One can’t possible think about the Architecture of buildings without considering the physical and non-physical conditions that surround it. In the process of thinking about a specific typology; especially a tall building, the context becomes more important than ever, If one has to reimagine the tall building, there has to be a clear understanding of what cause-effect relationship tall buildings have on its context and users. Most tall buildings are found in city centers of most major cities globally. These city centers are also known as the downtowns, they carry a different urban grain due to the inherent density of tall buildings.

In order to reimagine the tall buildings well, it would be most effective to consider them in the downtown context. That will enables us to understand the most important issues associated with them, helps us provide an integrated piece of architecture which will not just redefine the tall buildings but also the core concept of the Downtown; A new version of the downtown.

Higher density results in sustainable downtowns, but most tall buildings in the downtown function in a very unsustainable way; with a huge carbon footprint. Almost all buildings are huge masses of singular programs with only single connection to the context which happens at the street level. This condition results in a huge volume of population densely packed in the buildings, very close to each other yet disconnected. Due to the height of these buildings create longer and larger shading regions. These result in a lack of natural daylight at the street level, which is also the only active plane where people can interact with each other. These tall buildings do offer the best views; unfortunately rooftops of the same are occupied by mechanical equipment. Lastly, downtowns tend to have latent spaces- they are mainly used as parking. These spaces aren’t just underutilized but also a huge safety issue during the night since they are not well lit; these areas give downtowns a bad rap. The change can be brought upon about these issues in an intelligent way. This need for a design to bring about a change fuels my need to reimagine tall buildings. Read the rest of this entry »

According to the KMUTT Roadmap 2020, the university is aspiring to be one of the world class universities in the area of science and technology. For the Learning Innovation, the design by MAB Studio (Achawin Laohavichairat) used biomimicry as a natural inspiration to make the building harmony with the context. The building became a new transition of the university to transfer people to go to each building and to create the structure that can show the potential of the engineering because that is an image of the university, the biomimetic strategies that integrate form, material, and structure into a single process. We try to observe and study the behavior of natural form. The structure is derived from the geometry of an infinite array of the structure. The structure in the building is a light weight structure. There is main circulation in the building and each program was designed along the main circulation. There are three dimensional structures as a space truss module those transfer the load to each other. The structural module was created by a natural pattern. Read the rest of this entry »

The Buddhist temple soon to be built in Taichang, China, takes shape of a Mobius ring, reflecting the basic principles of Buddhism and the idea of reincarnation. With the aid of digital design and fabrication techniques, the spatial logic of the building is rooted in the idea of “formlessness”. The architecture is interpreted as a path, connecting the beginning with the end, ultimately representing the principle of reincarnation. The shape of the project allows the inner and outer surface to meet in the same point seamlessly. The entire building is intertwined with two spiral dislocation rise. The form of the building does not have the traditional architectural image of circular structures, but an “unstable” configuration with the beginning and ending of the worshipper’s path occurring at the same point. Read the rest of this entry »

Arteixo Tourist Office was designed by the Spanish firm Alejandro Garcia y Arquitectos and is located on a site previously used as a bus top. The ambition was to create an urban attraction of the Arteixo municipality in Galicia, Spain.

Note that other cities such as Santiago de Compostela and are themselves an attraction, not necessary that the Tourist Office be, however in Arteixo Tourism is little known (beaches, trails landscapes, architecture , trade is not known) is why from the beginning we wanted a solution that was the center of attraction of tourism, the tourist that goes to the coast of Finisterre or death did stop along the way through a unique building after giving staff would be responsible for information that will remain on Arteixo tourists to consume and learn from another point of view the area. Read the rest of this entry »

The sandsone walls of Junta Castilla y León offices are completely enveloped in glass. Using the same stone as the Zamora Catherdral, which is located in the west of the historic walled city, Spanish architect Alberto Campo Baeza has created a box-like building with two irregularly shaped courtyards. The building houses the advisory board for the autonomous region of Castilla y León. Read the rest of this entry »

The winning proposal for the New Keelung Harbor Service Project, designed by Neil M. Denari Architects, focuses on its relationship with the site and draws from it the design guidelines in terms of massing, materials and colors. Located in Keelung, Taiwan, the new port will serve up to 10,000 cruise ship passengers a day. The terminal is scheduled to enter construction in 2013.

The phasing of the construction process precipitated the terminal’s linear organization. The main entry and boarding corridor are located at +7m, while the shopping mezzanine and boardwalk are at +13m. Shaped by these parameters as well as the functional circuitry of the various pathways and hardware of movement, the terminal extracts formal properties from programmatic limits. ETFE skylights hover over voids lined with stainless steel mesh, a diaphanous surface intended to refract light into the terminal spaces. The Northern end of the terminal turns vertical as it supports a cantilevered scenic restaurant, which itself becomes a bridge to the second phase office complex. Below the Gateway Tower is a boardwalk called “the Shoelace” that forms a connective loop / roundabout to other directions on the boardwalk level. Read the rest of this entry »

2011 Winner - Student Digital/Mixed. Brent Lobstein

The Ken Roberts is the most senior architectural drawing competition currently in operation anywhere in the world.

In the late 1920’s, The Architectural League of New York established the first American competition for architectural drawings. It was named after Birch Long, one of their greatly talented and much-loved members who died while working on their 1927 exhibition. The “Birch Burdette Long Memorial Prize” was awarded annually until 1972, when it was discontinued for lack of interest in architectural illustration.

It seems a remarkable coincidence, indeed that a new annual event in far-away Texas was initiated the following year by the Dallas Chapter of the AIA, and was subsequently named for the untimely death of a respected colleague.

This event preceded by two years the 1975 founding of the British Society of Architecture Illustrators (SAI), the first of several national organizations to follow. In 1980 the Japanese Architectural Renderers Association (JARA) was initiated, followed by the 1986 founding of The American Society of Architectural Perspectivists (ASAP) in Boston by Frank Constantino, Steve Rich and myself. The NYSR in New York and the short-lived New Jersey Association were formed soon after ASAP. After the Koreans founded KAPA in 1990, the Australians became the “newest kid on the block” with their AAAI, which was organized [in 1995]. All this makes the Ken Roberts the most senior architectural drawing competition currently in operation anywhere in the world. – (article researched and written by Paul Stevenson Oles, FAIA) Read the rest of this entry »

The building was designed by MAD Architects, as proposal for the international competition for the future National Art Museum of China in Bejing. Their concept is based on an elevated public square which is protected by a floating mega volume above.

The original structure of the National Art Museum of China (NAMOC) built in 1962, houses one of the country’s largest art collections and has played host to some of the influential exhibitions as recorded in contemporary Chinese history. The current plans are to move the institution into a new building, situated within a designated ‘art district’ on the central axis of the 2008 Olympic site. Read the rest of this entry »

The most innovative architectural idea of this project is based on the possibility of a constantly changing skyscraper. It is all about developing a mutant vertical city building possibility, which answers to its time, place and inhabitants requirements. NODO project becomes much more than a skyscraper, it is a collective creation, a gauge, an urban infrastructure which evolves during its existence and adapts itself to its environment, receiving many functions and needs such as housing, offices, commercial and public spaces.

The project has two different parts: the permanent one and the mutable one. The vertical communications and facilities core (1), and standardized and mobile parts (2) on the other hand. An elevator inside (3) is in charge of transporting these prefabricated modules into their places inside the building, which are trucked from the factory. We can say that is the first proposal in the world of a “supertall” built with prefabricated modules, making it a flexible and versatile building. Betting into the future field of industrial architecture. This idea was the winner of the construction category of the competition. Read the rest of this entry »

The Icon Square houses a Peace Center, Community Center, and Eco Hotel designed by Kyle Duvernay and Mike Knowlton in located in Bunker Hill, Los Angeles. A 150,000 sq/ft lot invites the public in by creating a corridor across the site, and by uplifting the ground floors for minimal building footprint. A systematic power generator consisting of over 200 vertical wind turbines was created for the public to view and interact with. The expression of the Eco Hotel is complimented by the purity of the Peace Center by allowing them to share a common goal of sustainability in the community. Read the rest of this entry »