Hasta La Ideas

Brooklyn-based Caliper Studio has renovated the former home and studio of American pop artist Roy Lichtenstein, adding a rooftop sculpture garden and a pair of “eyebrow-shaped” skylights.

The two buildings were originally constructed as a garage and metal shop in New York’s Greenwich Village, before the late artist converted them into a residence and workspace in the 1980s. After his death, the studio was handed over to the Lichtenstein Foundation for preservation, but the apartment remained the home of Lichtenstein’s widow Dorothy.

Architects and metalworkers Caliper Studio were asked to make a number of interior and exterior changes to the jumble of buildings, including additions to the studio, the insertion of a new garden and the renovation of a penthouse office and guest apartment.

To bring natural light into the studios, the architects constructed two curved steel skylight modules, using a concrete spray technique to build up the curved body of each structure.

They then covered a total of eight rooftops with sedum grass, artificial hills and decking to create the elevated garden, creating a new home for the Lichtenstein sculptures Brushstrokes and Endless Drip. Timber pathways lead out towards an elevated viewing platform.

Above: artwork © Estate of Roy Lichtenstein

For the guest apartment and penthouse, new structures were built using dark grey brickwork and timber louvres.

Above: artwork © Estate of Roy Lichtenstein

We’ve featured a number of artists’ studios on Dezeen, including four on a remote Canadian island and one beneath a railway viaduct in London. See more art and design studios.

See more recent projects in New York, including an apartment with a tubular steel slide and the new offices for social network Foursquare.

Photography is by Ty Cole.

Here’s some extra information from Caliper Studio:

West Village Residence and Artist Studio

A renovation at the studio of the late artist Roy Lichtenstein includes 3,000SF planted roof and sculpture garden.

A new sculpture garden connects the 2nd floor roof level of two existing buildings used by the late artist Roy Lichtenstein and his family. Still the West Village home of his widow, Dorothy, the new garden features two of Roy Lichtenstein’s outdoor sculptures. The project also includes the renovation of a guest apartment and penthouse office with views of the garden.

The planted roof’s sedum carpet partially covers two eyebrow skylights over the artist studio below. Designed to modulate light, the thin shell skylights were built using innovative fabrication technologies. Their complex geometry was realized through computer milled formwork coupled with a sprayed‐on concrete technique often used in the construction of tunnels.

Preservation of the artist’s studio was a primary design objective of the project. Careful technical detailing of the building’s envelope help ensure the longevity of the studio. The quality of the space and its character has been maintained through original artifacts including the artist’s built‐in wall easel system and paint‐splattered floor.

Above: artwork © Estate of Roy Lichtenstein

Planted Berm Skylight

Caliper Studio designed, detailed and installed these steel and glass skylights. In addition to the steelwork, Caliper also worked closely with Riverside Builders to ensure that the sprayed concrete shell construction would meet the exacting tolerance of the skylights.

Above: artwork © Estate of Roy Lichtenstein

To that end, Caliper Studio provided an accurate 3D model that was used directly for CNC milling of the formwork. Automated drawing procedures developed in-house also aided the fabrication of the complex system of steel reinforcing buried in the concrete.

Architect: Caliper Studio
Structural Engineer: Gilsanz Murray Steficek

MEP Engineer: D’Antonio Consulting Engineers
Waterproofing Consultant: James Gainfort

Landcape Design: VertNY
General Contractor: Riverside Builders

Above: planted berm skylight fabrication

Above: planted berm skylight installation

The post Roy Lichtenstein residence and studio
by Caliper Studio appeared first on Dezeen.

Focus sur Lisa Tomasetti : une photographe passionnée de danse qui nous propose des clichés de filles en tenue dans des lieux célèbres comme les capitales Paris, New York ou encore Tokyo. Des images réussies et insolites rappelant l’initiative The Tutu Project. A découvrir dans la suite de l’article.

A tubular steel slide plummets through four storeys inside this penthouse apartment in New York by architect David Hotson (+ slideshow).

The apartment occupies the uppermost stories of a late nineteenth century tower in lower Manhattan and had never been used as a residence before, so David Hotson was able to restructure the entire volume to create a quadruple-height living room, a glazed attic, indoor balconies and the two-stage slide.

“The penthouse involved a complete re-imagining of the interior and all of the remarkable relationships between this space and the vertical cityscape around it,” Hotson told Dezeen.

This cityscape includes Frank Gehry’s rippled residential tower next-door and the Chrysler Building in the distance.

The slide starts at the very top of the apartment – an attic room surrounded by glass – and is slotted into a circular hole so residents can safely climb inside and start their descent.

Above: photograph is by Eric Laignel

It’s made from polished stainless steel, giving it a mirrored surface.

After winding around a column and through a window, the slide comes to a brief stop on the next floor down.

Residents can either get out and access the rooms on this floor, or clamber back inside and spiral down through three more floors.

At the end of the slide, the stainless steel surface fans out to create a rectangular funhouse mirror at the edge of the living room.

If they don’t fancy using the slide, residents can always walk down through a faceted stairwell.

“This is a complex interior with a number of dramatic elements,” Hotson explained.

Above: photograph is by Eric Laignel

“The four-storey stairwell twists up through the centre of the apartment while the four-storey-slide provides a quick trip back down.”

Above: photograph is by Eric Laignel

The architect collaborated with interior designer Ghislaine Viñas, who added all of the furniture and artworks throughout the apartment.

Above: photograph is by Eric Laignel

These furnishings include a floral-printed “nest”, which is accessed across a bridge, and bright green breakfast area with a spherical chandelier overhead.

The riveted steel columns of the building cut up through some of the spaces, while others feature arched windows that line up with the original facades.

Buildings with slides as well as stairs have cropped up on Dezeen a few times over the years.

Others include the Denmark office of toy brand Lego and a house with a concrete slide in Indonesia. See more slides on Dezeen.

Above: photograph is by Eric Laignel

Photography is by the architect, apart from where stated otherwise.

Here’s some more information from David Hotson:

Skyhouse

Occupying a four-story penthouse structure at the summit of an early skyscraper and commanding astonishing views of the surrounding Lower Manhattan cityscape, this project creates a breathtaking contemporary home in the sky.

As the collaborative brainchild of architect David Hotson and interior designer Ghislaine Viñas, the project pairs Hotson’s crisply delineated spaces and rigorous architectural detailing with the vibrant colors, playful references and startling juxtapositions that are signatures of Viñas’ work.

The residence features a four-story high entry hall spanned by structural glass bridges and illuminated by ingenious skylights borrowing light from upper level rooms, a fifty-foot tall living room ascended by climbing holds anchored to the central column, and a mirror-polished stainless steel slide that coils down through rooms and over stairways before it flares out to form a distorted wall at one end of the entry gallery.

Juxtaposed with this spatial drama, Viñas’ incandescent colors, startling overscaled floral patterns, whimsical menagerie of animal forms, tongue-in-cheek lighting fixtures and sly pop-cultural references create a playful and lighthearted foil to the vertiginous architecture.

The design exploits its theatrical location by capturing framed views of the iconic buildings and bridges of the surrounding cityscape at a range of scales, from the dramatic skylight in the private elevator vestibule which frames the top of the new Beekman Tower by Frank Gehry looming above, to the intimate peephole in the guest bedroom shower which captures the glow of the Chrysler Building seventy blocks to the north.

The historic riveted steel structure – among the earliest steel frames used in a New York skyscraper – is exposed as it weaves through the occupied spaces at all levels.

All these elements are woven into the enveloping prototypical house form of the historic penthouse – with its steep hipped roof, chimneys and projecting dormer windows- creating the startling impression of a magical house suspended midway in the vertical cityscape of Lower Manhattan.

Above: photograph is by Build Pictures

Above: long section – click for larger image

Above: cross section though living room one – click for larger image

Above: cross section through living room two – click for larger image

Above: cross section through entry stairwell – click for larger image

Above: west elevation

Above: east elevation

The post Skyhouse by David Hotson
and Ghislaine Viñas appeared first on Dezeen.

Manhattan studio SHoP Architects has designed a masterplan of hollow skyscrapers surrounded by gardens for the site of the former Domino Sugar refinery in Brooklyn.

Working alongside landscape architects James Corner Field Operations, SHoP Architects has planned a mixed-use complex that includes the renovation of the nineteenth century factory, five new buildings, plus a series of public parks, gardens and sports fields.

The plans replace earlier proposals by Rafael Viñoly for the historic site, which started production as a sugar factory in 1856 but has been out of use since 2004. Viñoly’s proposals proved unpopular with local residents, so developer Two Trees commissioned an alternative that would offer taller buildings but more public spaces.

“If you’re standing next to a 400-foot tall building or a 600-foot tall building, you have no idea,” SHoP principal Vishaan Chakrabarti told New York magazine Curbed. “But if a 600-foot building means that you get a park where your kid can graduate, that means something to you.”

The tallest building in the scheme is a 180-metre tower, which will be positioned beside the Williamsburg Bridge to the south. Other structures will be shorter in height, relating to the scale of buildings to the north and east, and will include a tower with a rectangular void through its middle and a school at its base, plus a 600-unit apartment building. The old factory will be transformed into offices for technology companies and the creative industries.

The developer plans to push ahead with the project this year and is organising community meetings in the upcoming weeks.

SHoP Architects has worked on a number of high-profile projects recently. The team completed the Barclays sports arena in Brooklyn in September and is also developing a masterplan for a new “silicon” city in Kenya.

New York-based James Corner Field Operations is best known for its role on the High Line, an elevated park on an abandoned railway.

Here’s some more explanation from SHoP Architects:

With Two Trees Management Company, SHoP and Field Operation’s masterplan for the Domino Sugar site replaces a city-approved 2010 plan with a new proposal that adds 60% more publicly-accessible open space on a new, highly accessible street grid; provides for a new 24/7 mix of office, residential, neighborhood retail, community facilities while retaining original commitments for affordable housing; and a new form of open architecture that connects the existing neighborhood to the new quarter-mile waterfront.

Most strikingly, the plan envisions a new skyline for Brooklyn—one that relates to the height of the Williamsburg bridge to the south and scales down to meet the lower buildings across Kent Avenue to the east. Central to the scheme is the renovated Domino Sugar refinery building, which will become the nerve center of the project as a new office building across from a new public space, Domino Square.

The new surrounding buildings are porous, featuring large openings that allow light and air to penetrate through the site and into the neighborhood beyond. While exuberant on the skyline similar to new architecture being built around the world, the buildings responsibly meet the ground and the Williamsburg Street grid.

The post Domino Sugar by SHoP Architects
and James Corner Field Operations appeared first on Dezeen.

Voici « This is My Court », le nom de cette vidéo de Jonathan et Josh Baker (collectif Twin) sur la culture du basket-ball de rue aux USA. Parfaitement maîtrisée, cette création en noir & blanc est une déclaration d’amour à la culture streetball. L’ensemble est à découvrir dans la suite de l’article en vidéo.