Category Archives: Architecture

Architecture Profiles: “Building Transformative Narratives – David Adjaye”

“Undoubtedly, the most significant project that’s really propelled and changed my career is the National Museum of African American History and Culture on the Mall. I was a young architect, but I was given the task to design and deliver this project. That was my role and my office’s role in the project. I didn’t do many things between that time, because it consumed so much but I learned so much. And when it opened with Barack Obama, before he left the White House, it kind of felt like something had been achieved. It was a kind of euphoric moment for me”

This is the Life Story of Sir David Adjaye OBE RA

Adjaye Associates was established in June 2000 by founder and principal architect, Sir David Adjaye OBE. Receiving ever-increasing worldwide attention, the practice has studios in London, New York and Accra and completed work in Europe, North America, the Middle East, Asia, and Africa. Two of the practice’s largest commissions to date are the design of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall in Washington D.C. and the Moscow School of Management (SKOLKOVO). Further projects range in scale from private houses, exhibitions, and temporary pavilions to major arts centres, civic buildings, and masterplans. Renowned for an eclectic material and colour palette and a capacity to offer a rich civic experience, the buildings differ in form and style, yet are unified by their ability to generate new typologies and to reference a wide cultural discourse.

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Interviews: 83-Year Old Danish Urban Designer Jan Gehl (Monocle 24)

The Urbanist PodcastAndrew Tuck brings you a special interview with Jan Gehl, perhaps the world’s best-known urban designer. Now 83, he’s waiting this pandemic out while isolating at home, enjoying spring from his garden.

Jan Gehl Hon. FAIA is a Danish architect and urban design consultant based in Copenhagen whose career has focused on improving the quality of urban life by re-orienting city design towards the pedestrian and cyclist. He is a founding partner of Gehl

Art & Landscape: Gardens & Grounds Of The Natural History Museum, London”

The Museum’s gardens were originally set aside for future expansion of the building, but when money ran out they became an outside space for the public. They haven’t just been for show – over the years they’ve been a burial ground for whales, they’ve hosted a secret war bunker, and they’ve been converted to a farm complete with eight Sussex pigs.

The Natural History Museum in London is home to over 80 million specimens, including meteorites, dinosaur bones and a giant squid.

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Housing: “Container Atlas – A Practical Guide To Container Architecture”

Container Atlas seeks out luxurious remote hideaways, urban dwellings, community centers, and more, all showing how the humble container can put the fab into pre-fab.

Container architecture has become an essential part of our twenty-first century surroundings, with it being used to create modular structures for pavilions, brand showrooms, retail premises, and even residential homes. Ten years after the first publication of Container Atlas, this eagerly anticipated follow-up charts how this movement has evolved into an essential part of today’s architectural vocabulary. Container Atlas serves as a practical and inspirational reference not only for architects and engineers, but also for all creatives eager to learn about the rich and diverse language of container architecture and modular building.

Architect and Professor Han Slawik and his team have established themselves as international experts in the field of container architecture. He is the author of the first edition of Container Atlas and has returned to the subject with refreshed insights into this burgeoning movement.

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Future Of Urban Housing: Stackable “OPod Tube Houses”, Hong Kong 2020 (Cybertecture Architects)

OPod Housing No.1 James Law Cybertecture Hong Kong 2020 Urban HousingComprised of 21 units of OPod Tube Houses, stack on 2 levels, the project is deployed on an unused urban plot in To Kwa Wan District of Hong Kong. Being a modular and flexible architecture, OPod Housing No.1 is able to be set up in less than 3 months, providing accommodation to 20 sets of residents with shared common kitchen and a co-living courtyard.

OPod Housing No.1 is social housing project providing accommodation to citizens of Hong Kong struggling to afford housing.

OPod Housing No.1 James Law Cybertecture Hong Kong 2020 Urban Housing

Each OPod Tube House is 140 sq.ft in size with private toilet and shower, food preparation area and living room with sofa bed. To facilitate a modern sustainable  lifestyle, the OPod Tube Houses are equiped with wifi and home automation for better management of resources. The project is scheduled to complete construction and open in 2020.

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Top Prefab Housing: “Le Petit Maison” By French Firm 2m26 – “Wood Design Fit To The Landscape”

Le Petit Maison by 2m26 Architects Interior April 2020From reception pavilion to proper house, 2m26’s houses are unique pieces. They are produced made to measure, on demand. They absolutely fit to the landscape. The houses are made of pine planks, rough cuted. The structure is protected with linseed oil to resist to weather conditions and walnut stain can be added to obtain a dark color.

The Small House by 2m26 Architects April 2020The building process / prefab gives the opportunity to prepare all the pieces at the Atelier. Moreover, it reduces on site time of construction, damages on plants and minimizes noise pollution. On site construction can be scheduled from a week to a month.

Techniques used are mostly cutting, drilling, screwing, so that the assembly work can be done together with the customer, reducing costs for him.

About 2m26: Born in 2015, 2m26 summarizes ten years of researches and experiments about inhabiting.

Proceeding between design and architecture, 2m26 offers tools for living / handmade, thrifty and luxury / unique pieces designed and produced on demand / raw materials, natural processings and mastered development / simple, handsome and functional.

The crew :
mélanie heresbach / artist / architect.
sébastien renauld / artist / architect.

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Design: Inside The New York Home Of Legendary Architect I.M. Pei (Video)

When Ieoh Ming Pei, one of the most lauded architects of the past 50 years, was first asked to renovate The Louvre in Paris, his reaction was unequivocal: ‘You cannot touch the Louvre, it’s sacrilege.’

His solution was both revolutionary and simple — he built a glass pyramid in the centre of the forecourt that concealed a subterranean entrance way. Scorned at the time as a modernist intrusion on the 16th- and 17th-century building, the Pyramid is today celebrated as a statement of bold, high-tech futurism, and indicative of an architect who made his reputation by creating buildings at the intersection of art, history and culture.

Learn more about I.M. Pei

World’s Top Architecture: “Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen” To Open In 2021 (MVRDV Architects)

Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen (in Rotterdam, Netherlands) is the first art storage facility in the world that offers access to a museum’s complete collection. The Depot has a different dynamic to that of the museum: there are no exhibitions, but you can browse amongst 151,000 artworks, alone or with a guide, and get behind-the-scenes glimpses of – among other things – conservation and restoration.

The design – a reflective round volume – responds to its surroundings, Rotterdam’s Museumpark in which it will be completed in 2020, doors will open in 2021.

Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen by MVRDV Architects The Netherlands 2020

Museum Website

MVRDV Architects Portfolio
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Lectures: “Beyond Gatsby: The Fabled Gardens of Long Island’s Gold Coast”

Originally comprising vast areas of the North Shores of Long Island, the Gold Coast was a favorite retreat of the rich and famous. Beginning around the turn of the century and through the 1920’s, the North Shore was the place to be for some of the most notable Americans. Along with grand houses, they built elaborate gardens, hiring such notable architects and landscape architects as Delano and Aldrich, Carrere and Hastings, the Olmsted Brothers, and Beatrix Farrand. Discover the gardens, as they were originally built, and learn about their history, landscape design, and present condition. This event was presented through the generous support of the Boston Design Center as part of the ICAA-NE Design Series.

CeCe Haydock graduated from Princeton University (BA English) and received a master’s degree in landscape architecture from the SUNY School of Environmental Science and Forestry. After working for the New York City Parks Department, she joined the firm, Innocenti and Webel in Locust Valley, NY, before starting her private practice. In 2007, she did research as a Visiting Scholar at the American Academy in Rome on Edith Wharton and Italian villas. She has lectured and written on historic Italian, French, and American gardens for Old Westbury Gardens, Maryland’s Ladew Topiary Gardens, Princeton University, and numerous garden and horticultural clubs. A trustee of Planting Fields Arboretum and a member of the International Council of The Preservation Society of Newport County, she is a visiting lecturer at the New York Botanic Garden and an adjunct professor at Long Island University. CeCe is currently expanding her private practice to include landscape sustainability.

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