Made from environmentally friendly post-formable plywood, for the 2011-12 Hong Kong & Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture, the Dragon Skin Pavilion marries the most up-to-date fabrication technologies with local industries of Hong Kong. The first version of the structure was designed and built at the Tampere University of Technology by students in the autumn of 2011. The pavilion was built in 8 days. An international team of material and structural engineers have built the second version For the Hong Kong Biennale.

The Dragon Skin Pavilion was carefully designed to maintain balance between the regular, repetitive framework of the rectangular panels and their gradually irregular interconnections as they configure the overall shape. It comprised 163 plywood components manufactured in Finland at TUT and shipped to Hong Kong. The components were the result of a complex process involving the latest techniques in digital fabrication. A CNC-router was used to make a wooden mould in which pre-heated flat rectangular pieces were bent into shape. A computer programmed 3D master model generated the cutting files for those pieces in a file-to-factory process: algorithmic procedures were scripted to give every rectangular component their precisely calculated slots for the sliding joints, all in gradually shifting positions and angles to give the final assembled pavilion its curved form. A meticulously pre-choreographed montage sequence required all components to be uniquely labelled and numbered for assembling or dismantling the structure. Read the rest of this entry »

Only hours to go before eVolo’s Kickstarter campaign for the book [ours] Hyper Localization of Sustainable Architecture comes to an end. Discover your inner parametric architect. At the $44 and $88 reward level we are offering the playful and mindful handcrafted zenblock, a building block that requires a special touch to be stacked or balanced. Custom made for this Kickstarter campaign the blocks are made with birch and non-VOC painted on a single facet with eVolo Magazine colors and finished with a non toxic oil finish. The wood is reclaimed from a window manufacturer and each unique piece is handcrafted.

They can be stacked, they can be balanced. They can be left alone and gazed upon, or they can handled. Whatever you do, they will look great.

From a child to an adult, it is the balance game that anyone can enjoy. Since it is a simple form, you may enjoy it as an art object. Place them on your desk or table, and observe.

Other rewards include eVolo Magazine #04, signed copies of the book, the chapter [Japan Condenses], exclusive transcripts of interviews with extraordinary architects, and even a presentation on what hyper-localization mean in the world and your community.

-> [ours] Hyper Localization of Sustainable Architecture on Kickstarter

The BMW Group Pavilion is inspired by Victorian bandstands, applied in relation to the building’s natural surroundings. Designed by Serie Architects, the building is a place of spectacle, presenting the BMW brand and services. Located on the Waterworks River in the Olympic Park, the pavilion achieved its distinctive appearance by re-imagining the classic podium. It is light and seems to be floating above the water. Its animated façade, with water streaming down around the ground floor, creates an exciting visual effect. The first floor that forms the plinth is covered with water; this water spills down on all four sides of the pavilion entirely covering the ground floor.

One of the pavilion’s functions is to display BMW’s new fleet of electric and hybrid vehicles. These vehicles use carbon fiber bodywork with fluid soft curves. The geometry of the pavilion roofs manifests a similar calm and rationale attitude to geometry through the use of off-phase sinusoidal curves set out in symmetrical arrangement. The building thus communicates as sense of fluid dynamism without imitating the product.

The pavilion is in fact a cluster of smaller pavilions. Huddled together, the group of spaces is planned to be dispersed to other locations after the Olympic Games and serving as constant reminders of the Games held in London.

Designed by students at the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia IAAC, the Endessa Pavilion is part of the Smart City Expo in Barcelona, Spain. The aim of the project is exploring the possiblities of distributed intelligence concept. The building is conceived as an adaptive system that responds to environmental influences. The skin is constructed as a network of intelligent nodes that position themselves according to solar radiation. Read the rest of this entry »

Panama City’s Museum of Biodiversity, also known as Biomuseo, is designed by American architect Frank Gehry. In attempt to recapture the energy and urban impact of his Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Gehry was commissioned to design an iconic urban structure for this burgeoning Central American capital city. The building in question, like Bilbao’s, is meant to act as a distinctive jewel in the city’s skyline, an emblematic structure that both houses and acts as art. As its name implies, the museum is meant to catalog the tropical region’s biodiversity, and contains within its walls, a series of rainforest-like gardens and climate controlled-biospheres that were designed by Bruce Mau Design, who helped to articulate the museum’s interior spaces, visitor experience, and the manner in which visitors learn while attending the museum. Read the rest of this entry »

London-based Illustrator and sculptor Arran Gregory’s latest line of creations take the notion of faceted surface and apply that concept to the form of wild animals. In this case, for his exhibition titled ‘Wolf,’ Gregory has sculpted a wolf out of acrylic resin and mineral stone and applied cut, faceted mirrors to every surface along its body. The resulting work is striking, yielding a dramatic form that reflects both light and image.The difficulty of translating the supple, organic lines of a living creature’s body into geometric lines and cut glass only furthers the impact of this aesthetic statement. Gregory often works in natural forms like these, typically employing all manner of fauna in his body of work. In the past, he has sculpted greyhounds, bears, deer, and a rhinoceros. His subjects portray a naturalism of form that is obscured and abstracted through material, sometimes via the faceted glass method, other times left unadorned, showing only the stark white of the cast resin and stone.

This work represents a formalized approach to naturalistic form that uses material and color to interpret and abstract that naturalistic form towards artistic ends. The artist utilizes line and plane to render complex form.

The private Mecenat Art Museum, designed by Naf Architect & Design, houses the work of a Japanese-style painter Kakudo Goami. The design of the building focuses on natural lighting which pours into the interior through a white cylinder structure.

Description from the architects:
The works of Mr. Goami give striking image of various lights, thus, I decided to design the building focusing on natural light.  Soft diffused light from top light, direct light pouring  from top light through white cylinder for condensation of light spreading on the first floor, soft light from slits on the walls reflecting on the exterior green, fragments of graphical lights pouring through 432 plate glasses on the concrete walls; the space is filled with various kinds of lights.  As an exhibition space, there was no need for structure such as columns and beams but as large wall as possible.  The important factor of the museum was to incorporate natural light and wind, so corners are sliced with slits to the extent which would not interfere the exhibit.  This idea would have left the building structurally fragile, so we studied a rational shape, which was structurally stable like folding one sheet of paper, origami, many time to make several corners, with models and three-dimensional structure analysis by computer. Read the rest of this entry »

eVolo’s Kickstarter campaign for the book [ours] Hyper Localization of Sustainable Architecture ends at noon on August 31. As the 21st century unfolds new paradigms in architecture are evolving where environmental awareness merges with a new sense of place. [ours] uncovers the best in environmentally astute building design so don’t miss your chance to help support the investigation of the new architectural archetype in three distinct regions and to receive some unique rewards.

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Realitat’s Microsonic Landscapes use 3-D printing machinery and algorithmic mapping to arrive at physical manifestations of recorded musical sound. These handheld sculptures are unique amongst one another because each represents the formalization of a different musical recording. In this instance, each recording is actually a full-length album; the albums chosen were picked according to Realitat’s musical tastes. Their self-stated mission, to create “an algorithmic exploration of the music we love,” is successfully completed. Each album is copied onto a program called Processing which maps and extrapolates the sounds on each song into coordinates that the 3-D printer can turn into solid mass. The objects are printed in a series of rings, but aside from that, the form taken can vary wildly, with each record registering unique patterns of height, depth, solid, and void. The process employed here represents a direct and literal translation of sound into form. There are no variables or inputs applied to the algorithms that would manipulate or affect the final form. Read the rest of this entry »

Located in front of the Casalgrande Padana Headquarters, the CCCloud monument is a result of the collaboration between Kengo Kuma Architects, Alfonso Acocella, Luigi Alini, and Casalgrande Padana. The monument is constructed of unglazed ceramic tiles that have been adapted for structural use.

The entire structure is 45 meters long and 12 meters high, with a maximum width of 1.7 meters in the central section. It consists of nine layers of porcelain stoneware tiles 60 x 120 cm that are stacked and articulated through fine threaded rods. Traditionally used as coating, the ceramic tiles are here used as a structural component.

As a thin curtain, the CCCloud divides the roundabout, drawing the attention of visitors. The monument is oriented in line with the street, making cars disappear from view. This anti-monumental strategy creates a low profile on the site that generates a space without overwhelming the viewer. The actual proportion of the line is apparent throughout the car’s movement through the site. Read the rest of this entry »