AE24: Undulating Metal Fins

[Aomori Nebuta House in Japan by molo design (2011) | image source]

A recent building getting a good amount of press lately is the Nebuta House in Aomori, Japan by molo design. The architects describe it as "a unique cultural building inspired by the craftsmanship and spirit of Aomori's Nebuta Festival ... a form of storytelling during which heroes, demons and animals from history and myth come to life as large-scale, paper lanterns (Nebuta) illuminated from within. The building is a house for these mythical creatures, functionally meant to share the tradition, archive the history and nurture the future of this unique cultural art form." The most notable formal aspect of the building is the wrapper of "twisted steel ribbons, each shaped to create variation: openings for light, areas of opacity, views, or opportunities for pedetrian circulation."


[Aomori Nebuta House in Japan by molo design | image source]

These ribbons, what I'm calling undulating metal fins, seem to be a recurring architectural element of late, the next step of straight projecting fins -- be they glass, metal, wood, or some other material -- that can be found on many facades, from cultural institutions to corporate campuses. An early example of undulations in metal can be found in the Central Signal Tower in Basel, Switzerland by Herzog & de Meuron, predating molo's building by over a decade. The earlier design undulates copper fins in a horizontal orientation to allow ventilation from the primarily solid cube; it elevates a typically mundane industrial structure into something mysterious and poetic. Molo's design turns the metal into fabric, as if the facade is draped from the roof, solidified into place after a breeze.


[Tenleytown-Friendship Library in Washington, DC by The Freelon Group (2011) | image source]

The Freelon Group's design for the facade of the Tenleytown-Friendship Library in Washington, DC, resembles molo's ribbons, in terms of color and direction, if not in undulation. Here the metal fins are angled to control daylighting, but it also gives a variable impression to the exterior, from transparent to solid. To put it another way, undulations across the facade are implied by one's perspective, rather than the manipulation of the fins. The same can be said if the pieces projected perpendicular from the glass wall behind, but the effect is more apparent with the angle, which varies depending on the facade's orientation.


[New Carver Apartments in Los Angeles, California by Michael Maltzan Architecture (2009) | image source]

In Michael Maltzan's design for the New Carver Apartments in Los Angeles, metal fins are used in the central courtyard, a circular space inside the spiral plan with a serrated exterior. The fins jog as they rise to give the cylindrical space a dynamism it wouldn't otherwise have. It's quite cinematic. And while the fins themselves don't undulate like molo's design, their angles give the effect of such.


[ThyssenKrupp Quarter in Essen, Germany by JSWD Architekten and Chaix & Morel et Associés | Photograph by Christian Richters | image source]

What may come to mind when speaking of implied movement and undulations is, well, actual movement. Some facades these days go that extra step and use operable fins to control daylight, but none is more impressive than the ThyssenKrupp Quarter in Essen, Germany by JSWD Architekten and Chaix & Morel et Associés. The louvered stainless steel fins of one building (above) aren't simple rectangular pieces; instead they zig-zag up the building, alternating with the neighboring fins to fit snuggly when closed but can appear folded or even totem-like when open, depending on their positioning.


[Carriage House in New York, NY by Christoff:Finio Architects (2008) | photos by archidose]

Getting back to literal undulating metal fins, here are a couple small projects that twist metal bars as they rise from the ground to the floor above; one I've seen in person (above, the Carriage House by Christoff:Finio Architects), while the other is in Hort Park in Singapore (below). I don't know any details on the latter, but the former impressively holds its own next to much bigger neighboring buildings designed by Richard Meier, Asymptote Architecture, and Daniel Goldner Architects. The fins control visibility into a transition space between the alley and house, but they also create a lovely texture from a simple gesture (the bars twist 90 degrees and alternate to create the pattern).

Today's archidose #514

Norris House, originally uploaded by ken mccown.

A New Norris House in Norris, Tennessee by students from the University of Tennessee, 2011.

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Book Review: Fabricating Architecture

Fabricating Architecture: Selected Readings in Digital Design and Manufacturing edited by Robert Corser
Princeton Architectural Press, 2010
Paperback, 224 pages



A recent issue of the New York Observer covered, of all things, the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture’s Teachers Seminar 2011, held last month at the New School in New York City. With the seminar's theme of "Peformative Practice," ASCA argues that, "The shift from tools to systems heralds the emergence of complex performance problems—active glass walls and self-powered buildings—that demand hybrid responses." SHoP Architects' Gregg Pasquarelli, the star of the Observer article and the keynote speaker at the conference, is quoted in Jonathan Liu's article as saying, "It’s about grabbing those territories back that have systematically been given away by our profession over the past 30 years. For us, that is the core of performance-based design. Think about what the buildings do, how they work, how they’re put together." Yet he also says that SHoP remains, "firmly rooted in the academic," what Liu calls, "the self-dramatizing ideas (and language) of 'capital-A Architecture.'"

Liu's article, which discusses the gulf between academia and practice but also bemoans "reducing architecture to just another consultant specialty," reminded me of this collection of "twelve key essays by important critics, theorists, and architects on [the] timely and essential topic" of new technologies in architecture. The work of SHoP Architects is found in the book (their Porter House Condo project is treated in detail in one essay), as are like-minded architects KieranTimberlake, and of course Frank Gehry. Actually this collection's title recalls the 2003 book by Stephen Kieran and James Timberlake, Refabricating Architecture: How Manufacturing Methodologies are Poised to Transform Building Construction, who contribute an essay on "Mass Customization and the Manufacture Module." In response to the Philadelphia duo's influential book and their embrace of technology towards changing architectural practice and building construction, Dan Willis and Todd Woodward's closing essay, "Diminishing Difficulty," brings a much-needed dose of skepticism and criticism to the discussion. It is a careful closing to a collection of essays -- most from Architectural Design and Harvard Design Magazine -- that for the most part optimistically champions new technologies like BIM and parametric modeling.

US: CA: UK:

Three Videos

Here are a few videos that recently landed in my inbox.

A mini-documentary on Seattle Modern architects Build LLC by FRANK:


Genre de Vie, an in-progress project -- currently seeking funds -- about "the relationship between man and their living environment, the city, with the bicycle as the discovering function.":

Genre de Vie from Photo Booth Works on Vimeo.

Bartlett School of Architecture's Year 1 2011 final project (see also 2010 and 2009):

Monday, Monday

My weekly page update:

This week's dose features Milanofiori in Assago, Milan, Itlay by OBR:


The featured past dose is Bathhouse in Como, Italy by Marco Castelletti:


This week's book review is The Green Studio Handbook, Second Edition: Environmental Strategies for Schematic Design by Alison Kwok and Walter Grondzik:



american-architects.com Building of the Week:

LandWave in Boston, Massachusetts by Ground:


Some unrelated links for your enjoyment:

barkitecture
"Soon to be THE architecture webzine"...reminds me of The Gutter. (Added to sidebar under Blogs » Architecture.)

cosmopolitan scum
"An occasional collection of writing, pictures and videos about architecture by Tim Abrahams," the 2011 Visiting Scholar at the CCA. (Added to sidebar under Blogs » Architecture.)

Jacob Gines: Intimations
" This blog provides the opportunity to showcase my own design work, travel and interests. In addition, I frequently display the work of others from around the world." (Added to sidebar under Blogs » Architecture.)

Klat Magazine
"Klat (Talk written back to front) is a publishing project launched at the end of 2009 with the aim of exploring the many-sided world of contemporary art, design and architecture, through a close encounter with its protagonists." (Added to sidebar under Architectural Links » Publications.)

Looking At Glass
"A daily reflection of glass used in design and architecture." (Added to sidebar under Blogs » Architecture.)

Today's archidose #513

Below are some photos of Zaha Hadid Une Architecture at the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, France. The exhibition (on display until October 30, 2011) is inside the Chanel Mobile Art Pavilion designed by Hadid, which toured New York, Tokyo and Hong Kong, starting in 2008, and is permanently installed in the plaza in front of Jean Nouvel's 1998 building. Photographs are by Simon Dubreuil.











Video from imarabe.org:



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Another Website Ranking

After compiling the list of the 66 Most Popular Architecture Websites -- since added in updated form to the sidebar near right -- I installed Alexa's status bar in my browser, which shows a website's traffic rank and a graph of its six-month trend. My browsing has been altered slightly through its presence, by being made aware of this ranking for each site I visit. Some web pages that I think are popular don't turn out to be, clocking in somewhere in the millions (remember Google is #1). Others that I find myself on for some reason turn out to be in the top 1,000, yet I never knew they existed before my visit. Of course, this ranking is only one indicator of popularity, and it is constantly changing, but it's still interesting to gauge websites with it.

So I started paying attention to the websites of architects' web pages, most of which are also up there in the millions. I wondered if any are in the top one million sites on the internet. Here is the list of the 36 Most Popular Architects' Websites I generated:

1. AECOM
2. Pentagram
3. Arup
4. Zaha Hadid Architects
5. Foster + Partners
6. BIG
7. SOM
8. Aedas
9. Steven Holl Architects
10. HDR
11. Gensler
12. VOA
13. Olson Kundig Architects
14. molo design
15. Heatherwick Studio
16. Perkins Will
17. OMA
18. HOK
19. Legorreta + Legorreta
20. BUILD LLC
21. WATG
22. Santiago Calatrava
23. Kengo Kuma and Associates
24. Shigeru Ban Architects
25. Populous
26. Bohlin Cywinski Jackson
27. Studio Gang Architects
28. MVRDV
29. UNStudio
30. KPF
31. Henning Larsen Architects
32. Studio Daniel Libeskind
33. Robert A.M. Stern Architects
34. HKS
35. RTKL
36. Ateliers Jean Nouvel

What does the list say? It tells us what types of architects are visited frequently:

» One of a number of Big Firms tops the list, followed by many more (Arup, Aedas, SOM, HDR, HKS, etc). Besides being big, they are international in scope and include engineers and other disciplines within the fold. In the latter case this means their sites are visited by a diverse audience, not just architects and their (potential) clients. Pentagram is a good example of this; while not as large as many on the list, their main focus is graphic design, and most people visiting their site are probably visiting for that aspect of their work.

» Not surprisingly, Starchitect Firms are in abundance (Hadid, Foster, BIG, Holl, Calatrava, etc.), but I was surprised by ones that did not clock in under one million: Renzo Piano, Morphosis, and Diller Scofidio + Renfro, in particular.

» A small part of the list are Blogging Firms, those that actively update a blog component of their site. Pentagram is one such firm, as is BUILD LLC, who may not be as well known as others on the list for their architecture, but their blog is quite popular and very well done. If I included Life at HOK, the firm's dedicated web page with various employee bloggers, it would actually be ranked #33. Likewise, Denver, Colorado-based EVStudio's blog would squeeze in between MVRDV and UNStudio, but the firm's portfolio site (which is what I'm gauging here) unfortunately doesn't make the cut. (This is an example where the blog and portfolio are two separate domains, but in the case of BUILD LLC and Pentagram, the blogs are integrated into the same domain as the portfolio.)

Please comment if you know of an architects' website that I may have omitted, and I'll adjust the list.

Today's archidose #512

Below are some photos I took of the recently opened Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center at Lincoln Center in New York City by the Rockwell Group. It is part of the redevelopment of the 16-acre Lincoln Center campus and is on West 65th Street below the Illumination Lawn by Diller Scofidio + Renfro.









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Half Dose #91: City of Culture of Galicia

Thanks to Duccio Malagamba Architectural Photography for sending me the below photos of the City of Culture of Galicia in Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain by Eisenman Architects.



Last week I found a used copy of Eleven Authors in Search of a Building. The building that K. Michael Hays, Henry N. Cobb, Sarah Whiting, Sanford Kwinter, Jeffrey Kipnis and others are "searching for" is the Aronoff Center for Design and Art at the University of Cincinnati, designed by Peter Eisenman. (Many of the same gathered at the building for a special taping of Charlie Rose on the building's significance and the future of architecture in America.) The building was completed in 1996, the year I graduated from undergraduate architecture school. The design was a big deal in those years; it was featured in the 1991 Venice Biennale, alongside Frank Gehry's design for the Walt Disney Concert Hall; it was an early and influential example of using the computer in architectural design, layering and torquing various blocks and grids; and its spaces seemed amazing in terms of complexity and effect. The qualities of the last, among others, come across in the book's numerous drawings and photos, be it computer wireframes, construction shots, or photos of the winding interior concourse.



I bring up Eisenman's project from two decades ago because much of it carries over into his design for the City of Culture of Galicia, a "landscraper" that is promising to be his magnum opus. (See my 2008 feature on the building in project form.) Of course the Aronoff Center can be seen as an extension of his projects going back to the 1970s, such as the well-known House series where the manipulation of grids leads to complex and sometimes unusable spaces. The photo above, for example, shows a grid overlaid onto the curving and Central Services Building, extending up the exterior wall of the Museum in the background, as if the abstract grid is a trace that exists regardless of the building's form. (So far the Library and Archive are the only pieces of the City completed and open to the public.)



Like in Cincinnati, where Eisenman manipulated grids derived from the program and the existing buildings on the site, the form of the City of Culture uses overlays and distortions to create what can be seen as landscapes as much as buildings. As one or two of the eleven authors point out in regards to the Aronoff Center, Eisenman's building really doesn't have a traditional exterior, since it merges itself with the existing buildings and the sloping site. That effect is more pronounced in Spain, where the buildings try to rise seamlessly from the terrain. Further the space between the buildings is fissure-like, as if the forms were created by seismic activity.



Yet it is inside where I'm struck by the consistency of the City of Culture with Aronoff Center. The complex circulation spine of the latter (more photos here) is like a collision of structure and surface, as if the space is a residue of the formal maneuvers creating the building envelope and program spaces. Added complexity and confusion comes with the articulation of the ceiling through angled cuts and lighting, the treatment of the walls and columns with projections, and the various colors and grids in the paving. All is capped by a skylight and suspended grid with artificial lighting.



All of that is evident at the City of Culture, minus the skylights, since the roof is a solid topography that melds with the landscape. Yet here the spaces are much more sensuous, owing to the different curves that lead the eye in all directions. As well Eisenman has divorced himself from the pastels that dominated the Aronoff, and perhaps dated it quicker than it should have, so the whites and earth colors of the City of Culture let light and form prevail over color. I've always had the feeling that Eisenman's approach makes circulation spaces become concourses, appropriate for a convention center but not an educational or cultural institution. With these spaces I don't get that feeling; they seem to fit the individual buildings and the scale of the City of Culture. I'm hard pressed to explain why, but gut reaction and sensation might be the best ways to deal with an architect whose idea of form-making is purely formal and quite arbitrary; or as Frank Gehry is quoted in Eleven Authors, "The best thing about Peter's buildings is the insane spaces he ends up with. That's why he's an important architect. All the other stuff, the philosophy and all, is just bullshit as far as I'm concerned."

Half Dose #90: PlayMobil

The following text and images are courtesy the City Leaks Team for their Temporary Playground for Urban Dwellers (PlayMobil) in Drewery Alley, CBD Melbourne, Australia. Thanks to Martin for sending me the information and making me aware of the project.




PlayMo is an urban intervention by the platform City Leaks. We seek to inspire urban dwellers to explore moments, spaces and places where one can deposit themselves. The challenge is to reconsider how we inhabit and identify ourselves in the cities. City Leaks acts as a hub for like minded people to address, share and realize ideas.



PlayMo was born from the intention of inventing a space that turns into a place where people meet, spend time and play. Its name comes from “playmobil”, a Lego styled child’s creative play toy. Using Milk Crates was like playing with big Lego pieces.



Milk Crates are a fantastic material for many reasons; they are structural, light, modular and they have an iconic role in Melbourne’s cafe image and laneways. We believe that familiarity to a material plays an important role in engaging with it.



PlayMo uses 3 different types of Crates. Black=platforms, Grey=stairs, Green=movable. The green crates provide the undefined random element; people rearrange their seats or even build small stairs themselves. There hasn’t been a single day where we found them in the same place.



Finally PlayMo is designed to grow and adapt. People are encouraged to leave things behind and to add to the structure.



We found artworks, plants, toys, pillows, new crates and received hundreds of letters. We even found that people had constructed a bin so that it could be kept clean.

Monday, Monday

My weekly page update:

This week's dose features 285 Montevideo in Belo Horizonte, Brazil by Vazio S/A Arquitetura e Urbanismo:


The featured past dose is Chapel of Our Lady of the Conception in Recife, Brazil by Paulo Mendes da Rocha:


This week's book review is Density Is Home: Housing by a+t Research Group by Aurora Fernández Per, Javier Mozas, Javier Arpa:



american-architects.com Building of the Week:

Bagley Classroom Building in Duluth, Minnesota by Salmela Architect:


Unrelated links will return next week.

Today's archidose #511

Below are photos of the "Alexander Brodsky: It still amazes me that I became an architect" exhibition at the Architekturzentrum Wien in Vienna, Austria. The exhibition is on display until October 3, 2011. Photographs are by Yuri Palmin. From the exhibition web page:

"Alexander Brodsky has realized a 'Total Installation' for the Az W that takes up the exhibition hall, drawing visitors into its wake: The day becomes night, the dimensions of space and time appear to slowly dissolve as one paces an archaeological chamber of wonders. Having returned to daylight, a selection of Brodsky's completed projects provides insights into his architectural oeuvre."

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Burble Rendering Bup Reality

I've yet to head over to Governor's Island this summer to see the 2011 City of Dreams Pavilion: Burble Bup designed by Bittertang in a competition earlier this year, but comparing the rendering:


[image source]

...to the reality:


[image source]

...umm, I might have to pass on this one. I can't say I was impressed by the design when it was unveiled as the winner, but do like the idea of a weird object rising seamlessly from the earth, only to return to it after the period of the installation, used in landscaping projects elsewhere on the island. But in reality it looks like the Bups -- the inflatable components capping the space -- lack the color and alien presence of the rendering. And the Burble -- soil- and bark-filled fabric tubes that make up the mounds -- just sits on the grass, sausage-like, without burying itself into the surrounding soil. If the installation were permanent, allowed to meld itself into the grass, it might come close to the rendering. But alas, Burble Bup will be on display only until mid-September.

Yet, another photo of the installation, probably taken later than the one above, shows more color in the Bups and some integration of the Burble with the grass -- owing to the difficulty in mowing so close to it, no doubt. Maybe I'll have to visit after all, to see for myself how well rendering has become reality.

Today's archidose #510

Frog Queen, Prisma Engineering headquarters, Graz, Austria, originally uploaded by Ken Lee 2010.

"Frog Queen," Headquarters of Prisma Engineering in Graz, Austria by SPLITTERWERK, 2007.

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Another Summer Installation

Recently I've featured MoMA PS1's courtyard installation by Interboro Partners and the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion in London by Peter Zumthor. These annual warm-weather architectural installations get most of the press, but they are not alone. One worth mentioning is SUPERFRONT Brooklyn's Public Summer installation, this year designed by CO (Christina Ciardullo and Naomi Ocko). The installation opens Sunday, July 17, and is on display until August 28.


[Rendering of Public Summer 2011 by CO | image source]

More from SUPERFRONT:

Join SUPERFRONT and Industry City resident artists Sunday July 17th 3pm - 6pm to celebrate architectural duo CO’s Public Summer outdoor installation. This opening reception is concurrent with the 15th anniversary of the legendary Body + Soul dance party, which jumps off next door at 220 36th street starting at 4pm. Public Summer access is free and open to the public, tickets to Body + Soul sold separately.

Located between two warehouse buildings, the festive outdoor space designed by CO will host public art and performance every Saturday and Sunday from July 23rd through August 28th.

Location : Sunset Park, Brooklyn
2nd Avenue between 35th and 36th Streets
accessible from 2nd Avenue, west of the BQE.