Hoshakuji Station by Kengo Kuma & Associates

Kengo Kuma Associates realised this renovation of the Hoshakuji Station north of Tokyo. Parts of the station are made from re-used Oya stone which was left over from an old warehouse that existed in this area.

Hoshakuji Station by Kengo Kuma & Associates

Here is what Kengo Kuma himself has to say:

“The starting point was to open the east exit of Hoshakuji Station. We aimed at connecting the west and east sides of the station, which had been divided by the railroad. It eventually meant the link between the west and the east of the town of Takanezawa, and between the station and Chokkura Plaza & Shelters, which we designed in the east exit area. It is not a design of a station as a box, but is as an aperture. The aperture starts at its ‘neighbor’, Chokkura Plaza. We first decided to preserve the old warehouse of Oya stone that had existed in the area. Then we took advantage of pores in Oya stone, and used them in the new structural system, in which steel frame and Oya stone are combined diagonally, and added the system to the warehouse. Following the design of this ‘neighbor’, we extended this diagonal skin to the other ‘pore’ or ‘aperture’, which is the station. By such extension and connection, we attempted to link not only the station’s west exit and east exit, but also the station and its location.
In order to reduce the weight, we used lauan-made plywood for structure, instead of Oya stone. By using wood, I wanted to revive the humane and warm atmosphere once any station building used to have. The touch of this station building would be conveyed further to the landscape of paddy fields and wooden houses in the town of Takanezawa.
Our emphasis was that by creating ‘pores’, things could be pulled together and restore the community that had been long fragmented.”

Hoshakuji Station by Kengo Kuma & Associates

Hoshakuji Station by Kengo Kuma & Associates

Hoshakuji Station by Kengo Kuma & Associates

Hoshakuji Station by Kengo Kuma & Associates

to the Kengo Kuma & Associates profile @ Architonic


read also: ‘The power of the empty space’

'Kaufhaus Tyrol' by David Chipperfield Architects, photo by Ute Zscharnt

David Chipperfield Architects recently finished a new Department Store ‘Kaufhaus Tyrol’ in Innsbruck, Austria. Here are some first photos of the multifaceted front of the building.

'Kaufhaus Tyrol' by David Chipperfield Architects, photo by Ute Zscharnt

“In a prime downtown location, the largest city centre department store in Tyrol is emerging on the Maria-Theresien-Strasse. The new building covers the site of the former ‘Kaufhaus Tyrol’ that expands from Maria-Theresien-Strasse over the whole block to Erlerstrasse. The neighbouring existing building, the former ‘Schindlerhaus’, is being integrated into the project while conserving the overall ensemble. The new department store fits into and respects the existing context of the Maria-Theresien-Strasse.”

'Kaufhaus Tyrol' by David Chipperfield Architects, photo by Ute Zscharnt

“With three façade areas at a slight incline to each other, the long, stretched front of the new building is structured without losing its artistic and creative appearance. The structure of the Maria-Theresien-Strasse, which has grown irregularly since the Middle Ages, is reflected in the façade line-up of the new department store. The main entrance, situated in the centre, is subtly emphasised by the central part of the building being positioned forward and facing the Old Town and the pedestrian zone. Façade pillars form the main tectonic characteristic of the building. The façade structure is made of prefabricated concrete sections offset with natural stone. Room-height window apertures cover all storeys and act as mediators between the new Kaufhaus Tyrol and the historic environment.”

'Kaufhaus Tyrol' by David Chipperfield Architects, photo by Ute Zscharnt

Project start: 2007
Construction start: 2008
Completion: March 2010
Gross floor area: 58 000 m2
Client: Signa Holding GmbH, Innsbruck
Principal: David Chipperfield
Director: Christoph Felger (Design Director), Harald Müller (Managing Director)
Project architect: Ulrich Goertz (outline and detailed proposals, construction drawing phase, artistic overview), Hans Krause (concept study)
Project team: Florian Dietrich, Kristen Kinke, Ole Hallier, Paul Hillerkus, Guido Kappius, Mikhail Kornev, Katrin Löscher, Michael Schmidt, Lukas Schwind, Francois von Chappuis, Boris Wolf,
Structural engineer: dibral, Dipl.-Ing. Alfred R. Brunnsteiner Ziviltechnikergesellschaft mbH, Natters
Services engineer: Wagner & Partner ZT GmbH, Linz
Electrical planning: A3 Jenewein Ingenieurbüro GmbH, Aldrans
Façade consultant: gkp Fassadentechnik AG, Aadorf
Lighting consultant: matí AG Lichtgestaltung, Adliswil
General planning: Dieter Mathoi Architekten, Innsbruck

to the David Chipperfield Architects profile @ Architonic

Design for new US Embassy in London by Kieran Timberlake

US ambassador to London Louis Susman has unveiled the winning design in an architectural competition to create a new American Embassy for the British capital. Philadelphia-based architect Kieran Timberlake beat Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, Richard Meier & Partners and Morphisis to win the project, which will be built at Nine Elms on the south bank of the Thames.

Design for new US Embassy in London by Kieran Timberlake

The skin of the 12-storey box-like structure will be clad in blast-proof glass and plastic. It replaces Eero Saarinen’s 1957 embassy building in Mayfair’s Grosvenor Square, which has listed status.

Design for new US Embassy in London by Kieran Timberlake

The British newspaper ‘The Guardian’ reports that the jury’s decision-making was far from straightforward: ‘The only two British members of the seven-strong design jury “fought to the death” against their American counterparts in a failed bid to block a winning design which they argued was not world class and was unfit to represent the US in Britain. Lord Rogers, the architect of the Pompidou Centre in Paris, and Lord Palumbo, the property developer and art collector, felt so strongly about the inadequacies of the winning design, they submitted a “minority report” setting out their case to the US state department in Washington, which commissioned the building. (…) Rogers and Palumbo are said to have thought the design was boring and “not good enough to represent one of the great nations in London”, said sources familiar with the jury process.’

Design for new US Embassy in London by Kieran Timberlake

Rolex Learning Center by SANAA in Lausanne, Switzerland

The Rolex Learning Center, designed by leading Japanese architectural practice SANAA, has opened in Lausanne, Switzerland. Situated on the campus of the EPFL Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, the centre will function as a cultural hub for both students and the public, featuring a library with half a million volumes.

Rolex Learning Center by SANAA in Lausanne, Switzerland

What is particularly striking about this project is that the 20,000 square-metre interior is articulated as single, continuous fluid space, providing, as the institution’s press release puts it, ‘a seamless network of services, libraries, information gathering, social spaces, spaces to study, restaurants, cafés and beautiful outdoor spaces’.

Rolex Learning Center by SANAA in Lausanne, Switzerland

There is something of the outside inside with this building, when one thinks of its geopraphical context. The EPFL campus is situated on a site that overlooks Lake Geneva and the Alps. The changing topography of this landscape, it could be argued, is echoed in the undulating interior landscape of this remarkable project, which was financed by the Swiss government in partnership with major Swiss businesses.

Rolex Learning Center by SANAA in Lausanne, Switzerland

St Gerold Community Center, photo by Hanspeter Schiess

The Bregenz based CUKROWICZ NACHBAUR ARCHITEKTEN realised this community center in St Gerold in the west of Austria. 

St Gerold Community Center, photo by Hanspeter Schiess

“The new building of the community centre is positioned as a 4-storey building laterally shifted to the school building.  School and new building develop a spatial gate situation. The building uses both existing even surfaces [the village-square to street level as well as the playground level] and places itself as a connecting element in between and contains the areas of Kindergarden, children’s game group, village shop, multipurpose room and municipality. The new center is the first 4-storey timber building of Vorarlberg. All construction units of the house are from massive wood and come mainly from forests own to municipality. They are inserted completely untreated. The compact volume is designed as a passive house and in energy-technical respect nearly self-sufficient. The building is already considered as a paradigm on the subjects of ecology, sustainability and native creation of value.”

St Gerold Community Center, photo by Hanspeter Schiess

St Gerold Community Center, photo by Hanspeter Schiess

St Gerold Community Center, photo by Hanspeter Schiess

St Gerold Community Center, photo by Hanspeter Schiess

Design team: Andreas Cukrowicz, Anton Nachbaur-Sturm, Stefan Abbrederis [PL], Christian Schmölz, Michael Abt.

Client: Gemeinde St.Gerold Immobilienverwaltungsges.m.b.H. & Co KG

to the CUKROWICZ NACHBAUR ARCHITEKTEN profile

to the Hanspeter Schiess website

Festival Hall in Amriswil, photo by Thomas Enz

The Zurich based practice Müller Sigrist Architekten realised this festival hall, a crystalline, copper cladded volume, in Amriswil, close to Lake Constance.

Festival Hall in Amriswil, photo by Thomas Enz

“With its loosened-up shape, the large volume fits into a rurally determined city. Seemingly introvert, a – from roof top to base level – integrated front conceals its inner workings. Only the main entrance is accentuated by breaking up the uniform façade. The complex shape arises from the combination of the present parameters: the specific interpretation of the programme, the locations of the small town and the desired identification effect from the festival.”

Festival Hall in Amriswil, photo by Thomas Enz

“The primary demand to provide a suitable framework for the celebration in the interior is met by the erection of a five-cornered central festival hall. A free polygonal outer shape allows an onion-shaped arrangement of the serving rooms around its core. Spatial tension is created by the concentric order around the main room. A central space highlights the importance of the celebration with people at the centre of attention. Leaving a strong mark on the external perception, the roof also unfolds its effect in the interior reaching its zenith high above the heads of the visitors. The roof bend itself centres the room and the house in a non-concentric location.”

Festival Hall in Amriswil, photo by Thomas Enz

Festival Hall in Amriswil, photo by Thomas Enz

Festival Hall in Amriswil, photo by Thomas Enz

to the Müller Sigrist Architekten profile @ Architonic

Birkerød Sports and Leisure Centre

The Danish practice schmidt hammer lasse architects realised this sports centre in Birkerød, a small town in the north of Copenhagen. The façade’s long sweeping lines and striking sculptural roof contours  evoke a sense of movement and activity. This is underlined by a giant sun blind system designed by the Danish textile designer Astrid Krogh.

Birkerød Sports and Leisure Centre

“The sports and activity centre is a multifunctional structure. The new building includes a large multipurpose hall with enough space to accommodate two handball courts with accompanying mobile spectator stands, as well as a V.I.P. lounge. The centre also houses two smaller halls. This means the complex can accommodate major sporting events, concerts and other cultural events, but also be adapted for school sporting events and local sports initiatives requiring smaller, more intimate settings. 

The new centre is located in the midst of existing football pitches and the old public swimming baths, both of which have received a facelift, and now include a new grandstand for the football pitch and a full-scale remodelling of the public swimming baths which are now significantly larger. This bridges the gap between the existing sports and recreational facilities to create a more coherent offer for sports and cultural activities in Birkerød.”

Birkerød Sports and Leisure Centre

“The new centre represents a quantum leap from the typical Danish sports facilities typically characterised by large rectangular halls with laminated wood arches. Birkerød Sports centre is very different in terms of both flexibility and design. 

The aesthetics and design of Birkerød Sports centre are immediately distinctive – with its long curves it is a bold and beautiful sculptured focal point for the local community, combining sports, cultural and recreational activities in the Birkerød area.”

Birkerød Sports and Leisure Centre

“The series of façades are decorated by graphic artist Astrid Krogh, Denmark. The black circles form interconnected patterns when the louvres are closed and daylight shines in through the oblong window sections. The façades were developed especially for this building project and have since been honoured by inclusion in the Danish Ministry of Culture’s Canon for Design and Craft Art.”

Birkerød Sports and Leisure Centre

Birkerød Sports and Leisure Centre

to the schmidt hammer lassen architects profile @ Architonic

Bailly School Complex, photo by Kleinefenn

The Paris based architectural practice Mikou Design Studio realised this school building for the City of Saint-Denis in the north of their hometown.

Bailly School Complex, photo by Kleinefenn

“The school complex of Bailly is situated on a changing territory and is located on the starting point of the reconstruction of the scale of the district. The expression of the project is inspired by this specific context of the material used – glazed brick – and by the idea of the roof which give reference to the lanterns of the cathedrals.

The school complex is aligned on the rue de Bailly like a “building wall” on one level which grows hollow and inflects to form the esplanade for the entrance.”

Bailly School Complex, photo by Kleinefenn

“The esplanade is designed like a space of hospitality, protected and covered by a playful light shelter. Its base of brick is extended in the building by an internal brick street which functions as an interspace area to access both schools, the recreation centre and at the same time serve like the connection area for the various functions.

The body of the building seen from the rue de Bailly shows a glazed screen printed façade to protect the intimacy of the children, giving the possibility for transparency in the interior gardens and under the coloured ceiling.

The classrooms are organised in the north-south transverse on two levels which end on the firewall on the side of the railway. They are structured by horizontal circulations and interior gardens protected by noise by a glass screen.

This configuration makes it possible to limit the façade exposed direct to the noise and to create independent units emphasised by the green transparency for the preschool, the recreational centre and the elementary school which are connected between them by an interior street open towards the forecourt.” 

Bailly School Complex, photo by Kleinefenn

“In this constellation, the preschool and the elementary school yard are located sidewards in contrast to the units for the teachers. Placed on the north and south end of the site, they are protected by noise and acoustic screen made up of circular tubes of different densities from the west which also absorb the noise during the recreation.

Each schoolyard is extended visually one level higher by the garden, accessible by a ramp connected from the schoolyard. These gardens, important for the class rooms on the higher levels, bring freshness to the project and enable the children to get fresh air between the lessons and to connect with the schoolyard while walking on the protected and planted way.

The school complex of Bailly is on a site which is under the development of Plaine Commune who want it to be the initiator for the reorganisation for the district along the rue de Bailly.

Being a building on two levels, its roof will be apprehended as a pedestrian scale because of the surrounding high buildings. The roof therefore is designed like a crucial factor of the project; it is the fifth façade seen from the rue de Bailly by the children like a bright coloured pallet, visible from the surrounding high buildings in the shape of thin straps of vegetation cut in the sheds.”

Bailly School Complex, photo by Kleinefenn

to the Mikou Design Studio website

more architcture and design projects @ Architonic

Palacio de Congresos, Badajoz, by SelgasCano, photo by Roland Halbe

The Madrid based practice SelgasCano realised this cylindric conference center in Badajoz / Spain. The building was awarded by the Museum of Modern Art in New York and is regarded as one of the most important 50 Spanish constructions of the last 30 years.

Palacio de Congresos, Badajoz, by SelgasCano, photo by Roland Halbe

Here is what the architects say:

“The base on which we work is rather unrepeatable, strange: the old bullring of the city, circular, inserted in a pentagonal bastion of the Vauban XVII century wall. In the contest final report we have always excused ourselves for using a quote from Leopardi as our headword: “The last stage of knowledge is recognizing that all we were looking for was always in front of our eyes”. With this quote we summarized the process of how the initial difficulty involved in acting in such a conditioned place became resolved when we realized that what we were looking for already existed. 

The bullring was created for the city of Badajoz in the specific enclave of the Baluard of San Roque over the remains of the old bullrings that have existed there throughout the centuries. We consider of great importance the palimpsestic process of all the previous bullrings and their evolutions, not only the last one we encounter in that site. We are not concerned with the physical echo of what is no longer there, but rather with the condition created previously, in the XVIII century, by the decision of emptying a circle in a massive pentagonal bastion, distorting the whole defensive concept and turning it around to make it receptive to public access and public events, either a bullfight, a concert or a conference. Therefore our decision from the beginning was to maintain this condition of a public empty space, of a space taken from the city. In order to maintain it, we “limited” ourselves to covering the whole existing field, filling it in completely. The difficulty in applying this procedure to fill a plot of land is due to the fact that it is a circular void on a bastion and so it must remain.”

Palacio de Congresos, Badajoz, by SelgasCano, photo by Roland Halbe

“The complexity of placing a Conference Centre in an empty space and maintaining it empty is resolved by means of a simple trick, a magic trick, consisting of inverting the spectator area and taking it to the ring, to the centre, and taking the empty central area to the spectators, to where the old stands used to be. Then we dress the cylinder that is produced in the centre with light, projected upon the outer polyester rings that mark the uncertain limits of a void. Of course, the trick is prepared by placing underground and under the bastion the greatest possible number of elements of the program, placed in a radial position projecting towards the centre. 

From the outside we might think that the shelter of the main entrance is the only existing construction or crank that appears, represents and opens, down the staircase it covers, the whole building. 
From the inside, the main room corresponds to the same exterior idea of the cyclinder with luminous walls of the same acrylic material, translucid ceiling in the shape of a grid on which the shadow of the óculo moves, and a floor of the same dark colour as the plaza and the external patio. From the outside, this work, almost finished, has been creating, overall, a great unrest: the more we work on it, instead of appearing, it disappears. Diluted in that inevitable heritage.”

Palacio de Congresos, Badajoz, by SelgasCano, photo by Roland Halbe

more architecture and design projects @ Architonic

Technology College of Barreiro by ARX Partugal Arquitectos, photo by FG + SG - Fotografia de Arquitectura

The Technology College of Barreiro has been awarded the International Architecture Award for the Best New Global Design 2009 by the Chicago Athenaeum, Architect and Design Museum. It has also been shortlisted for ENOR 2009 and FAD 2009, the results of which will be announced in the next couple of months. Located on the outskirts of Lisbon the college was designed by ARX Portugal, the firm lead by brothers Nuno and José Mateus.

Technology College of Barreiro by ARX Partugal Arquitectos, photo by FG + SG - Fotografia de Arquitectura

“The building site assigned for the School is located in the outskirts of the city of Barreiro. These are rural territories which were invaded by recent constructions intersecting green-gardens and reed plots. Residence houses are predominant and other functions were not predicted for this area and so this neighbourhood is now just a suburb with little urban life. The soil, however, is quite interesting: broad, softly inclined and well-related with its shape – unevenness of 13,12 feet in perimeter to north and south – having at one end a dense forest of cork and large pine trees.”

Technology College of Barreiro by ARX Partugal Arquitectos, photo by FG + SG - Fotografia de Arquitectura

“There are some projects that cause a public reaction even before its existence, and there one can find a great deal of important matters to consider. This school is such an example. The inhabitants of this “neighbourhood” protested against its existence because they wanted a primary school instead – which was transferred elsewhere –, but also because they feared the impact a building of large proportions would have, both visually and ecologically. Fearing that the trees would be cut down, they counted and marked every single one.

We aimed at imprinting to the building a somewhat ambiguous character. On one hand it “dissipates” and accepts the prevalence of the natural elements, on the other hand it deals with their presence as an artificial element of abstract origin. This principle is highlighted by the constructive choices: big coal-grey block that, when sectioned, reveals a white interior.

The architecture becomes more topographic in one of the extremities of the building, where there is no way to tell where the surrounding starts or ends, and in the opposite side, with its more present limits, defined by the alignment of the tops of the different bodies of the building.”

Technology College of Barreiro by ARX Partugal Arquitectos, photo by FG + SG - Fotografia de Arquitectura

Construction: 2005 – 07      

Architecture: ARX PORTUGAL, Arquitectos Lda., José Mateus, Nuno Mateus

Project Team: Paulo Rocha, Stefano Riva, Andreia Tomé, Clara Martins, Marco Roque Antunes, Nuno Grancho, Pedro Alves, Pedro Dourado, Pedro Sousa, Tânia Pedro, Francisco Marques, Sónia Luz

Landscape Architecture: GLOBAL, Arquitectura Paisagista Lda.

Structural Engineering: TAL PROJECTO, Projectos, Estudos e Projectos de Engenharia Lda.

Electrical and Telecomunications Planning, Security Planning, Mechanical Planning: AT, Serviços de Engenharia Electrontécnica e Electrónica Lda.

Sanitary Planning: AQUADOMUS, Consultores Lda.

Contractor: Obrecol

Gross Construction Surface: 10 500  m2

to the ARX Portugal Arquitectos website

seen at World Architecture News