Rather than responding to the brief with a monumental artwork “representing the heritage of Perth”, Emergent’s design consists of an outcropping of human-scale Photobioreactors which relate to the city in a more nuanced way. These devices are intended to operate ontologically at both conceptual and visceral levels, in terms of space, color, luminosity, but also infrastructure and engineering. There are seven elements, tied together by a pleated, color-variegated groundscape which tracks a network of biofuel lines leading across the street to the Perth train station.

The outer shells of the Photobioreactors are fiber-composite monocoque construction, pleated for stiffness. These structures support large transparent polycarbonate apertures to allow in sunlight while also protecting internal moving parts. Inside are coils of transparent acrylic which contain green or red algae colonies. The photosynthetic process of the algae requires carbon dioxide on the front end, and produces bio-diesel or hydrogen at the back-end. These devices therefore simultaneously remediate the environment by removing carbon dioxide from the local atmosphere and generate fuel in a closed-loop, off-the-grid system. One of the implications here is that energy production may, in the future, be super-localized and embedded in daily behaviors, rather than magically available from distant sources. Read the rest of this entry »

David Tajchman received an honorable mention to design the Meribor Museum in Slovenia. The high-tech project consists of fragmented pixilated surface inspired in the traditional Slovenian lacework. The steep condition of the site was considered to elevate the museum galleries to the first level and create a public square at the ground plane where different ramps connect the exterior with the interior spaces creating a constant flux of people.

An interesting aspect of the proposal is the transformation of the walls into continuous programs. It is an innovative surface that folds and peels according to program and circulation. At one point it creates and enclosed auditorium and in another it organizes the public outdoor landscape. Read the rest of this entry »

Diller Scofidio + Renfro designed the new Museum of Image and Sound in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to be completed in 2011. The architecture of the museum takes Copacabana Beach as its inspiration; its coastline, its mountains, and its distinctive beach promenade designed by Roberto Burle Marx. The building is conceived as an extension of the promenade, stretched vertically into the museum. This new “vertical boulevard” gently traverses indoor and outdoor spaces and branches to make galleries, education programs, and spaces for public leisure and entertainment.

The vertical circulation sequence connects the street with the building’s entertainment programs. The building is also conceived as an instrument to observe the city in a new way. The panoramic view before it, overexposed to tourists in the hotels and restaurants while restricted for many residents, is perhaps the central image at stake. Read the rest of this entry »

New York architecture firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R) designed the museum expansion and sculpture garden to the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington DC.  According to DS+R “The Bubble is an inflatable event space planned for the cylindrical courtyard of the Hirshhorn Museum. In respectful dialogue with this Modernist icon originally designed by Gordon Bunshaft in 1974, the Bubble is an architecture of air; a pneumatic structure enclosed only by a thin translucent membrane that squeezes into the void of the building and oozes out the top beneath its mass.”

In contrast to the familiar strategy of roofing over courtyards of institutional buildings, the Bubble produces a soft building inside of a hard one in which existing and new spaces, both interior and exterior are playfully intertwined. The ephemeral structure will be erected twice-yearly, allowing the museum to program its courtyard. Read the rest of this entry »

Chris Bosse has sliced up the Panton chair as part of the Re-loved: designer stories at the Powerhouse Museum from July 31  to October 10.

Bosse, director of innovative architectural firm LAVA, is one of several designers commissioned by the Powerhouse to use a pre-loved chair to tell a story about a piece of furniture they love. He chose a design classic that relates to current design and manufacturing techniques.

The gravity defying Panton chair c1967 by Danish designer Verner Panton was a radical departure from traditional design and manufacturing techniques. It anticipated the digital revolution by 30 years and is the first freeform, organic molded piece of furniture. “I’ve chosen to represent this shape as slices, similar to an MRI scan in order to make visible its complex 3dimensional geometry. The chair is metaphorically and physically carved out of a sliced box ” says Bosse.

“The project retro-digitises the chair design, although it was the chair that preceded the digital design revolution.”

“What made the Panton chair so spectacular when it came on the market and what makes it so interesting today in terms of design history is not only its shape, which is as extravagant as it is elegant, but also the fact that it was the first chair made out of one piece of plastic. Every chair at the time was about the assembly techniques of materials, compression, tension, and junction. Verner Panton exploited the possibilities offered by the new material in order to achieve a total departure from classical design thinking.” Read the rest of this entry »

Table Cloth, designed by Ball Nogues Studio, is collaboration between the UCLA Department of Architecture and Urban Design, The Herb Alpert School of Music, and UCLA Design Media Arts. It is made possible by generous support from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts and the UCLA Arts Initiative.

The installation in the courtyard at Schoenberg Hall serves as an integrated set piece and backdrop for performance and everyday social interaction. We understand the work as a tablecloth to adorn and activate the architecture of the campus. Tables are places where people interact socially. Dining tables, specifically, facilitate organization and communication within the typical American home.

We see this project like the cloth adorning a dining table; however, at Schoenberg it will embellish a courtyard, an important social hub, and will facilitate community at the scale of the University. It can be used for a variety of activities, from musical practice to performance, dance to lectures, and from casual conversations to academic discussions. It will embellish the courtyard through the summer of 2010. The processes to manufacture, assemble, and dismantle the performance space are examples of an unique approach to the challenges of sustainability. This approach to design, manufacturing and re-purposing of building materials is a process we term “Cross Manufacturing.” Read the rest of this entry »

SOFTlab is one of the most talented design studios in New York; they recently won the New Practices New York Award and they need your help to produce an installation at the Bridgegallery in the lower east side of Manhattan. The idea is to fill the gallery by August 26^th with a funnel made out of 5,000 panels of different color.

In order to fund CHROMAtex.me they have created a Kickstarter page. The catch is that if they do not raise the set amount in the remaining days, they will lose all the funds. So, if you have as little as $5 you will help this project become a colorful reality. In addition, there are very interesting rewards including pieces of the actual exhibit mailed to you. Read the rest of this entry »

Architecture firm Peter Rose + Partners has completed the Kripalu Annex, the first step in the firm’s master plan to reshape the Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health. The project, which reflects Rose’s career-long commitment to ecologically innovative design, has recently been declared a winner of the prestigious AIA National Housing Award in the category of Specialized Housing; just one day later, I.D.’s 2010 Annual Design Review awarded Kripalu an Honorable Mention in the Environments category.

Tucked into 300 acres of dense forest in the Berkshire Mountains, Kripalu (kri-PAH-loo) is the largest and most established yoga retreat in North America. For over 30 years, Kripalu has been teaching skills for optimal living through experiential education for mind, body, and spirit, and this holistic approach was the starting point for the innovative plan that secured Peter Rose the Kripalu commission in 2004. 

According to Rose, “Kripalu’s housing needs are modest and straightforward, but the architecture of the Annex, like yoga itself, is full of subtlety and layers of complexity that gently improve the structure’s performance. Light, air, using minimal means to create a calm, healing environment—it’s all about fulfilling these almost intangible requirements.”

The 80-room Housing Tower is attached to Kripalu’s existing facility through a glazed passage with a planted roof and sunny southern exposure, allowing guests to pass from the older structure to the new one with ease—in their stocking feet if they choose. Under a canopy on the western façade, the primary entrance leads to a modest lobby and a 2,400-square-foot yoga space glazed on two sides, surrounded by dense foliage, and filled with light. Read the rest of this entry »

eVolo Magazine is pleased to invite students, architects, engineers, and designers from around the globe to take part in the 2011 Skyscraper Competition.

The annual eVolo Skyscraper Competition is a forum for the discussion, development, and promotion of innovative concepts for vertical density. It examines the relationship between the skyscraper and the natural world, the skyscraper and the community, and the skyscraper and the city.

The exponential increase of the world’s population and its unprecedented shift from rural to urban areas has prompted hundreds of new developments without adequate urban planning and poor architectural design. The aim of this competition is to redefine what we understand as a skyscraper and initiate a new architectural discourse of economic, environmental, intellectual, and perceptual responsibility that could ultimately modify our cities and improve our way of life.

The use of new materials, technologies, aesthetics, and novel spatial organizations, along with studies on globalization, flexibility, adaptability, and the digital revolution are some of the multi-layered elements that the participants should take into consideration. This is also an investigation on the public and private space and the role of the individual and the collective in the creation of a dynamic and adaptive vertical community.

There are no restrictions in regards to site, program or size. The objective is to provide maximum freedom to the participants to engage the project without constraints in the most creative way. What is a skyscraper in the 21^st century? What are the historical, contextual, social, urban, and environmental responsibilities of these mega-structures?

Registration

Students, architects, engineers, and designers are invited to participate in the competition. We encourage you to have multidisciplinary teams.

• Participants must register by January 11, 2011.
• Early Registration:  US $65 until November 16, 2010
• Late Registration: US $85 from November 17, 2010 to  January 11, 2011
• One registration = One project.
• Participants may submit various projects, but must register each entry.
• There is no limit as to the number of participants per team. Individual entries are accepted.
• After your registration has been approved eVolo will send the registration number which will be necessary for submission boards.

Schedule

• July 19, 2010 – Competition announcement, registration begins, acceptance of questions
• November 8, 2010 – Deadline for submitting questions
• November 16, 2010 – Early registration deadline
• November 30, 2010 – Answers to questions posted on website
• January 11, 2011 – Late registration deadline
• January 18, 2011 – Project submission deadline
• February 28, 2011 – Winners’ announcement

Submission Requirements

This is a digital competition and no hardcopies are necessary. Entrants must submit their proposal via email no later than January 18, 2011 (23:00 hours US Eastern Time) to the following email address:  skyscraper2011@evolo.us

The project submission must contain the following files:

1. Two boards with the project information including plans, sections, and perspectives. Participants are encouraged to submit all the information they consider necessary to explain their proposal. These boards should be 24″ X 48″ in HORIZONTAL format. The resolution of the boards must be 150 dpi, RGB mode and saved as JPG files. The upper right corner of each board must contain the participation number. There should not be any marks or any other form of identification. The files must be named after the registration number followed by the board number. For example: 0101-1.jpg and 0101-2.jpg.
2. A DOC file containing the project statement (600 words max). This file must be named after the registration number followed by the word “statement”. For example: 0101-statement.doc.
3. A DOC file containing the entrants’ personal information, including name, profession, address, and email. This file must be named after the registration number followed by the word “info”. For example: 0101-info.doc.
4. All the files must be placed in a ZIP folder named after your registration number. For example:  0101.zip

Jury

Benjamin Aranda [principal Aranda\Lasch]
Juan Azulay [principal Matter Management, professor at Southern California Institute of Architecture]
CarloMaria Ciampoli [port director Live Architecture Network]
Mario Cipresso [principal Studio Shift, professor at University of Southern California]
Ted Givens [associate director RMJM]
Eric Goldemberg [principal Monad Studio, professor at Florida International University]
Jose Gonzalez [principal Softlab, professor at Pratt Institute]
John Hill [editor Archidose] 
Mitchell Joachim [principal Terreform One, professor at New York University]
Andrew Liang [principal Studio 0.10., professor at University of Southern California] 
Chris Lasch [principal Aranda\Lasch]
Neri Oxman [principal Materialecology, Presidential Fellow at MIT Media Lab]
Javier Quintana [principal Taller Basico de Arquitectura, Dean of IE School of Architecture]
Rezza Rahdian [Architect, Second Place 2009 Skyscraper Competition]
Michel Rojkind [principal Rojkind Arquitectos]
Michael Szivos [principal Softlab, professor at Pratt Institute]

Regulations

1. This is an anonymous competition and the registration number is the only means of identification.
2. The official language of the competition is English.
3. The registration fee is non-refundable.
4. Contacting the Jury is prohibited.
5. Entrants will be disqualified if any of the competition rules are not considered.
6. Participation assumes acceptance of the regulations.

Awards

• 1st place – US $5000
• 2nd place – US $2000
• 3rd place – US $1000

Winners and special mentions will be published in several print magazines including eVolo_04.
Previous winners have been featured in:

About:Blank Magazine – Portugal, Aeroflot – Russia, Architecture and Culture – Korea, AWM – The Netherlands, B-1 – Thailand, Bauwelt – Germany, Blueprint – United Kingdom, BusinessWeek – USA, C3 – Korea, CAAOH – Ukraine, Casamica – Italy, Casas y Mas – Mexico, Discover Magazine – USA, Enlace – Mexico, Focus – Canada/Italy, Future Arquitecturas – Spain, Grazia Casa – Italy, Indian Architect Builder – India, Kijk – The Netherlands, L’Installatore Italiano – Italy, La Razon – Spain, L’Arca – Italy, Le Fourquet – Mexico, L’Uomo Vogue – Italy, Mark Magazine – The Netherlands, Mladina – Slovenia, NAN – Spain, New Scientist – United Kingdom, Of Arch – Italy, Pasajes de Arquitectura – Spain, Popular Mechanics – USA/Russia, Puls Biznesu – Poland, Quo – China/Spain, RUM – Sweden, Salt Magazine – The Netherlands, Space – Korea, Spade – Canada, Spazio Casa – Italy, Stafette – Germany, Tatlin – Russia, The Broker – The Netherlands, The Outlook Magazine – China, Time Style and Design – USA, Vida Simples Magazine – Brazil, Vogue – Australia, USA, Vox Design – Poland, Wettbewerbe Aktuell – Germany, Wired – USA/Italy, Woongjin – Korea, World Architecture – China

Leading international art-based design studio Urban Art Projects (UAP) today announced their collaboration with artist Ned Kahn, Hassell Sydney,  and the Brisbane (Australia) Airport Corporation (BAC) to convert Brisbane’s new Domestic Terminal short-term multi-level car park in to an eight-storey kinetic public art project.

After being engaged by BAC for the project Urban Art Projects commissioned established American artist Ned Kahn who is known for his innovative works throughout North America and Europe.

Kahn, who has developed an international following for his artworks that incorporate the use of natural elements such as wind and light will collaborate with UAP and BAC’s design team to create a 5000 Sq m kinetic façade for the new Domestic Terminal short-term car park. Read the rest of this entry »