie).
Make based the design of the kiosks on the folded paper forms of Japanese origami, but chose to reproduce them in metal to create a compact and robust structure that can house street vendors.
“Origami was fundamental in developing the design; the ideas of a folding fan informed the design and folded paper models were used throughout the process, right up to the final testing of the completed design,” project architect Sean Affleck told Dezeen.
Two of the kiosks were installed in a public plaza at London’s Canary Wharf and acted as information and vending points for the duration of an ice-sculpting festival last month.
Affleck said the kiosks were created to perform multiple functions at different venues: “They’ve been designed to be used anywhere and for a multitude of purposes; from serving coffee, to information points, to a spot for DJs at events.”
The folded structure is made from hinged aluminium panels that radiate from a central axis and are treated with a resilient powder-coated finish.
A counterweight system controlled by a winch raises the front of the kiosk upwards from the base to create an opening that reveals the interior.
The folded section forms a canopy that protects the inside and anyone standing in front of the counter.
An interior space measuring 1.95 by 3 metres is lined with a plywood skin covered with a waterproof membrane, while a further layer of cladding creates an insulating gap to reduce the impact of solar gain.
Make collaborated with metal fabrication specialist Entech Environmental Technology Ltd to manufacture and test the pavilions off-site and then transported and installed them pre-assembled.
The kiosks will continue to be used as information points or rented out to vendors during an ongoing series of events taking place in Canary Wharf, and can subsequently be moved to a new location.
All images are courtesy of Make.
The architects sent us the following project description:
Make kiosks open for business
Two unique prefabricated retail kiosks designed by Make Architects were opened to the public for the first time when they became part of the Canary Wharf’s Ice Sculpturing Festival.
The simple folding geometric form of the kiosk is based on the concept of origami.
Expressed as a compact, sculptural rectangular box when closed, the structure is transformed when open, with folds and hinges in the aluminium panels allowing them to expand and contract like a fan when the kiosk opens and closes.
Sean Affleck, Make lead project architect, said: “It’s fantastic to see the kiosks on site being used and enjoyed by the public, and adding vibrancy and character to Canary Wharf’s public realm area.
“Our solution on the modern street kiosk is a distinctive sculptural rectangular box that transforms when it opens and its function is revealed. The design is also efficient and functional with compact, robust, durable, easy to maintain and vandal and graffiti- proof features. The internal fit-out elements can be adapted to suit the needs of individual vendors.”
The extremely lightweight, portable structure was tested and prefabricated off-site by Entech Environmental Technology Ltd, delivered to Canary Wharf via lorry and installed complete and pre-assembled.
Portuguese architect Álvaro Fernandes Andrade has completed a training facility for Olympic-standard rowers where angular white volumes snake across a tiered landscape of grassy slopes and dry-stone walls (+ slideshow).
The Pocinho Centre for High Performance Rowing is located in Portugal’s Douro Valley, a wine region that is classified as a World Heritage Site, so Andrade designed a structure with most of its body buried underground.
The building is divided into three zones that each accommodate different activities. The first and largest section is the accommodation, which comprises a total of 130 dormitories that stagger down the hillside.
The other two sections are labelled as “social” and “training” and are housed within the white-rendered concrete blocks that jerk across the surface of the complex like a huge faceted serpent.
“The two more dynamic and productive major areas impose themselves on the landscape, spreading out along several different levels in large white, formally dissimilar and volumetrically complex structures,” said the architect.
The entrance to the complex sits within a sunken tunnel. This runs parallel with the rows of staggered dormitories, which are revealed above ground as descending roof terraces with long narrow skylights.
“Terraces and clusters of buildings, abrupt, tense connections tearing through terraces, steep ramps, and stairs between walls, usually in the open, are all covered here in order to meet the needs of the program,” said Andrade.
Communal areas where resident athletes can relax are located at the highest point of the hillside to allow views out over the scenic countryside, while training and workout areas are tucked away behind.
Currently the facility accommodates training for up to 130 people, but could be extended in the future to allow this number to increase to 220.
Here’s a project description written by Álvaro Fernandes Andrade and translated into English by Jed Barahal:
High Performance Rowing Centre, Pocinho, Foz Coa, Portugal
Memory
The guiding principles and strategies of the project for the Pocinho Centre for High Performance Rowing play their part in a dense and inextricable mixture that includes the peculiarities and identity of a pre-existing, specific “place”, the characteristics and demands of a very recent program, and the needs and wants of the architectural act.
If we fall back on references that are closest to us, such as Fernando Tavora (with whom I was lucky to have studied in my first year of college, the last year he taught at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Porto), along with all that Siza Vieira thought and said (a lot) and wrote (not a lot, but much better designed and engineered), we need to appreciate the various meanings contained within this “place”, in particular as a cultural “thing” and, most notably here, the landscape of the Douro River Valley as a World Heritage Site, and the specific ancestral expression of man’s intervention and transformation of the landscape.
For the demands of a very recent program, as is this case of a complex developed specifically for training and preparing high performance, Olympic level athletes, there is no or very little “historical precedent to put the words in the mouth of the president,” as Sting put it a few years ago. For architects, in general, this only makes the challenge of the project more exciting. This case was no different.
As regards the needs and wants of designing (as if architecture were not also a conscious act of will and innovation), they in turn also played out within “pre-existing” requisites (such as ensuring “Mobility and Accessibility for All”, and the essential values of “Sustainable Development”), and those that materialised during the design process, such as the problem of taking on a large program (8,000 m2/84 rooms/approx. 130 users), with the prospect of future expansion (up to 11,500m2/170 rooms/approx. 225 users) in a possible subsequent expansion phase of the housing area, without a significant impact on size and the landscape.
In the resulting complex interaction, the decision to structure the program in three fundamental components (Social Zone, Housing Zone and Training Zone) merges with the (re-)interpretation of two elements of secular construction of the Douro landscape: the ubiquitous terracing, a recurring form of “inhabiting” this markedly sloping valley (read here “inhabit ” as “extracting bread from the earth”), and the large white bulks of the buildings set in the landscape, in particular of the large wine-producing estates, formally complex and varying in size (often resulting from building over a long period of time, due to successive changes in the requirements of working the land).
Between them we find terraces and clusters of buildings (often between them and the river as well), abrupt, tense connections tearing through terraces, steep ramps, and stairs between walls, usually in the open, are covered here in order to meet the needs of the program.
But the choice of structuring/separating the program into three distinct zones is also a help in the effort to place the most-used zones on the same level, while minimising eventual movements between levels, something that surely will not be foreign to the history of physical and spatial transformation of this valley, which we are only trying to reinterpret.
The above is also an expression of the typical understanding of the history of architecture at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Porto… not as an end in itself, but as one more element brought to the drawing board/computer, in coordination with other design problems.
Concurrently, the set of aforementioned options, accepted or adopted, allowed for a more organised coordination of the principles of passive management of the building’s energy. In the housing area, used for longer periods of time with less physical activity, the “skin” exposed to the elements has been limited , and the structures leant up against and dug into the ground (as the Eskimos do with their igloos). Rooftop greenery reinforces this insulation. Complementing the use of passive solar energy, the rooms have skylights facing south, in search of the sun, taking into account the general Northern exposure of the entire complex. The walls of the rooms, in naked concrete, reinforce simultaneously the meaning of “land”, “home”, of protection, of this component of the program, and allow for optimal storage of solar thermal energy captured through the skylights which, during the heat of the Douro summer, are shaded from the outside.
As a bonus, stars can be seen from the beds. And in conjunction with the necessary windows and welcome natural light in the halls leading to the rooms, we have made it possible that, from outside, the shale terraces and what covers them “float”, consciously rejecting any direct imitation. Even the irregularity of the plans of the housing area, rather than contributing to the “irony” of imitation, serves the relationship between a systematic and repetitive component of the program (the rooms cells), and the need for close proximity of these with other areas, whether for servicing the rooms themselves (kitchenettes, small social areas, laundry rooms for individual use, etc.) or for services such as machinery, equipment, storage, etc. This irregularity has a role in the interplay between repetition and identity, fragmenting the protracted spaces and long visually undifferentiated corridors, punctuating them with limits of perspective and unique spaces as they expand.
However, even considering the above, this combination of conditions and design options does not prevent the quantitatively most significant component of the program from being “diluted” into the land/landscape, and the future expansion of the desired number of rooms at the centre from being carried out without major disruptions to the general logic of the project (also because the whole project has been developed taking into account the prospect of maximum use of the land).
It may be added, in reference to this component of the program, that in spite of the limited size of the housing area, all of the rooms built at the level of the access hall can be used by athletes in wheelchairs. Just by removing and placing the supports in the bathrooms of these rooms, athletes with physical constraints may choose their rooms, and they can lodge in the same areas as the rest of their team, without having to be relegated to some convenient corner, in rooms “for the disabled”.
Having defined the structures and the contours of the land, the site and the programmatic component of “lodging”, the two other more dynamic and “productive” major areas (Social Zone and Training Zone), impose themselves on the landscape, spreading out along several different levels in large white, formally dissimilar and volumetrically complex structures.
Adopting a language and expressiveness of their own, and emerging as the most visible components of the project, they express the meaning of project and transformation, in contrast with the “shyness” of the terraces. Developed in conjunction with research on the characteristics and physical needs of each of the programmatic components, they emphasise the particularities of the relationship of these with the setting.
The communal areas for rest and relaxation take over the higher levels and look out over the countryside. Turning their backs to these are the training and workout areas, in an attempt to reflect the logic of effort and concentration that high performance athletes know so well.
Along with these particularities, they also foster different interactions with the previously outlined principles, in interdependent relationships of cause and effect. Formal complexity coordinates the development of a specific image with, for example, the freedom to control solar exposure through windows between summer and winter, or from east to west. In other words, the ostensible randomness of shape actually guarantees direct exposure to the winter sun through glass, as well as shade from the excruciating heat of summer. An effort was made to insure respect for the particularities of this system of construction, an element that is inseparable from questions of language that come into play. With a system of construction that includes facades and ventilated rooftops, double thermal insulation, and a system of “dry-wall construction”, we have attempted to equate questions of sustainable development, allowing, for example, for the disassembly and recycling of materials at the end of their life cycle.
An engaging and exciting challenge for the architect, the centre was also a challenge in investigation of the forms and processes of the integration of the specificity of “new” themes, such as accessibility and sustainability, which we seek to define, indefinitely, as… architecture. Only architecture. Without labels. Without adding labels that only lessen it, such as “environmental”, “green”, “accessible”, or “sustainable”. If there is anything missing from this work of architecture, it is those who, I think, architects really work for: the people who will use it.
The Estadio Nacional de Fútbol de Venezuela will be the first football stadium designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners.
Developed in collaboration with engineers Arup and Schlaich Bergermann und Partner, it will feature a brightly coloured circular roof that the architects refer to as a “bicycle wheel canopy”.
The building will be located at the top of a hill, overlooking the city centre to the north east.
“The hillside site created an unusual challenge and the design reflects this with terraces cut into the landscape giving way to a series of floating esplanades that provide access to the various levels of stadium,” said Simon Smithson, the lead architect on the project.
The stadium forms part of a wider masterplan by Richard Rogers’ firm for the area known as La Rinconada, located approximately eight kilometres south west of the capital.
The architects had originally been commissioned to design a bus station replacing an existing facility, but the project later evolved to encompass a new transport interchange between the bus station and the existing metro and train station, as well as the establishment of a metropolitan park to protect the surrounding hillsides from further development.
The football stadium will be located within the park alongside a new baseball stadium, while an existing racecourse designed by Californian architect Arthur Froehlich in the 1950s will be retained.
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