Humans have been living in cities for thousands of years, and the United Nations estimates that by 2050, 68 percent of the world’s population will have moved to urban areas. There are lots of clear benefits to city life, like access to jobs, culture, restaurants, shopping, mass transit, and each other, but the noise, stress, and constant activity that comes with it can wear on even the most ardent urbanist over time.

There are plenty of ways we can make our cities more livable and relaxing, like bigger green spaces, pedestrian-only zones, and the replacement of loud diesel vehicles with greener, less polluting technologies. But what about our personal spaces? Can’t they be designed in a way that satisfies our desire for a connection with nature, even if we live in an urban high-rise?

Architect Aquiles Jarrín has completed an interesting experiment with “Bosque Apartment,” an intervention in a 1970s apartment in the historic center of Quito, Ecuador. The 112-square-meter (1205-square-foot) space features modern, often industrial materials, but it’s laid out in such a way that it conveys the feeling of living in an “indoor forest.”

“The project starts from an investigation carried out with the owners, from which several fundamental ideas emerged such as the importance of generating less defined spaces, the central role of the social area, diffuse divisions between spaces, and a strong presence of nature within the apartment,” says Jarrín.

The apartment already had an existing “air and light well” in the form of an interior courtyard and lots of textural concrete, much of which was previously hidden behind interior walls. The renovation knocked down these walls, including the ones blocking off the courtyard. New doors and windows blast the once dark space with daylight, air, and access to a garden that’s exposed to the elements.

“Without walls, the columns of the concrete structure acquired a strong presence, inviting us to work with this element as a basic unit of the project,” Jarrín explains. “In addition, this configuration of elements triggered a poetic dimension of the work, [in which] the columns ceased to be columns [and] started being called trunks. This metaphor of space defined the entire design and understanding of the project. The idea of not being in a domesticated space arose, inviting one to enter a wilder world, ‘a forest.’”

The architect introduced new elements with the same proportions as these concrete “trunks,” inserting them at random diagonal angles to break the rigid patterns imposted by human creations and mimic something more natural. By overlapping these black metal “logs,” new floor levels were created. Standing among them are matching built-in elements packed with shelves, surfaces, and storage cabinets.

Instead of one continuous plane, the floors step up in some areas and recess in others, creating a dynamic landscape. The introduction of wood floors brings in another reference to nature while setting off the black metal and concrete. Red brick, a rainbow of books on the shelves, and lots of indoor plants add pops of color and vitality. The cherry on top of this striking design is the sunken indoor pool overlooking both an indoor cactus garden and the outdoor courtyard.

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The Designer’s Vision

Steven Chilton, leader of London’s world-renowned Steven Chilton Architects, was inspired by the Sea of Bamboo national park in nearby Yixing, the largest bamboo rainforest in China, in his design concept for the theater.

Representing an abstract impression of a bamboo forest, Chilton wanted to replicate the feeling of the forest to his audiences experienced as they witnessed the magnificent water show. He explains that he “[hopes] the audience found a connection with the architecture that resonates with them emotionally. Wandering through the Sea of Bamboo forest on the edge of Wuxi will be a common memory for many visitors, and we hope the experience of visiting the theater will [also] prove to be evocative and meaningful.”

Bringing the Elements Together

The circular theater is over 104 feet tall and made up of three key components: the columns, the shade canopy, and the building envelope. The columns are further abstract representations of the bamboo forest, each one painstakingly positioned around the perimeter of the structure to create a screen between the building facades and adjacent landscape.

The columns are topped with an awning of leaves to complete their transformation into forest trees, running around the whole of the building at roof level. This canopy consists of an assortment of triangular bays holding rows of gold-anodized aluminum louvers. The slats are arbitrarily arranged to create a natural pattern of light and shade that dances around the building throughout the day. Each cove of louvers is also positioned at different perspectives to amplify the the illusion of their being a real-life canopy. Every bay of slats is held up by a triangular lattice configuration that supports the tops of the columns and shifts their load onto the main structure of the building.

The shade canopy and columns also serve the eco-friendly purpose of casting a gentle shadow over the building that inertly lowers the structure’s cooling load.

The building envelope is chiefly made up of painted block-work and curtain wall glazing. This glazing extends the total height of the building in and above the entrance hall to afford the greatest all-around views of nearby public areas. White and gold stripes on the envelope lightly illuminate the theater’s full length at night, bringing an added air of magic to the already-spellbinding forest of columns.

The 2000-seat Wuxi Taihu Show Theatre opened on December 22nd, 2019 and is expected to keep showcasing Dragone’s water show for the indefinite future.

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That could change as more architects, designers, and urban planners turn to strategies like “Design for Disassembly,” which plans for the end of a structure’s usefulness as well as its potential for reincarnation. The goal is to create enduring projects that are “closed loop,” in which as many of their materials are recovered as possible and adapted for new purposes. Above all, it necessitates looking at the supply chain in reverse, thinking about the ways a building will eventually be disassembled.

When the owner of a real estate business decided he needed a new sales center in China’s Henan province, he approached architecture firm LUO Studio looking for an innovative, budget-friendly, and green solution. More specifically, he wanted to target consumers who prioritized sustainable living with a building that was environmentally responsible and made from natural materials — and he wanted it designed, constructed, finished, and decorated in less than two months.

The Beijing-based architects responded with Longfu Life Experience Center: a design that delivered on all of those goals without compromising an ounce of elegance or beauty. Drawing inspiration from Mies van der Rohe’s Crown Hall at the Illinois Institute in Chicago, the firm envisioned a series of modular structures held within a crystalline envelope. These tree-shaped units are made from renewable, cost-effective timbers and joined together using simple metal connectors.

Each structure is independent of the others, but when they’re combined, they form strong and stable continuous arches. Infinitely expandable, the system produces a series of stackable columns, producing mezzanine levels as they branch out at the top.

It was a challenge, says LUO, but the system they came up with is clearly worth all the hard work. They even established a set of standard assembly tactics to make the construction and installation processes as quick and smooth as possible, with many components prefabricated offsite.

“All components can be completely dismounted, installed, moved and reused for other constructions, making the building thoroughly reversible,” they explain. “If the building is a person, all the equipment, electromechanics, pipelines of it are the respiratory systems, collaterals, and blood vessels of the body. All these systems in the body are by no means isolated, but are highly integrated with the skeletons and muscles in a symbiotic state, resulting in a more effective and intensive space.”

“Other parts of the building were also designed in a way similar to the structure of body. Taking furniture as example, all the furniture ‘grows’ on the structural column, with each table surrounding a single ‘clustered column.’ All the furniture and guardrails stretch out of the core structure and even weave a surface by extending outward. These necessary parts are concomitants of the main structure, providing support against it and making it more stable.”

The resulting “universal space” offers infinite possible usages rather than being constrained to a certain specific function, ensuring that its life will last well beyond the needs of the business owner who commissioned it. Any part of it can be enlarged, removed, replaced, or moved based on current needs, and when it’s time for it to come down, all of the materials can be reused for new projects.

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It is generally easier to stack linear things – or so conventional wisdom goes. But what happens when you add just the tiniest twist – or tilt – to such traditional approaches? Things can get a little more complicated… and a lot more visually interesting.

Take, for example, a modular bookshelf design that’s still generally functional, but just off kilter enough to look extra cool.

These simple-seeming shelves address multiple issues at once: books are meant to lean, not stand straight, and stackable systems need to nest in order to work (which often means matching pieces on both top and bottom).

By adding just a few degrees via a slight extension on one side, all of these typical dilemmas are tackled, with gravity doing the work to keep your books safe and your shelves stacked.  Designed by MicroWorks.

“4° (four degrees)
Bookshelves are flat, so if your collection is incomplete,
you have to put the books on an angle so they don’t collapse,
and as a result they bend and become damaged.
Because ‘4°’ leans on a 4 degree angle it allows gravity and math to protect your books,
leaving your unique bookshelf neat.
design: MicroWorks, 2006
material: MDF
status: prototypephoto (c) MicroWorks“

About the design studio, Japan-based Micro Works:

“A design studio established in 2003 by Shunsuke Kaiyama.
With the cooperation of various factories and craftsmen, we plan, design, and sell original products by proper production instead of mass production.“

“In 2013, a 60-year-old private house with a studio was self-renovated, and the atelier and space “Suginami Uminoie” was opened.
Although various exhibitions and events were being held, it closed in September 2018 due to the circumstances of the property.“
 
“In March 2019, relocated to Shinagawa Ward and reopened as ‘umi neue.’
In addition to original products, we sell antiques, tools, parts and objects with ambiguous purposes, and also hold various exhibitions and events.“

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From ancient Greek temples to the modern open-plans homes of Mies van der Rohe, columns are curious things. They stand right in the middle of rooms, but are taken for granted over time like walls and doors. One could easily miss that this is anything but a structural support, suspended from the ceiling but seeming to reach all the way down to the floor.

In fact, the upper (wooden) portion is a storage system – a series of doors open to reveal shelves and drawers. The lower (marble) piece is not a static base, but rather a pull-out step stool one can use to reach higher on the column or sit on to work with something lower down.

The layout of the openings and sizes of various spaces inside are somewhat beside the point. The real key to this clever design is the use of normally-architectural elements in an unusual way, while simultaneously transitioning away from the normal layout strategies for storage pieces (typically found along walls).

Each piece is custom-designed by Sophie Mensen to suit a particular interior. In this instance, the forty-five-degree angle makes it parallel and perpendicular to the zig-zag wood flooring instead of the walls, which in turn gives the ‘secret’ away somewhat.

With the right materials and orientation for a specific space, though, one could really go a long way toward hiding this in plain site.

Says Mensen, “Collecting is a condition of humanity, a fascination for a particular object or relation to an experience you cherish.”

“I have the compulsion to give these objects their own particular orientation within my personal space, a subtle yet prominent position. I have chosen to work with a shape that gets absorbed by the space; the column, a constructive element of the house.”

“A column is also a monument to impress, to remember important events that may not be forgotten. The column as a monument and the column as a constructive element are like the equivalent of my Column, but in the size and scale that fits to our interior.”

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