Hasta La Ideas

Pale bricks are arranged in a herringbone pattern on the outer walls of this compact house in north-east London that local architect Zoe Chan designed and built for herself (+ slideshow).

The Atelier ChanChan principal wanted the house to relate to the Victorian terraces that characterise London’s housing stock but to also have its own character, so she chose a steel frame infilled with a non-load-bearing herringbone brickwork, instead of the typical English and Flemish brick bonds.

“The choice to use brick creates a visual reference to the masonry construction of this particular street,” Chan told Dezeen. “However this isn’t a terrace, it’s quite different in character, so I chose to create my own personal expression using brickwork as the basis.”

Named Herringbone House, the two-storey structure slots into a non-linear plot that previously accommodated a series of derelict buildings, all of which had to be demolished beforehand. “It was in such bad repair, so everything needed to come down,” said Chan.

One of the biggest challenges was ensuring that light would be able to reach all parts of the 30-metre-long plot. As such, the house takes on an L-shaped plan that wraps around private courtyards at the front and back to allow light to permeate both floors.

Two skylights puncture the gabled roof to draw extra light in from above. One sits directly above the stairwell, where Chan has added a steel staircase with open risers to allow more light through.

For the interior, white-washed timber floors and surfaces are complemented by Scandinavian furniture, and a variety of soft grey and pinkish hues.

“I wanted to use materials that are very natural but also warm,” said Chan. “The idea was to maximise light, but I didn’t want it to be sterile, so I drew inspiration from Scandinavian architecture and its light natural palettes.”

An open-plan layout on the ground floor brings the living room and kitchen alongside one another, while a small study sits to one side and opens out to the front courtyard through a wall of glazing.

Three bedrooms are located beneath the sloping ceilings of the top floor and feature built-in storage units designed to add to the thickness of the walls.

Photography is by Mike Tsang.

Here’s a short description from  Zoe Chan:

Herringbone House

The house aims to relate to its context by taking the syntax of the local vernacular: namely gable ended roofs and the brick material of the Victorian terraces. However, the open plan interiors with ceiling to floor windows, skylights and courtyards are supported by a modern steel structure.

The combination making for a modern vernacular house inspired by the old to create something new. The ornamental herringbone brickwork was used to create personal expression and to articulate the picture windows and volumes by using framing, pattern and variety in the laying of the bricks.

Practice name: Atelier ChanChan
Team: Zoe Chan (lead designer), Bob Chan and Joao Neves
Location: Islington, London

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Atelier ChanChan’s Herringbone House appeared first on Dezeen.

Laboratory for Architecture in Barcelona uncovered barrel-vaulted brick ceilings during the renovation of this apartment in the architects’ home city (+ slideshow).

For the renovation of Casa Tomás, Laboratory for Architecture in Barcelona separated the interior into areas that will be used most at night and those that will be active during the day, connected by a small intermediate room.

Architect Pepe Gascón told Dezeen they discovered the “lovely roof” when they demolished the existing plaster ceiling.

“We supposed there was this kind of roof in the apartment because most of the apartments and flats built in this period of time were built with this kind of construction,” Gascón said.

“In the Catalan language it’s called ‘volta catalana’ which means ‘Catalan arch’ and it was an easy way to build a roof with ceramic tiles, where the arch distributes the forces it receives to both sides,” he explained.

On one side of the apartment’s H-shaped plan, four rooms have been transformed into a single open-plan space for the living, dining and kitchen areas.

A bathroom on the opposite side of the apartment features green tiled walls that never meet the vaulted ceiling, but a row of glazed panels is slotted between to bring extra light into the space from above.

Two bedrooms are situated on either side of the bathroom, completing the side of the residence dedicated to night time.

The ceiling in the living area has been left exposed to show the red tones of the clay ceramic, while vaulted ceilings elsewhere are all painted white. A mixture of wooden boards and patterned Mallorcan tiles cover the floors.

Narrow terraces are positioned at each end of the apartment. The one at the bedroom end is screened by a steel trellis covered with climbing plants, while the second faces down onto the street.

Photography is by José Hevia.

Here’s some information from Pepe Gascón:

More Dualism, Less Monism

Louis Kahn divided spaces into two types: served and servant (where ‘servant’ refers not to domestic staff but to spaces serving other spaces). Marcel Breuer structured a considerable number of his single-family homes into a bi-nuclear scheme. The pre-existing H-shape of the Tomás home already favoured its spatial organisation into two living areas, as in Breuer’s plan: one part to be used for daytime activities – the social area – and the other for night-time functions – the private area. The connecting room was to be a servant space but also given its own character so that, rather than being relegated for use as a mere passageway, it could also function as a living area. The other two rooms would be served spaces.

Although these two served spaces are almost similar in terms of dimension and geometry, both are defined in completely opposite ways. The public part is clear space while the private section is divided. The former is open to the street and the latter closed off by the inner courtyard of the block. The main space extends outwards via a balcony, while the other area is filtered and separated from outside by a uniform glassed-in veranda where climbing plants partly screen the glass slats that close it off. The balcony acts as a kind of solarium before the living room, dining room and kitchen area. The veranda, however, is like a shade house in front of the dormitories thanks to the plant filter provided by the creepers.

Dimorphism is the term used in biology for the phenomenon in which two different anatomical aspects appear in the same species. This principle was used to “furnish” the served spaces of the house. In the public zone, it is by means of the free-standing bench in the kitchen. In the bedroom area, the bathroom is set out like one more piece of furniture since it rises from the floor and does not reach up to the joists or the vaulted ceiling. The bathroom can be understood in Kahn’s language as a servant space since it serves both bedrooms.

The same applies to the transversal strip comprised by the vestibule, the toilet and the storage space for household appliances – paved and finished with decorative tiles – which also serves the living-room, dining room and kitchen. Even the servant space connecting the two parts of the house is multiplied by adding a dual-level or, better said, a bi-vertical loft space.

The spatial result of this project is therefore a contrivance whereby opposites, symmetries and balances mediate served and servant spaces. This is a house structured in a bi-nuclear fashion which repeats dualities again and again or, in other words, it brings together in one very small home twofold, different and contrasting spatial characteristics: clear-divided, open-closed, extended-separated, broken up-filtered, above-below. In short, it is a project based on dualism rather than on monism, with Kahn and Bauer as its double references.

Architecture: LAB, Laboratory for Architecture in Barcelona – Pepe Gascón & Víctor Sala (architects)
Client: Miguel Gayoso
Contractor: Constructora Montnegre (Tordera, Barcelona), Spain
Dirección de obra: LAB, Laboratory for Architecture in Barcelona – Pepe Gascón & Víctor Sala (architects)
Coordinación de seguridad y salud: LAB, Laboratory for Architecture in Barcelona – Pepe Gascón & Víctor Sala (architects)
Project area: 8000 m2
Cost: €73.000, 00

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renovated Barcelona apartment appeared first on Dezeen.

Concrete block walls with window-like apertures surround a courtyard at the front of this Melbourne house by local practice MRTN Architects, which also features an angular wooden roof (+slideshow).

MRTN Architects designed the family home, named Fairfield Hacienda, so that it would engage with neighbouring properties on its suburban street. The designers convinced the clients to downscale the building’s planned footprint by a third, making room for a courtyard that acts as an uncovered outdoor living room.

“The enclosed courtyard is located to the north of the house and creates a buffer between the street and the house, allowing the living spaces to open up to and access northern light and warmth,” the architects explained.

A path that meanders through a small garden leads from the street to the courtyard, which is level with the fronts of the adjacent houses.

The walls shelter the courtyard from the wind but contain holes that allow the residents to see their neighbours and people passing on the street.

A tree at the centre of this outdoor space provides some shade from the sun, while vines and other plants will eventually cover the concrete walls, giving it the appearance of a secret garden.

Concrete blocks enclosing the courtyard continue along the front of the house and also appear internally, where they are polished to a smooth finish.

The material is used for the front half of the house and was chosen for its high thermal mass, which reduces the need for artificial heating and cooling.

Glazed panels create a gap between the solid walls and the angular projecting roof, which is covered on the underside with red cedar.

The faceted ceiling appears to hover above the main living room and kitchen and dining space, where it complements an angular stone-clad breakfast bar.

A small courtyard at the centre of the home separates two wings occupied by the parents and children. Plants inside the glazed structure will gradually grow and increase the privacy of these areas.

The rear half of the property containing the bedrooms and bathrooms is constructed from a timber frame and clad in plywood panels.

Photography is by Peter Bennetts.

Here’s a project description from MRTN Architects:

Fairfield Hacienda

On the fringe of Melbourne’s inner suburbs, this new family home sits in an established residential street of Victorian villas and Californian bungalows. From the footpath, the Fairfield Hacienda with its angled roof fits into the landscape of single level homes, effortlessly picking up the street’s original pattern of hipped and gabled roof forms.

A closer look however, reveals that this new house sits behind a sunny, walled courtyard. This room without a roof, except for a sheltering courtyard tree, is an extension of the living and dining spaces that open onto it. The enclosed courtyard is located to the north of the house and creates a buffer between the street and the house allowing the living spaces to open up to and access northern light and warmth.

The front wall of the courtyard matches the front setback of the adjacent neighbours. In holding the typical front setback of houses along the street, and setting the house to the south, a sun filled outdoor area is created that can be used as a living, dining or play area.

The courtyard space also becomes a semi-public space allowing interaction between the owners and local passerby’s; responding to the owners desire that the house engage with the established residents in the area.

The concrete block walls of the courtyard continue without interruption through the house’s main living areas. These walls remain unchanged except for the patina. Outside they are rough and weathered, but become polished and honed once inside. The design is not precious of the courtyard walls, eventually vines and creepers will take over the exterior concrete block and create a walled garden that will change by season.

The living spaces are covered with an undulating canopy of cedar, a warm blanket of timber. From the exterior the roof form relates to the neighbouring roof geometries along the street but from inside the roof dips and rises to define the dining, kitchen and living spaces below. The timber ceiling is kept clear of down lights and services, all lighting is provided by concealed perimeter uplighting, at night the roof appears to float over the masonry walls below.

Beyond the living spaces the private zones of the house are arranged as two wings, a parents wing and a children’s wing, that wrap around a small courtyard. This central planted courtyard provides light and ventilation to the centre of the house. Currently parents and young children can see each other through this void but over time planting will create greater privacy for older children.

The owners’ brief was to create a long-term family home, somewhere they could become a part of the street and its ongoing history. The Fairfield Hacienda sits comfortably within its local context while creating a contemporary light filled home that is orientated to the north and provides a variety of spaces to live in, both inside and out.

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house by MRTN Architects appeared first on Dezeen.

Thom Mayne’s Los Angeles firm Morphosis has completed a new Hollywood campus for arts school Emerson College where a rectangular frame surrounds a curvaceous cluster of classrooms (+ slideshow).

Situated in the heart of the entertainment industry on Sunset Boulevard, Emerson College Los Angeles will accommodate over 200 undergraduate students from the renowned creative arts and communication school based in Boston, Massachusetts.

The building’s frame-like outer volume accommodates ten storeys of student housing, while the curving central sections contain teaching facilities and staff administration, amidst a series of terraces and connecting bridges.

“The building is designed to expand the interactive, social aspect of education,” said Thom Mayne. “We focused on creating with the broader community in mind – both in terms of public space and sustainable design.”

The east and west-facing sides of the building feature glazed curtain walls and are screened by an intelligent shading system where horizontal fins angle open or closed to suit changes in light, temperature and the angle of the sun.

Rigging and audio-visual equipment are also incorporated into the facade’s metal framework, accommodating various outdoor performances and events.

“The entire building becomes a stage set for student films, screenings and industry events, with the Hollywood sign, the city of Los Angeles and the Pacific Ocean in the distance providing added scenery,” said the design team.

Teaching areas and workspaces within the facility include video-editing suites, computer laboratories, a film screening room, sound mixing suites, and live performance spaces. There’s also a green wall at the north-west corner.

Photography is by Iwan Baan.

Here’s a design statement from Morphosis:

Emerson College Los Angeles

Based in Boston, Massachusetts, Emerson is renowned for its communication and arts curriculum. Located in the heart of Hollywood, Emerson College Los Angeles (ELA) defines the college’s identity in the centre of the entertainment industry and the second largest city in the United States. The new facility establishes a permanent home on Sunset Boulevard for Emerson College’s existing undergraduate internship program that will extend the ELA experience to students studying in any of the seven disciplines that are offered through the School of Communication and the School of the Arts. Additionally, ELA will offer post-graduate, certificate, and professional study programs. The new facility will also host workshops, lectures, and other events to engage with alumni and the LA community.

Bringing student housing, instructional facilities, and administrative offices to one location, ELA condenses the diversity of a college campus into an urban site. Evoking the concentrated energy of East-Coast metropolitan centres in an iconic Los Angeles setting, a rich dialogue emerges between students’ educational background and their professional futures.

Fundamental to the Emerson Los Angeles experience, student living circumstances give structure to the overall building. Housing up to 217 students, the domestic zones frame a dynamic core dedicated to creativity, learning, and social interaction. Composed of two slender residential towers connected by a helistop, the 10-storey square frame encloses a central open volume to create a flexible outdoor “room”.

A sculpted form housing classrooms and administrative offices weaves through the void, defining multi-level terraces and active interstitial spaces that foster informal social activity and creative cross-pollination. Looking out onto the multi-level terrace, exterior corridors to student suites and common rooms are shaded by an undulating, textured metal scrim spanning the full height of the towers’ interior face.

Looking to the local context, the centre finds a provocative precedent in the interiority of Hollywood film studios, where outwardly regular facades house flexible, fantastical spaces within. With rigging for screens, media connections, sound, and lighting incorporated into the facade’s metal framework, this dynamic visual backdrop also serves as a flexible armature for outdoor performances. The entire building becomes a stage set for student films, screenings, and industry events, with the Hollywood sign, the city of Los Angeles, and the Pacific Ocean in the distance providing added scenery.

Anticipated to achieve a LEED Gold rating, the new centre champions Emerson’s commitment to both sustainable design and community responsibility. Wrapping the building’s northwest corner, a green wall underscores the towers’ actively changing exterior skin. Connected to weather stations that track the local climate, temperature, and sun angle, the automated sunshade system opens and closes horizontal fins outside the high-performance glass curtain-wall to minimise heat gain while maximising daylight and views. Further green initiatives include the use of recycled and rapidly renewable building materials, installation of efficient fixtures to reduce water use by 40%, energy savings in heating and cooling through a passive valence system, and a building management and commissioning infrastructure to monitor and optimise efficiency of all systems.

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curvy classrooms within a hollow frame appeared first on Dezeen.

Shimmering golden panels clad the monumental folded ceilings of this new airport terminal in St Petersburg designed by London studio Grimshaw (+ slideshow).

Grimshaw collaborated with engineering firm Ramboll and delivery architect Pascall+Watson to complete the first terminal of Pulkovo International Airport, which is expected to bring 12 millions passengers in and out of the Russian city each year.

The architects gave the airport a large flat roof so that it will be able to cope with heavy snowfall. This allowed the underside to be expressed as a series of folded surfaces, which help to distribute weight to different parts of the structure.

“We used this language of folding to take weight away from the mid-span and then to create more space and height for the passengers in the key spaces,” explained Grimshaw associate Ed Ross.

Tessellating metal panels give these folded surfaces their golden colour, intended as a reference to the gilded spires of churches around St Petersburg. Lighting fixtures run along the folds, while voids between surfaces reveal skylights that help passengers to navigate the terminal.

“This building represents a point of departure for Grimshaw,” said Grimshaw partner Mark Middeton. “We are known for our expressive structures and attention to detail. We wanted to keep all of those elements – the practicality and the buildability, and our interest in sustainability – but also try to make this building more about form and space.”

The layout of the terminal is divided into two parts; the first accommodates check-in and security, while the second contains the departure lounge. According to Middleton, this arrangement was designed to reflect the islands that make up the landscape of the city.

“We did this for several reasons,” said the architect. “Firstly to reflect St Petersburg as a city of islands and bridges, and secondly to celebrate arrival by providing a void over the baggage reclaim area, to allow arriving passengers to experience the terminal.”

Large windows spans the front and rear facades of the building, and were engineered to maintain indoor temperatures and to reduce glare from low sun.

The design team are now working on the second and final phase of the project, which will increase capacity up to 17 million passengers. Construction is set to complete in 2015.

Scroll down from more information from Grimshaw:

Grimshaw’s first project in Russia opens to the public

Grimshaw’s new terminal at Pulkovo International Airport is now officially open to the public. Grimshaw has worked in a team with Ramboll and Pascall + Watson to design the airport, based in St Petersburg, Russia.

The opening of the new terminal marks the completion of phase one of a staged sustainable masterplan for the airport, and is predicted to transfer 12 million passengers per year. Grimshaw won the project in 2007 in an international competition against a shortlist of world leading architecture practices. Working towards a completion date of 2015 for phases one and two, the finished airport will cater for 17 million passengers annually.

Pulkovo Airport, the third largest airport in the country, will act as a gateway to St Petersburg and Russia, while reflecting the city it serves. The internal layout of the new terminal consists of distinct zones connected, designed to echo the external layout of islands and bridges that make up the city. These open rooms are comparable to the many civic spaces found in St Petersburg, emphasising the airport’s role as the first and last great public space of the region for air travellers.

The masterplan of the airport represents and responds to the climate and heritage of St Petersburg. The striking new terminal roof and envelope are designed to accommodate the extremes of climate experienced by the city, including the characteristically heavy snowfalls of winter.

Funding for the airport scheme comes via a €1bn public-private partnership development programme – the first of its kind in Russia. The Northern Capital Gateway Consortium (NCG) was awarded the 30-year concession and appointed Ramboll as the lead design consultant in 2008. Grimshaw has been retained on the project as concept guardians, while Pascal + Watson were appointed as executive architects.

Concept architect: Grimshaw
Design consultant: Ramboll
Executive architect: Pascal + Watson
Structural Engineer: Arup
Services Engineer: Buro Happold
Quantity Surveyor: Turner & Townsend
Airport Specialist: Naco
Retail Specialist: Chapman Taylor

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with folded golden ceilings appeared first on Dezeen.