Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki in New Zealand, which was designed by Australian architecture studio Frances-Jones Morehen Thorp together with New Zealand studio Archimedia, is an extension and refurbishment of an existing gallery.
“It’s a turn-of-the-century building, it kind of embodies a colonial attitude to a European settlement,” says Francis-Jones of the original gallery.
“This new project gave us an opportunity to rethink that, to recast it in current values, to create a bi-cultural gallery that can have a much more holistic relationship to New Zealand society.”
The extension provides the gallery with a new entrance, atrium and gallery space, areas that are covered by large wooden canopies made from the indigenous kauri tree.
Francis-Jones says that it was very important for the design team to create a building that related to its local surroundings.
“One of the great challenges we face as architects in this age is that our materials and our systems are sourced from all over the world,” he says. “But we were seeking to make a building that was really embedded in this place, in this culture.”
He continues: “To create these canopies we wanted to use a material that was very precious and meaningful to New Zealand, so we used natural kauri. It’s got to be one of the most beautiful timbers you’ve ever seen in your life and it’s a timber of great significance and meaning to Maori culture.”
“But, of course, it’s a protected species, so we had to source it from fallen kauri or recycled kauri. We had to use it very sparingly.”
Photograph by Luke Hayes
The large glass walls of the building are designed to allow clear views outside to the surrounding landscape.
“The building, in a sense, creates a connection between the natural landscape and the city,” says Francis-Jones.
“Our effort was to strive to make a building that was transparent in a way, to create a building that was more open, inclusive and connected with the landscape. It is a more open interpretation of New Zealand’s future.”
Photograph by Luke Hayes
World Architecture Festival 2013 took place at Marina Bay Sands in Singapore from 2-4 October. Next year’s World Architecture Festival will take place at the same venue from 1-3 October 2014. Award entries are open from February to June 2014.
News: designer and entrepreneur Gwendolyn Floyd has launched an e-commerce platform that allows female artisans from developing countries to overcome “economic discrimination” and sell jewellery using just a mobile phone (+ movies).
Named Soko, the platform is aimed at turning women in places like Africa into entrepreneurs, selling their creations directly to customers rather than through traditional supply chains that leave them with little profit.
“Women in Africa produce 60 to 80 percent of the continent’s goods, yet they earn only 10 percent of the incomes,” said Floyd. “Soko empowers craftswomen to become global entrepreneurs by transforming the ubiquitous mobile phone into a tool that expands access to economic opportunity for women, giving them a greater share of the profits of the global craft industry.”
By using Soko, makers are able to upload a vendor profile, product images and descriptions to the website using SMS, allowing them to trade even in areas without internet services.
Consumers can then browse, order and pay for the designs on the website. The credit card payments are transferred into mobile money, which is sent via text message to the retailers on purchase of their goods.
They then claim the cash at designated kiosks where they also deliver the goods to be posted anywhere in the world. This means the retailers receive the maximum amount of profit for their wares.
“Soko disrupts the traditional export supply chain, removing the middlemen to enable direct peer-to-peer exchange of goods and money between global artisans and online consumers,” said Floyd, who graduated from Design Academy Eindhoven in 2005 and co-founded Soko with MIT graduate Ella Peinovich and ICT developer Catherine Mahugu.
The service is open to men as well as women, Floyd explained, but added: “Women face economic discrimination that leads to disproportionate representation in the informal economy, leaving them unable to access financial services such as banks, loans, or credit, and vulnerable to the dangers and limitations of the cash economy.”
The lack of economic opportunities for women is one of the greatest barriers to sustainable development, Floyd added. “When women are able to overcome the institutional discrimination they face in the workforce and earn incomes, they make more equitable decisions about sons and daughters’ diet, education and health, they favour sustainable environmental practices, and domestic violence rates go down.”
A video promoting Soko (above) explains further how the site can help women. “Although these women are poor economically, they are rich in cultural capital,” it says. “Millions of women across Africa attempt to earn a living by supplementing meagre incomes by making and selling crafts – a skill that roots them deeply in culture and community. However, due to a costly export supply chain, their crafts are limited to the local economy with inconsistent demand.
Introducing Soko: A Global Platform for Innovation, Style, and Impact
Soko is the online destination for shoppers to discover stunning handcrafted accessories from around the world and purchase directly from the makers. Using Soko on a simple mobile phone, designers and artisans in the developing world can upload and sell their jewelry pieces online, with no need for a computer or a bank account.
Innovation
Soko’s unique technology platform allows artisans in the developing world to create online storefronts, sell to global shoppers and get paid, all using their mobile phone, even if they do not have access to a computer or bank account. This innovation, and our drive to continue building innovative solutions to promote the work of artisans, is at the heart of Soko.
Style
With Soko, you can discover incredible design and creative ingenuity made in communities that lay outside of the digital economy. Soko brings you exceptional style in the stunning handcrafted jewelry designs created by artisans the world over, directly to your door.
Impact
This unprecedented direct access, created by transforming the mobile phone into a tool, expands access to economic opportunity for women in underserved communities creating real, immediate impact and disrupting the traditional export supply chain.
This boutique interior by Brazilian architect Guilherme de Vasconcelos features a red faceted wall that references the angular qualities of polished gems (+ slideshow).
Vasconcelos of GUIV Arquitetura designed the interior of the Las Chicas womenswear boutique that stocks Brazilian brands in Belo Horizonte.
The faceted wall houses a small illuminated shelf for products. Made of triangular MDF polygons, it is finished in a red lacquer. “The project strategy is inspired by the process of lapping and polishing gems, which transforms raw elements of nature in precious jewellery with angular faces and bright colours,” said the architect.
Large full-height mirrored doors hide two dressing rooms.
The white counter follows a similar triangular shape to the faceted wall and sits in front of a wall patterned with hexagons.
Women’s garments are hung from tubular stainless steel supports.
Las Chicas Boutique intends to be a reference space for fashion in Belo Horizonte and seeks to enhance the Brazilian design offering clothing and accessories of consecrated national brands to the female audience. Located at the traditional neighborhood of Lourdes, in a street with high pedestrian flow and moderated commerce, the Las Chicas Boutique also promotes periodically vernissages and meetings for professionals and connoisseurs of the fashion world.
The project strategy is inspired by the process of lapping and polishing gems which transforms raw elements of nature in precious jewellery with angular faces and bright colours. The objective was to integrate a large ambient, clear and enlightened and impactful elements with angular faces and well-defined lines, to capture the attention of pedestrians passing through the region.
In that sense, the faceted panel is the key piece of the store, not only for its scale, but also due to the function it takes as space articulator. Made by triangular polygons in MDF, each one different from another, and finishing in pink matte lacquer, the panel continues to the back of the store and hides two dressing rooms behind the mirrors.The counter uses the same language, with faceted geometry and offers space for two people to work comfortably.
The clothing exhibition is made by four tubular stainless steel supports. Accessories are exposed on the bench just below the plow, at the sideboard and in panel niche. The layout adopted allows the non-linear flow of customers, which can freely explore the space of the store, and on events days enables the rapid reconfiguration of the environment.
Architect: Guilherme de Vasconcelos (GUIV Arquitetura) Photos: Gabriel Castro Start of project: September 2012 Building Completion: March 2013 Built area: 130m² Building Company: Gilberto Lacerda & Cia. Woodworking: Marcenaria Monte Santo
Speaking at Beijing’s Peking University yesterday as part of a London trade mission to China, Johnson said: “I’m here to let students know that if they would like to study internationally, London’s world class higher education intuitions will welcome them with open arms.”
“Our creative hubs from Central Saint Martins to Royal College of Art are filled with a plethora of international artistic master minds shaping the designs of things to come,” he continued. “So I hope many young people take me up on the offer to expand their horizons and study in London.”
There is no cap on the number of international students that can study in the UK and 67,000 of the country’s current overseas students come from China, but recent changes to immigration rules have made it more difficult for them to remain in the UK after graduation.
In a Dezeen story earlier this month, leading figures on the London design scene raised concerns over new visa rules that make it harder for overseas students to stay in the city. “It would be a disaster for London,” said Nigel Coates, professor emeritus at the Royal College of Art. “It’s making it very, very difficult for AA students,” agreed Sadie Morgan, president of the Architectural Association school.
Johnson is understood to share the institutions’ concerns and convened a meeting with leading London arts schools this summer to discuss the issue, but the mayor has no influence over national immigration policy.
A combined car park and terrace covers the roof of this hillside house in Los Angeles by Californian studio Anonymous Architects (+ slideshow).
Anonymous Architects designed the single-storey home for an actor. It is situated on the edge of a steep slope, so the floors are arranged from top to bottom, with an entrance on the roof and rooms on the level below.
“The added benefit of providing the parking and the house as the same structure is to eliminate the need for additional foundations and walls for a garage,” said architect Simon Storey.
“The inversion moves the typical ground floor of the house up on the roof, and makes the simple act of arriving home and driving onto the roof of the house a surprise every time,” he added.
Supported by chunky concrete columns, the house appears to be thrusting away from the edge of the slope. A recessed balcony offers views of the San Gabriel Mountains to the north east of the city.
A kitchen sits at the centre of the plan and forms the corner of an open-plan living room, while three bedrooms and two bathrooms are positioned around the other side of the house.
A bridge connects the roof with the street, providing an entrance for both cars and pedestrians.
Starting with a vacant lot with a very steep down-slope from the street, the design of the house places the carport on the roof with the residence below. In addition to being a dramatic shift of expectations, it is also a logical response to the building code which requires parking for two vehicles.
This inversion moves the typical ground floor of the house up on the roof and makes the simple act of arriving home – and driving onto the roof of the house – a surprise every time. The roof is also usable as deck space and has unobstructed views of the San Gabriel Mountains, which are to the Northeast of Los Angeles.
Because of the steep terrain the house is designed to float over the hillside. This reduces the amount of foundation required and also means that the only way to access the house is over the bridge – so it is truly a floating structure.
The added benefit of providing the parking and the house as the same structure is to eliminate the need for additional foundations and walls for a garage.
Date of completion: August 2013 Location: Echo Park, Los Angeles, California Clients: Hal Ozsan/ Judson Williams Architect: Simon Storey/ Anonymous Architects, Los Angeles Lot Area: 8,477 sq.ft Building Area: 1,405 sq.ft Building footprint: 1,405 sq.ft – single level dwelling with roof deck/ parking. 3 bedroom & 2 bathrooms. Method of construction: Concrete pile foundation with concrete pilasters above grade; steel (primary floor structure – cantilevers); wood floor, walls and roof
London architect Zaha Hadid has designed a family of superyachts for German shipbuilders Blohm+Voss (+ slideshow).
Concept for 128-metre yacht
Zaha Hadid created a concept for a 128-metre yacht, which informed the design of five smaller vessels engineered by Blohm+Voss.
Concept for 128-metre yacht
The upper structure of the design is formed from sinuous shapes connecting the different decks. This conceptual language has been pared down and applied to a series of 90-metre-long Unique Circle Yachts, refined so the vessels meet the technical specifications for ocean crossings.
Concept for 128-metre yacht
“As a dynamic object that moves in dynamic environments, the design of a yacht must incorporate additional parameters beyond those for architecture – which all become much more extreme on water,” said Hadid. “Each yacht is an engineered platform that integrates specific hydrodynamic and structural demands together with the highest levels of comfort, spatial quality and safety.”
Concept for 128-metre yacht
The JAZZ yacht, the first of five in the range, has a sharp solid prow and becomes more open towards the back. The other four boats will be customised to meet the requirements of their owners.
JAZZ yacht (left) next to the 128-metre concept yacht
Keep reading for more details from the design team:
Zaha Hadid designs Superyacht for Blohm+Voss
Pritzker prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid has collaborated with the renowned Hamburg-based shipbuilders Blohm+Voss to design a new superyacht.
The design concept, launched at the latest exhibition of Zaha Hadid’s work at the David Gill Gallery in London, is based around the sculptural form of a master prototype conceived for a 128m yacht. In addition, The Unique Circle Yachts by Zaha Hadid Architects for Blohm+Voss is a family of five individual 90-metre yachts that creatively explore the design philosophies of the master prototype within the technical requirements of a fully-engineered yacht design.
JAZZ yacht
The overall design is informed by fluid dynamics and underwater ecosystems, with hydrodynamic research informing the design of the hull. The exoskeleton structure of the upper section is an interwoven network of supports that vary in thickness and lend a natural aesthetic to the yacht’s external appearance; evoking the organic structural systems found in natural marine formations. This exoskeleton connects the various levels and decks of the ship seamlessly via expressive diagonals. Whereas traditional yacht designs adhere to a strict horizontal order, Hadid has created an intense connectivity between the various decks and elements of the design. The fluid design language of the master prototype has been applied to subsequent variations of the Unique Circle Yachts 90-metre yacht concepts, creating a coherent design with the highest correlation between the various design options.
The 90m JAZZ yacht is the first of the five Unique Circle Yachts that has been technically specified and detailed by the naval architects at Blohm+Voss. Its lineage from the 128-metre master prototype is evident, with further technical refinements to address the specifications required for ocean crossings.
JAZZ yacht
In addition to JAZZ, four further 90-metre yachts have been designed to fulfil the different requirements and individual requests of their designated owners. Each design will vary in layout according to the owner’s preferences.
The design process was very much a collaborative one, with Blohm+Voss and ZHA working together to address the practical challenges of designing a yacht while remaining true to the strong iterative design language of the master prototype. The resulting designs are the synergy of Hadid’s design vision and the technical expertise of Blohm+Voss, allowing a flexibility and customisation in the eventual design of the yacht.
JAZZ yacht
“As a dynamic object that moves in dynamic environments, the design of a yacht must incorporate additional parameters beyond those for architecture – which all become much more extreme on water. Each yacht is an engineered platform that integrates specific hydrodynamic and structural demands together with the highest levels of comfort, spatial quality and safety,” explained Zaha Hadid.
Blohm+Voss has the proven experience, the in-house technical expertise, and the capacities to offer tailor-made solutions for the most demanding buyers in the superyacht market. The naval architects of Blohm+Voss are forever pushing the boundaries of technology and innovation. In recent years Blohm+Voss has built many of the world’s most prestigious mega yachts. These include the groundbreaking 394-foot “A” designed by Philippe Starck and the “Eclipse”, designed by Terence Disdale, which at 533 feet (162.5 metres), is the world’s second largest private yacht. Other Blohm+Voss superyacht projects include, the “Mayan Queen IV” and the “Palladium”.
JAZZ yacht
Dr. Herbert Aly, CEO and Managing Partner of Blohm+Voss says: “On an aesthetic level a superyacht is a great design task as everything is customised down to the last detail. A superyacht is by definition an exercise in total design, where every detail is looked at with attention and refinement. In the past, in the era of steam liners, there has been an attempt of utilising ship building elements in architecture. Zaha Hadid and her team have taken this ethos and created a bold new vision and a new benchmark in the design of superyachts.
“The idea of the Unique Circle Yachts allows for variation of a genotype and its phenotypes, offering a range of possible solutions based on an cognate platform. As a result Zaha Hadid’s design is malleable to suit the very individual wishes and needs of a potential customer which lies at the heart of Blohm+Voss’ approach to yacht design. The strength of the design lies not just in its functionality and form, but also its effortless adaptability.”
Zaha Hadid Architects and Blohm+Voss have transformed yacht design; creating an innovative concept and developing this vision into a fully seaworthy design that offers dynamic new possibilities for naval architecture.
Dezeen promotion: tables with surfaces balanced on angled supports by Japanese designer Tokujin Yoshioka will be on display at US design brand Luminaire‘s showroom during Design Miami in December.
Yoshioka’s Elements Collection of metal furniture references the growth of crystal structures and includes side tables, desks and dining tables.
Luminaire displayed the tables at their Chicago showroom earlier in the year and will also show them at the Luminaire Lab, 3901 NE 2nd Avenue, Miami, Florida, for Design Miami taking place from 4 to 8 December.
Luminaire is excited to continue growing its relationship with Japanese designer Tokujin Yoshioka. Working throughout many years with his genius we were not surprised when the Elements Collection was revealed at the Milan fair. We still view it as one of the highlights of the week. Yoshioka’s pieces are innovative in both design and engineering. The pieces are also congruous with the designer’s poetic aesthetic.
Continuing with our mission to have the newest and best pieces showcased in our showrooms, we were the first to bring the pieces to the US and have them displayed in our showrooms. Our first engagement was during NeoCon at Luminaire Chicago. The feedback and excitement generated from the collection left us inspired. We are continuing our commitment to good design by presenting the collection as part of Luminaire’s Art Basel/Design Miami in December at our Design District location, Luminaire Lab.
Precast concrete lintels with oozing courses of grout create a distinct facade on this house near Brussels by Belgian studio And’rol (+ slideshow).
Named Wall House, the three-story family home is located near to a former stronghold, so And’rol designed a grey-brick facade with concrete lintels to reference the crumbling stone walls of the old fortress.
“The relief of the bulging grout reinforces its rough character,” said the architects.
A low wall surrounding the plot is constructed from the same materials, while the three remaining elevations of the house are clad with dark grey fibre-cement panels.
Square windows are scattered across all four elevations. Some are recessed, while others sit flush with the walls and some are screened behind horizontal concrete bars.
The house is located on the top of a steep hill and contains a split-level interior that negotiates a change in level across the site.
An asymmetric roof creates the necessary head height for the uppermost floor, which features a deep-set window facing out to the south.
The kitchen worktop is constructed from a stack of concrete slabs, referencing the building’s exterior. Other interior details include a wooden staircase with integrated seating, low-hanging pendant lights and a selection of brightly coloured furniture.
The plot’s particularities are on the one hand its perturbing position close to a steep rock slope, and on the other hand its small depth and its unusual longitudinal orientation parallel to the street.
Starting point for the young Belgian architects were traces of a nearby former stronghold. The main design element consists of an enclosing wall with a recessed rising part, to which the modest and sober main house nestles and adapts.
A second shallow volume that houses a large number of storage spaces is also located behind the wall.
The architects chose precast concrete lintels as a reinterpretation of the old fortress walls of rubble stone. The relief of the bulging grout reinforces its rough character.
Inside, a split-level organisation responds to the plot’s sloping ground, intensifies the open space concept and gives the compact building a generous and spacious character.
The used materials are deliberately kept simple and easy; the bare prestressed concrete slabs, the polished concrete flooring and the concrete bar refer to the enclosing wall.
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