Hasta La Ideas

This wooden chamber by Irish architects O’Donnell + Tuomey stretches up like a funnel towards the roof of the Arsenale Corderie at the Venice Architecture Biennale.

Top and above: photography is by Alice Clancy

There are rectangular holes between the columns and beams of the wooden structure, which the architects compare to the timber moulds that are used to cast bricks.

Above: photograph is by Alice Clancy

Vistors to the exhibition can climb inside the chamber through openings on each side, while light filters in through another opening at the top.

Other exhibitions at the Arsenale include hanging foam models by Herzog & de Meuron, a pleated metal funnel by Zaha Hadid and a house built by Indian craftsman.

See all our coverage of the Venice Architecture Biennale »

Here’s a description from O’Donnell + Tuomey:

The word vessel is suggestive of embodiment, enshrinement and containment. It carries associations with craft and circulation. Airship, boat, blood vessel, utensil.

Vessel is a site-specific response to the theme of Common Ground, a plank-stacked structure in conversation with the layered brick construction of the Corderie. Vessel is a contemplative space hollowed out of solid matter, a light funnel, a lantern chamber, and a passage leading towards our common ground.

Literary and artistic affinities constitute our common ground. Architecture’s deeper resonance is related to its wider culture. The work of other architects, artists, poets, and performers sustains us. They provide inspiration for us to make our own work. Such affinities are part of our cultural context. We have invoked precedent and invited practitioners to contribute to our installation. We have remembered inspirational works and reflected on projects that run parallel to our own pursuits.

Above: photograph is by Alice Clancy

Bricks are cast from a mould, each special brick has to be hand-thrown from its own wooden casing. Clods of clay are dug out from the forest floor and the wood for the mould is cut from the trees. Brick and timber, the raw materials of archaic construction, have not changed much since the ship-builders built their vessels between the brick columns of the Corderie.

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at Venice Architecture Biennale 2012 appeared first on Dezeen.

Urban improvement projects in neighbourhoods across America are presented on stripy blinds that can be pulled down from the ceiling of the United States Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2012 (+ slideshow).

Above: photograph is by Dezeen

The panels are connected to a system of pulleys and counterweights, which are labelled with the names of the problems identified by each project.

As visitors pull the panels down to eye-level, the corresponding rectangular weights lift up to reveal how each problem was resolved.

A total of 124 projects are illustrated across the four rooms of the pavilion and include seedbomb vending machines, guerrilla bike lanes, a pop-up wedding chapel, a mobile farm and a tree-measuring kit.

Above: photograph is by Dezeen

A graphical timeline covers the floor, placing the projects alongside their historical predecessors.

See our pick of the five best pavilions here, including the shape-shifting Dutch pavilion and the QR code-covered Russian pavilion.

Above: photograph is by Dezeen

See all our stories about the Venice Architecture Biennale »

Photography is by Freecell, apart from where otherwise stated.

Here’s some information from the organisers:

SpontaneousInterventions: Design Actions for the Common Good
United States Pavilion

The U.S. Pavilion at the 13th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, organized by the Institute for Urban Design on behalf of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, is devoted to the theme SpontaneousInterventions: Design Actions for the Common Good.

Above: Greenaid Seedbomb Vending Machine by COMMONstudio

The exhibit features 124 urban interventions initiated by architects, designers, planners, artists, and everyday citizens that bring positive change to their neighborhoods and cities. The selection was narrowed down after a search process that included an open call for projects realized in U.S. cities in recent years, which yielded over 450 submissions.

Above: Edible Schoolyard New York City by WORKac

SpontaneousInterventions captures one of the most compelling contemporary urban trends, wherein individuals are taking it upon themselves to create projects that expand the amenities, comfort, functionality, inclusiveness, safety, and sustainability of cities. From parklets to community farms, guerrilla bike lanes to urban repair squads, outdoor living rooms to pop-up markets, sharing networks, and temporary architecture, Spontaneous Interventions highlights viable citizen-led alternatives to traditional top-down urban revitalization tactics.

Above: Ghost Bikes

Together, these projects offer an opportunity to examine the history of the American city, painting a critical and dynamic portrait of its most pressing issues today and a vision of its future. At heart, SpontaneousInterventions is a reflection of country’s complex attitudes towards civic participation, social justice, and the built environment.

Above: Guerrilla Bike Lanes

SpontaneousInterventions—curated by Cathy Lang Ho (Commissioner and Curator), David van der Leer, and Ned Cramer (co-curators)—resonates on many levels with the overall theme of the Biennale, conceived by director David Chipperfield, Common Ground. The projects featured in Spontaneous Interventions are characterized by their interest in collaboration, in serving the collective needs of a community, and in improving the literal common ground— public space. The exhibition examines how urban actions that originated as radical ideas have moved ever closer to the center, evolving from subversive tactic to increasingly accepted urban strategy.

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Architecture Biennale 2012 appeared first on Dezeen.

Curator Justin McGuirk tells us why his Golden Lion-winning installation about a community living in a vertical slum in Caracas could set an example for new forms of urban housing, in this movie we filmed at the Venice Architecture Biennale.

“Why should the majority of the poor in countries like Venezuela be forced to live in the slums around the edge of cities if there are empty office towers in the city centres?,” he says.

McGuirk teamed up with architects Urban-Think Tank and photographer Iwan Bann to create the Torre David/Gran Horizonte exhibition and restaurant, which presents the findings of a year-long research project.

The 45-storey Torre David skyscraper was designed for a financial organisation in the 1990s, but construction was abandoned following the the death of the developer and squatters began moving in. The building is now home to around 3000 residents, who have adapted the concrete shell by partitioning off rooms to suit their needs.

“When you look inside you will find that the apartments are actually like any middle class apartments in the world,” said Urban-Think Tank founder Alfredo Brillembourg at the preview on Monday. “So this is not a slum; the slum is in your head.”

Photographs by Iwan Bann displayed in the Arsenale exhibition show how businesses and groups also occupy the building, including factories, hairdressers a gym and even a church. ”We’ve mapped how people have built a whole infrastructure and city themselves,” said Baan.

The pop-up Venezuelan restaurant brings a flavour of Caracas to the exhibition, illustrating the team’s belief that “sharing a meal is the best way to establish common ground for a discussion.”

We also reported on the project earlier this week, when it was awarded the Golden Lion for best project at the biennale.

See all our coverage of the Venice Architecture Biennale »

Photography is by Iwan Baan.

Here’s some more information from Urban-Think Tank:

Torre David, a 45-story office tower in Caracas designed by the distinguished Venezuelan architect Enrique Gómez, was almost complete when it was abandoned following the death of its developer, David Brillembourg, in 1993 and the collapse of the Venezuelan economy in 1994.

Today, it is the improvised home of a community of more than 750 families, living in an extra- legal and tenuous occupation that some have called a vertical slum.

Alfredo Brillembourg and Hubert Klumpner, along with their research and design teams at Urban-Think Tank and ETH Zürich, spent a year studying the physical and social organization of this ruin-turned-home. Where some only see a failed development project, U-TT has conceived it as a laboratory for the study of the informal.

In this exhibit and in their forthcoming book, Torre David: Informal Vertical Communities, the architects lay out their vision for practical, sustainable interventions in Torre David and similar informal settlements around the world.

They argue that the future of urban development lies in collaboration among architects, private enterprise, and the global population of slum-dwellers. Brillembourg and Klumpner issue a call to arms to their fellow architects to see in the informal settlements of the world a potential for innovation and experimentation, with the goal of putting design in the service of a more equitable and sustainable future.

In the spirit of the Biennale’s theme, Common Ground, the installation takes the form of a Venezuelan arepa restaurant, creating a genuinely social space rather than a didactic exhibition space. The residents of Torre David have similarly created a variety of common grounds—for sports, leisure, worship, and meetings—that reinforce the cohesive nature of this settlement.

Even before its opening, this installation has become controversial in the Venezuelan architectural community. Many are dismayed that the nation’s architectural accomplishments are “represented” by a never-completed and “ruined” work; others argue that the exhibit condones the Venezuelan government’s tacit and explicit support of illegal seizure and occupation of property. In fact, none of these positions reflects the true nature and purpose of the exhibit.

Above: the installation at the Arsenale

It, and its creators, avoid taking political sides, arguing that Torre David represents not Venezuelan architecture but rather an experiment in informal/formal hybridity and a critical moment in the global phenomenon of informal living.

Above: the restaurant

With the aim of developing the debate over Torre David and similar sites in other cities, the installation includes many of the letters and newspaper articles that have appeared in response to the announcement of this exhibition.

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empty offices in the city?” asks Justin McGuirk appeared first on Dezeen.

Patrick Vale is an architectural illustrator, which is awesome because I didn’t even know that job existed anymore. On the drawing of a building in London, above, you can see the UK-based Vale has scrawled “Too many effing windows.” But lest you think the man lacks patience, check out his video below, where he spends five days drawing up an insanely detailed view of Manhattan:

By the bye, potential clients should be aware that the plotter-like Vale didn’t require five full days to complete the drawing, but did it in spurts over that time period. “Had to fit it in round paid work!” he explains.

Check out more of Vale’s stuff here.

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Portuguese architects Álvaro Siza and Eduardo Souto de Moura have created a pair of installations in the Giardino delle Vergini for the Venice Architecture Biennale (+ slideshow).

Siza, who was this year awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, has installed a series of bright red walls amongst the trees and plants of the garden, while Souto de Moura has created a sandy-coloured structure that frames views over the waters of the Arsenale.

Angled slices provide windows in the walls of Souto de Moura’s piece and Siza’s features a cantilevered canopy that shades visitors as they leave.

Landscape designer Piet Oudolf designed the surrounding gardens for the 2010 biennale and returned this year to maintain them.

The Venice Architecture Biennale opened to the public this week and will run until 25 November.

Click here to see more projects by Siza, or here to see architecture by Souto de Moura.

See all our stories about the Venice Architecture Biennale 2012 »

Here’s some more information from the exhibition:

Siza’s piece accompanies and complements the installation by his long-time collaborator Eduardo Souto de Moura.

If the latter considers the choreography of views as an area of architectural enquiry, Siza’s evokes the intimate bodily scale of the streets of Venice, and frames and makes new settings for the trees and planting of the Giardino delle Vergini.

Souto de Moura’s piece, looking out across the water, creates both a gateway to the gardens, and directs views across the waters of the Arsenale.

The piece is intended as a reflection on the composition of facades and windows, while interpreting the surroundings of the garden and water.

Souto de Moura says “Geography become how we want it to be and not as it has to be. This is the great leap of the modern movement, and a result of postmodernism.”

Siza was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at this year’s International Architecture Exhibition by La Biennale di Venezia.

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Álvaro Siza and Eduardo Souto de Moura appeared first on Dezeen.