Hasta La Ideas

Dutch supermarket Spar’s flagship store in Budapest features a series of undulating wooden forms through its interior by local firm LAB5 architects (+ slideshow).

The curvaceous forms of the interior are designed to guide shoppers to the back of the store. “There is a short route for quick daily shopping and a long route for weekend buyers,” Andras Dobos of LAB5 architects told Dezeen. “All the forms in the interior are inspired by this flow of customers.”

Shelving is created in between curved wooden ribs that extend from the walls and across the ceiling.

The wooden sections merge into an island for displaying bottles of wine. “[The wood] helps to create a more cosy atmosphere in spite of many industrial elements,” said Dobos.

Curved counters are clad vertically with similar wooden lengths in the bakery. Walls are painted brown, in keeping with the natural feel of the materials.

In other parts of the store, white beams zigzag between ribbed sections on the ceiling where wooden lengths are spread more sparsely.

A mix of pendant lamps, spotlights and tube lights are attached between the ribs on the ceiling.

A pair of curved white beams guide the shopper through the aisles, while fruit and vegetables are displayed within rounded counters made from Corian – a solid surface material that creates a smooth finish.

Rounded grey and white tills are positioned at the front of the store, which is located in Budapest’s MOM Park shopping centre.

Photography is by Zsolt Batár.

Here is some more information from the architects:

MOM Park is a shopping mall located in a wealthy district of Budapest. When SPAR decided to open its supermarket there, they had the idea to build a flagship store, and have a unique design for it to achieve elevated experience of shopping. They invited architects and interior designers to submit design proposals in a non-open competition. LAB5 architects won because of the look and feel of a market space, with a friendly industrial atmosphere. Luckily later 90% of the original ideas could have been realised.

Located in a shopping mall, this retail can draw mainly three kinds of costumers, so the layout is organised accordingly. One can be shopping very quickly even not entering across the gates. There is a “short route” for quick daily shopping, and a “long route” for weekend buyers. All the forms in the interior are inspired by this flow of costumers.

From the entrance the ceiling is attracting you to the back zone, and then shows different possible ways to go on. The block before cashiers doesn’t have suspended ceiling, and it is just clear and organised.

Due to the condition of the modest internal height, we wanted to gain the space above the suspended ceiling zone, so we didn’t put a ceiling, unless it was really necessary, and also in a free-form way. Where we could we used solid white surface, and where we had to put additional elements (lights, sprinkler, etc.) we used optical ceiling.

Where possible, shelves and counters are forming islands, just as if they were standing at a market.

There are two zones where the ceiling converts into a 3d form by flowing down to the ground. At the bakery products warm feelings are strengthen. At the wine section, the lamellas of the ceiling are continuing down to the ground to form a space of a cellar, and to indicate at this point the quality and the culture of the product. Generally saying, as the ceiling is the element that can be seen from everywhere, it became one of the main elements in orientation and of impression.

The Dutch word “Spar” meaning pinewood gave the idea of using “wood-like” materials at the ceiling or at the winery. It also helps to create a more cosy atmosphere in spite of many industrial elements. We chose acryl (corian) for the finishing of all rounded furniture, as they had to be white, shiny, clean, durable, and supporting the “fluid” effect.

Due to many contradictory specifications we couldn’t apply concrete for the floor as we planned, but the single colour solution of grey tiling is perfect for the goal.

Maybe because of the fact that we are architects and not interior designers originally, we were seeing this retail as being one part of the big shopping mall, so we used the colour brown of its public spaces, on many elements (floor, ceiling, rear of shelves, etc.), and no other colours (beside grey and white).

Supermarket with 2000 m2 of public zone.
Location: Piazza floor of MOM Park (EU – Hungary, 1123 Budapest, Alkotás utca 53.)
Competition: March 2013
Design: May 2013
Construction: June – September 2013

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between curved wooden ribs appeared first on Dezeen.

Panoramic views of the dramatic Icelandic landscape are offered from this holiday home near Reykjavik by local studio PK Arkitektar (+ slideshow).

PK Arkitektar designed Árborg House for a mossy hill high above the glacial valley of the Hvita river, a two-hour drive from the Icelandic capital.

The single-storey house is clad in concrete, which is textured with vertical lines and contains gravel from the river below as an aggregate.

Moss that was removed to make way for the structure has been reinstalled on the roof.

The house is entered through a long corridor that leads from the back, past the garage.

Guest bedrooms are accessed along another corridor that runs adjacent to the entrance passage.

A linear volume positioned perpendicular to these rooms is glazed entirely across the longest facade, facing the valley and mountains to the west.

Kitchen, dining and living spaces as well as the master suite are arranged along this section, connected along the glass wall so the view is uninterrupted.

Internal surfaces are covered throughout with smooth concrete and teak boards, which conceal cupboards and drawers in the kitchen.

The wood continues out onto the terrace, where it is intended to weather and blend in with the landscape.

“Doors and terraces are clad with teak boards that will gradually weather to a colour grade to match the seasonal moss and the broken concrete surface,” said the architects.

Projecting out from the terrace, an infinity pool containing a circular hot tub has pebbles from the riverbed covering its floor.

Photography is by Rafael Pinho and Helge Garke.

Here’s a description from the architects:

Árborg House

This vacation house is located on the banks of the Hvita river, a two-hour drive East of Reykjavik. The site is a moss-covered hill with a view over a quiet bend in the glacier-formed river. In the spring, the river carries the icebergs from the glacier towards the sea some 100km away.

The approach to the vacation house is from the top of the hill. The building is organised as a sequence of events: from the entrance porch through the closed courtyard into the living space and out onto the terrace at the end.

Living, dining, kitchen, and master bedroom are all arranged in one continuous room. This enables panoramic views of the river and the distant mountains to the west.

The exterior is a broken surface of light grey fair-faced concrete. The gravel from the riverbed is blended into the concrete, and is revealed in the broken surface. It harmonises the outside walls with the moss of the surrounding landscape.

Leftover moss from the footprint of the house covers the roof. It was kept aside and regularly nursed during the building process, before being reinstalled on the roof.

Doors and terraces are clad with teak boards that will gradually weather to a colour grade to match the seasonal moss and the broken concrete surface. Fair-faced concrete walls through out the entire interior are matched with untreated teak boards on floors and ceilings.

Selected pebbles from the nearby riverbed cover the bottom of the infinity pool. The pool projects out in front of the terrace, and serves as a railing which otherwise would have interrupted the view of the river.

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an Icelandic glacial valley appeared first on Dezeen.

Japanese practice k/o design studio has designed a bulbous silver building that adjoins a red-tiled rectilinear tower at the Senzoku Gakuen College of Music in Kawasaki (+ slideshow).

The freeform building, called Silver Mountain, houses new rehearsal halls, while the Red Cliff tower contains offices, a faculty lounge and student lounge.

“Free 3D form Silver Mountain and rectangular Red Cliff are designed depending on functional needs to be devoted for rehearsal hall and office, and located at the pivotal point of traffic of the campus, but intended to show the powerful outline of form and contrast of silver and red,” said architect Kunihide Oshinomi of k/o design studio.

A glass canopy spans the gap between the two buildings, which provides one of three pedestrian routes to the rest of the site.

The exterior of the Silver Mountain is clad in stainless steel plates in a pattern developed using 3D surface analysis to determine the most efficient combination of standard rectilinear tiles and irregular panels used to fill the gaps.

Inside the building, the curved walls create a smooth-sided cave-like foyer which leads to a rehearsal room contained in a central concrete core.

Further rehearsals rooms are located in the basement and on the first floor and feature undulating concrete walls that improve the rooms’ acoustic properties.

A faculty lounge on the ground floor of the Red Cliff building contains boxy armchairs and a separate meeting room, and adjoins a lounge area for students. The upper four floors contain offices.

Photography is by Nacasa & Partners / Atsushi Nakamichi.

The following information is from the architects:

Silver mountain and Red cliff

First of all I wanted to avoid to be included into the category of architecture called as a ＊fragmentation or poetry dominant in Japanese cool design trend.

Therefore I intended to look back to the basic principles of architecture, which are form, space and material or colour.

Free 3D form Silver mountain and rectangular Red cliff are designed depending on functional needs to be devoted for rehearsal hall ＆ office, and located at the pivotal point of traffic of the campus, but intended to show the powerful outline of form and contrast of silver and red.

Silver mountain is carefully cladded with stainless steel plate based on precise computer simulation to maximise use of regular size plate. Red cliff is furnished as a random graphic patch-work of 3 different red colours of mosaic tiles.

Interior of Silver mountain is a purely exposure of back side of 3D free form and resulted to create spaces used for a lobby or foyer of each halls like a dramatic cave.

Rehearsal halls interior are also back side of 3D free form but flanked with exposed concrete waved wall for avoiding echo. First floor studio wall show interesting traces of the hitting pattern with this flanked wave wall and 3D free form.

Glass roofed space between mountain and cliff called as a Valley roofed with Cloud of glass is a main pedestrian root for this campus.

Location: Kanagawa prefecture, Japan
Project: Silver mountain& Red Cliff Senzoku Gakuen College of Music
Design: k/o design studio / Kunihide Oshinomi + KAJIMA DESIGN
Photo: Nacasa & Partners / Atsushi Nakamichi
Site area: 65,744,08 square metres
Building are: 1,437,59 square metres
Total floor area: 5,084,00 square metres
Structure: reinforced concrete construction
Construction period: 2012.04 – 2013.08

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at a Japanese music college appeared first on Dezeen.

Architects Takero Shimazaki and Charlie Luxton have renovated a 1960s house outside London to create a modern home that features black-painted brickwork, large windows and a new angular roof (photographs by Edmund Sumner + slideshow).

Now named Aperture in the Woods, the old house had been vacant for three years and was desperately in need of repairs, but Shimazaki and Luxton chose to retain and modernise as much as possible of the houses’s original structure to preserve its simple character.

“Whilst the existing house was not a building of significant design importance, we felt there was a spirit there worth preserving and enhancing, being that of post-war British modernism,” they said.

New brickwork was added and the whole house was then painted black to hide the junctions between new and old.

“It was clear that no matter how carefully we tried to match the brick a homogenous finish would not be achieved,” said the architects. “Black was chosen to make the house recede into the shadows created by the surrounding woodlands.”

The architects increased the angle of the roof to heighten the ceiling in the open-plan living room and create a row of clerestory windows.

More new windows frame vistas of a nearby church, but also offer residents views of a wildflower garden planted between the house and the forest.

“Without any curtains or blinds, the house is a transparent black viewing box, its external walls reflecting or absorbing the surrounding nature throughout the season,” added the architects.

A glazed lobby provides a new entrance to the house. Inside, walls are painted white and are complemented by oak joinery and wooden floors.

Bedrooms sit on the opposite side of the house to the living areas, while a small office is tucked away at the back.

Photography is by Edmund Sumner.

Here’s a description from the architects:

Aperture in the Woods, High Bois Lane, Buckinghamshire

A conversion of a derelict 1960s modernist house in the outskirts of Amersham, Buckinghamshire, the house has multiple aspects and is sited next to a local Church and surrounded by the Buckingham woodland.

Reflecting the economic downturn post 2008 and with a limited project budget, the design developed out of the architectural language of the original house; the owners and the architects working as much as possible to maximise the existing structure.

Most of the original brickwork was retained and added to. It was clear that no matter how carefully we tried to match the brick a homogenous finish would not be achieved. It was decided to paint the brick and the black was chosen to make the house recede into the shadows created by the surrounding woodlands. One half of the roof was raised to create a taller, sharper, pitch to the living room. Bedrooms were placed in the other half, retained at its original pitch, with an additional volume projecting into the garden to create a larger master bedroom. A new glass entrance lobby has also been added to open up the front of the house.

The family recently relocated from London to enjoy life within the Buckingham woods. The house is Phase 1 of 3 phases that will include additional spaces for quieter activities such as a study/guest house (Phase 2) and a green house (Phase 3).

Views of the house’s woodland surroundings were made through careful amendments to the existing openings, with additional apertures focusing on specific viewpoints including the church, immediate and distant woods and the newly planted wild flower garden to the front of the house.

Without any curtains or blinds, the house is a transparent black viewing box, its external walls reflecting or absorbing the surrounding nature throughout the season. The interior is realised in a light grey tone with all joinery including windows and doors in oak. The contrast of dark and light makes this building highly ephemeral and reflects the family’s aspirations for more dynamic living. The house is often used as a shelter for music events (with all the doors and windows open!), gatherings for local families and children as well as a quiet retreat for the family.

The project is a collaboration between Takero Shimazaki Architecture (t-sa) and Charlie Luxton.

Client: Jonathan and Ana Maria Harbottle
Architect: Takero Shimazaki Architecture (t-sa) and Charlie Luxton
Design Team: Jennifer Frewen, Charlie Luxton, Takero Shimazaki, Meiri Shinohara
Structural Engineer: milk structures
Approved Inspector: STMC Building Control
Main Contractor: Silver Square Construction Solutions Ltd
Single ply roof: Bauder

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Takero Shimazaki and Charlie Luxton appeared first on Dezeen.

Twitter’s headquarters in a 1937 San Francisco building features brightly coloured furniture, padded booths, games rooms and an enormous roof terrace (+ slideshow).

Global interior firm IA Architects collaborated with local San Francisco practice Lundberg Design on the renovation of floors seven to nine of an eleven-storey Art Deco building that formerly housed a wholesale furniture store.

“Twitter’s new headquarters is the first workspace designed specifically for the company, with the intent to reflect and nurture the Twitter culture, enable creativity, and appeal directly to Twitter’s bright and passionate staff,” said IA Architects.

The offices’ large open spaces are punctuated by original concrete columns, with meeting rooms, breakout spaces, a yoga studio, fitness room and games rooms distributed across the two floors.

“The multi-storey location gives a new twist to the term ‘urban campus’ and sets the bar for all comers,” IA Architects added.

The brand’s bird motif recurs throughout the interior, as does its signature shade of blue.

Wood is also used as a unifying feature, with imagery of twigs appearing on wallpaper and real branches emerging from a round lightwell next to the lifts. The reception desk is partially clad in wood reclaimed from a bowling alley.

An expansive cafeteria with acoustic panels suspended from the ceiling in an undulating pattern also features a stage that can be used for meetings and events.

Large windows connect the cafeteria to a 2023-square-metre outdoor terrace with turfed and planted areas that overlook the city.

Responsibilities for the project were divided between Lundberg Design, which focused on the front office and dining area, and IA Design, which led the planning, layout and design of the remaining spaces.

Other offices designed for software companies recently include Google’s headquarters in Madrid, which features wooden arches leading to colourful meeting rooms, and Pinterest’s converted warehouse headquarters with two-storey white cuboids that house meeting spaces, bars and a canteen.

Photography is by Chad Ziemendorf.

The following project description is from IA Architects:

Twitter Global Headquarters

Twitter’s new global headquarters occupies floors 7-9 of the 11-floor Market Square complex, an iconic 1937 Art Deco landmark that once housed the San Francisco wholesale furniture mart. Until recently, the building, like the rest of its mid-Market Street neighbours, has been a casualty of urban blight.

Twitter’s occupancy marks the beginning of a long-overdue renewal for the area, which is adjacent to some of the city’s most historic venues: Davies Symphony Hall, the War Memorial Opera House, the Asian Art Museum, and City Hall.

Twitter’s desire to stay in the city where it was founded and a recently-passed San Francisco tax forgiveness measure inspired the company to commit to the area. This decision has subsequently attracted other tech companies to consider locations nearby.

Twitter’s new headquarters is the first workspace designed specifically for the company, with the intent to reflect and nurture the Twitter culture, enable creativity, and appeal directly to Twitter’s bright and passionate staff. The multi-story location gives a new twist to the term “urban campus” and sets the bar for all comers.

The space is subtly branded throughout with the use of the Twitter logo and signature blue, natural wood, and a frequent twig motif. The once cavernous open space, including the building’s original concrete columns, has become a great expanse of white benching systems, punctuated with informal seating areas, large and small conference rooms, break areas with pantries, banquettes, and easily reconfigured lounge areas, all complimented by art from local artists.

A yoga studio, fitness room, and two very popular game rooms are also part of the mix. This variety of options takes full advantage of the huge floor plates and natural light at the window walls. The overall effect is edgy yet polished, complimented by an array of art by local artists.

An enormous cafeteria and gathering space known as the Commons offers an impressive menu and includes a stage for group meetings and entertainment. It opens onto the park-like roof garden that covers almost half an acre and offers impressive skyline views – a great place to hang out by day (blankets provided for those chilly Bay Area afternoons) and a dramatic venue for nighttime events.

Using a highly integrated team approach, IA collaborated with Lundberg Design; all design decisions were made as a group. Lundberg Design was the lead on the front office area and dining facilities; IA led the overall planning, layout, and design for the rest of the project, with responsibility for construction documents and administration.

Twitter fully occupies its new space and has recently taken two additional floors; other tech companies have taken additional floors. A retail area is planned for street level, with cafes, restaurants, a health club, and grocery store.

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by IA Architects and Lundberg Design appeared first on Dezeen.