“Our design for the project responds to the layering of Tokyo; the juxtapositions of scale and the character of buildings that draw the eye upwards,” says Neil Hubbard, group leader at Heatherwick Studio.

“Set within a natural valley, we have chosen to accentuate that topography through our design, creating an undulating arrangement that uses a pergola-like structural system to create a variety of landscaped spaces, from hidden gardens to sunken courtyards. Weaving and flowing through the scheme, a family of pavilions emerges from the grid of the pergola. Rather than focus on one single impression, we hope to encourage exploration by creating hundreds of moments to be revealed and discovered.”

Led by architect Thomas Heatherwick, London-based Heatherwick Studio is no stranger to working living vegetation into its designs. In this case, the “planted pergola” makes brilliant use of an irregularly shaped plot, with an undulating roof that stretches down to reach the ground and planted balconies tucked into the vertical spaces.

“As many new developments around the world can be harsh and sterile, we wondered if we could provide a more human-centered alternative by integrating surprisingly intense quantities of planting and greenery,” says Heatherwick.

“As a way of combining an architectural construction system with significant amounts of nature, we developed the idea of a garden pergola scaled up to district size. This concept has allowed us to bring an overarching logic to an eight-hectare piece of Tokyo whilst also making space for facilities such as housing, shops, hotels, spas, a school, and a temple within the sections framed by the grid.”

Some areas of the “planted pergola” penetrate the ground, reaching down into the basement levels to provide natural light. The design references traditional Japanese crafts like edo kiriko, a 19th-century glass etching technique.

The project is the first by Heatherwick Studio to be constructed in Japan, and it’s set for completion in March 2023. Other structures in the district are currently underway, including apartment towers with wood-clad interiors by architect Sou Fujimoto, hotels, and a seven-story school for 700 international students. All of them will be connected by an underground pedestrian tunnel that contains a food hall.

Developer Mori aims for Toranomon-Azabudai to be a “modern urban village” offering a park-like atmosphere in the heart of Tokyo. It’s been in the works for 30 years, and construction finally began on August 5th, 2019.

“It’s been a remarkable period over the last four years to work with Mori Building Company, to create this new part of Tokyo — going beyond the norms of typical large mixed-use developments to create something meaningfully embedded within the city,” says Hubbard.

The post Heatherwick Studio Proposes a Planted Pergola Building for Tokyo first appeared on Dornob.

Right in the middle of urban Los Angeles, black tar bubbles up from the ground, often covered in fallen leaves. A registered National Natural Landmark, the La Brea Tar Pits are a rich source of paleontological treasures, having trapped thousands upon thousands of mammoths and other extinct creatures in its sticky liquid asphalt muck.

Today, they’re at the center of Hancock Park, alongside the George C. Page Museum, which itself is full of millions of fossils from the pits, including saber-toothed cats, dire wolves, bison, ground sloths, and more. The Tar Pits are the only active paleontological research facility in the world located in a major urban area, and their centerpiece is currently a group of mammoth statues emerging from the fenced-in Lake Pit.

The 12-acre park and its surroundings are due for a makeover, and three major architecture firms are competing to overhaul them, with three very different approaches in mind.

New York-based Weiss/Manfredi proposes preserving most of the park’s existing architecture, adding an elliptical new wing that will facilitate a more cohesive journey throughout the grounds. This wing cuts into the landscape of the park so that anyone walking along the outside can peek into the museum. They would also plant hundreds of additional trees on site and build walkways right over the pits.

“The La Brea Loops and Lenses form a triple mobius that links all existing elements of the park to redefine Hancock Park as a continuously unfolding experience, connecting three distinguishing identities that are latent within the park today: Research and Revelation — the site of the excavation pits and Pleistocene Garden; Community and Culture — where the museum and central green are located; and Spectacle and Urban Fictions — where the lake pit and mastodons join the public imagination on Wilshire Boulevard. The different identities of the loops embody journeys, with programming that appeals to diverse interests — from paleontology to bird watching, from science to play.”

Danish architecture firm Dorte Mandrup would add a new floor and rooftop garden to the museum while keeping the mammoths intact. Their main goal is to expand the museum’s floor area without taking away from the green space outside.

“Our proposal interweaves the park and museum, so [from] the moment you step inside the park you become immersed into the story of the Tar Pits. We want a visit here to be a journey of curiosity, where senses and imagination are instantly awakened. Our hope is that this will bring visitors much closer to the world of natural science, and in turn heighten their understanding of the past, present, and future of our planet.”

By far the most radical of the three, Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s proposal would raze the entire museum and rebuild it as a series of stacked, overlapping plates surrounding a glass box, which would house exhibition, collection, and laboratory spaces.

“As an urbanized culture, we are rarely conscious of the geological forces that shape the ground we walk (and drive) on. A new masterplan for the La Brea Tar Pits and Page Museum offers a unique opportunity to not only heighten awareness of the natural history held underfoot, but also to engender a sense of responsibility towards the role humans play in shaping the environment they inherit.”

The firm continues: “A revitalized Hancock Park is conceived to be the connective tissue between existing and new institutions, public spaces, and urban infrastructure. We have taken a ‘light touch’ approach for the next evolution of the Page Museum, infilling underutilized spaces and reconfiguring what is already there to create a more dynamic and efficient hybrid structure that is both building and landscape.”

Displays of each proposal will be on view at the museum at La Brea Tar Pits through September 15th, so the public can check out renderings, models, and drawings and provide feedback either on-site or online. The Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County are expected to decide on one by the end of the year.

The post Three Design Firms Present Their Visions for L.A’s La Brea Tar Pits first appeared on Dornob.

After years of ideas and proposals from the community to resuscitate the Harlem riverfront in New York City, Foster + Partners recently announced a major renovation project in the area’s Sherman Creek Park. When completed, the new boathouse there will help Row New York’s free and inexpensive youth programs prosper, which means more kids will be able reap the physical and character-building rewards of competitive rowing. Even better, they’ll have access to new educational programs designed to guide them through the college admissions process.

Harlem River History

For many years, the nine-mile Harlem River tidal channel between Manhattan and The Bronx has been dubbed “New York’s Forgotten Waterfront.” As recently as the early 20th century, the river was a thriving fishing and crabbing community, with many timber boathouses lined up along its banks. But time eventually turned the area into a desolate mixture of communal dumps, abandoned vehicles, freight trains, chop shops, and struggling small industries.

Community Efforts

Locals and city officials alike have been racking their brains trying to figure out how to breathe new life into the district, with new parks, restored marshes and beaches, and a even labyrinth of bike paths slowly popping up over the last few years.

The new Foster + Partners boathouse is expected to bring even more people to the shore, and make sure the Harlem River waterfront is remembered fondly into infinity. Most importantly, it’ll allow Row New York to significantly increase its influence, helping up to five times as many students, including those with learning disabilities and physical limitations. Plus, for the first time ever, the organization will be able to house all its programs in one central location.

New Beginnings with Classic Features

The 1,600-square-foot Foster + Partners design, spearheaded by the firm’s iconic Founder and Executive Chairman Norman Foster, is made exclusively from wood. A huge plaza surrounds the main structure, with folding ramps leading to all levels. Flood-resistant boat storage on the lower level is topped with an oversized multi-use hall, which itself is flanked by classrooms and changing rooms and opens to a broad terrace with panoramic views of the river.

A great folding timber canopy floats over the entire boathouse, protecting both its terrace and plaza from the harsh summer sun. The unique lattice design of the covering casts mottled shadows over the structure, and over the bordering landscaped areas that play host to community events and performances, casual picnicking, and overall family fun.

Natural Bonuses

It appears that nature uncannily “knows” that a new era is dawning for the Harlem River shore. Locals claim that fishing has never been better in the area, with ample numbers of eel, catfish, toadfish, porgies, flounder, and striped bass being caught there in recent months, along with crabs, mussels, oysters, and clams. There have also been reports that about 45 assorted species of birds have been frequenting the shore as of late.

Foster’s Vision

Norman Foster’s visualization of what his group seeks to accomplish with this project is clear. He explains: “In envisioning a design for a boathouse that will serve a diverse population and be a resource to the community at large, I wanted to create a building that was both functional and accessible, but also one that responded to the Hudson River’s long history as a busy transportation hub. This timber boathouse will fit naturally into the landscape of the riverfront and will transform this stretch of the Harlem River into a lively gathering place for people from all communities.”

The post Foster + Partners Unveils Proposal for New Timber Boathouse on Harlem River first appeared on Dornob.

Observation points take on all sorts of forms: mirrored cabins that blend into their landscapes, treetop towers with incredible vistas, and floating platforms for the contemplation of watery scenes are just a few of them. But rarely do they lurk above the caldera of a volcano while mimicking the form of flowing lava like the stunning Nemrut Caldera Observation Route by architect Keremcan Kirilmaz and product designer Erdem Batirbek of Turkey. Created for the Bee Breeders Nemrut Volcano Eyes Architecture Competition, the concept taps into the site’s history as an ever-changing mountain shaped by unseen forces.
Addressing the competition brief to create a dynamic visitor observation platform on top of the dormant Nemrut Volcano in eastern Turkey, the winding overlook provides unobstructed views of the landscape as intended, but the symbolism within its form goes much deeper than that, both physically and metaphorically. It creates a bridge made of vivid red corten steel and perforated stairs between a ski station on the site and the lookout point itself.

“Now dormant and peaceful, Nemrut Volcano was once a giant boiling engine of destruction,” say the designers. “After many millennia of quakes, eruptions, tectonic crashes, and tears, this ancient inferno calmed down and became a colossal monument of nature, movement, and time, that now contains a small serene piece of eden inside. This means that Nemrut’s journey is not complete yet; its story is still being written, while it is being constantly sculpted by movements from within and below.”

“Nemrut Caldera Observation Route was designed as an embodiment of Nemrut Caldera’s continuous movement and ongoing journey. It is not a single platform with a single viewpoint, but it is an observation path that offers a journey with a variety of viewpoints. The visitor is not limited to a constant point on a single platform, [but] is an active observer who moves freely and is able to have unrestricted panoramic points of view.”

The Nemrut Caldera Observation Route won second prize in the competition. The jurors praised the design for its sinuous form in keeping with Nemrut’s history, noting that the detailed renderings were particularly effective in outlining the design and how it could potentially be constructed. The proposal’s one downfall, as far as they’re concerned, is the feasibility of physically supporting the platform.

But winning the top prize was beside the point, say Kirilmaz and Batirbek in a post-competition interview with Bee Breeders. The chance to design something out of the ordinary was a “refreshing exercise,” and a rewarding opportunity to face a challenge and develop creative new perspectives that directly addressed it.

The post Steel Lookout Point in Turkey Mimics the Flow of Lava first appeared on Dornob.

For those reasons, watching a baseball game in person is as much about the experience of the stadium as it is about the game itself. A great ballpark is like a great public park or beautiful beach: if the scenery is appealing enough, you will completely relax and enjoy your activity, be it a picnic, a book, or a sporting event.

In November of 2018, when the Oakland Athletics released renderings for their new Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG)-designed stadium, the team showed fans what they could expect starting in 2023. Gensler and James Corner Field Operations are also part of the project. Following the example of other North American professional sports teams who have recently built new mixed-use entertainment projects, such as the Edmonton Oilers of the NHL and the Brooklyn Nets of the NBA, the Athletics are proposing a new community for Oakland’s Howard Terminal, with their $700 million, 34,000-seat stadium as the centerpiece.

Building arenas and stadiums in the middle of nowhere may have been the norm in the 20^th century, but today, professional sports facilities are more commonly built alongside entertainment and leisure districts, where residents can live close to the action. Condos and public amenities are now extensions of the caps, jerseys, banners, and other merchandise being offered on the grounds.

The Athletics’ new Howard Terminal location would be right by the water near downtown Oakland, with an actual park built onto the roof of the stadium. Inspired by the layout of Shibe Park in Philadelphia, where the Athletics played from 1909 to 1954, the stadium opens up to plaza at centerfield to give fans a theatrical entrance to the inner bowl. Around the stadium itself will be pedestrian malls and mixed-used buildings with slanted roofs — one of BIG’s most signature design gestures.

For those who are unfamiliar with baseball or the Oakland franchise, the Athletics currently play in what some say is the worst stadium in all of Major League Baseball. The Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum, known simply as the Coliseum, looks dated, decrepit, has too many seats too far from the field, and is surrounded by a large unsightly parking lot. It is not an exciting place to watch a baseball game. Returning to the comparison of a great ballpark to a beautiful beach, the Coliseum can be thought of as an ugly beach with dark sand and unpleasant water. Not the best place to enjoy anything.

The team hopes to eventually purchase the Coliseum for $135 million and convert it into a sunken amphitheatre for Minor League Baseball in the middle of a municipal park, with residential, corporate, retail, and institutional projects all throughout. The adjacent Oracle Arena, where the NBA’s Golden State Warriors currently play, will be transformed into an events venue around the same time.

As promising as this project is, it is far from the first proposal for a new Oakland stadium. There are still many local approvals that have to be obtained before this project gets built and a new era of baseball can begin in the city. With any luck, this will be the time the team and their fans aren’t left stranded on base.

The post Will the Oakland Athletics Finally Get a New Stadium? first appeared on Dornob.

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The obvious homeless are those in tent cities on streets and next to freeways. To many residents, these cities are unsightly, prompting them to oppose any settlement plan that threatens to get too close to their backyards. Even though a majority of residents agree that homelessness is a big problem in the Los Angeles area and have even voted for public policy that allocates hundreds of millions of tax dollars to help the situation, the compassion of some quickly turns into resistance once their own neighborhoods are selected as possible settlements.

There is evidence that suggests this resistance is about much more than just aesthetics, but if appearance is in any way standing in the way of giving people hope, then ensuring that good design is used to elevate the dignity of future shelters is imperative. This is especially true of temporary shelters, (also known as bridge housing), which are needed to protect the homeless population while more permanent solutions are constructed.

There is also another group to consider when discussing this issue: the unseen masses who either live in their cars or apartment hop between sympathetic and discrete friends. These people could never be singled out as being homeless, but their lack of a stable address does put them in that category. For all you know, this could even be the case for someone you work with. This should at least evoke more compassion among the permanently housed public. Yet, the temporarily housed and the flat-out unhoused continue to be treated like lepers who just ruin neighborhoods and decrease property values.

In July of 2018, when the Urban Land Institute’s Los Angeles District Council and Mayor Eric Garcetti tasked six architecture firms with designing shelters that all residents could support, they wanted proposals that felt less isolated and utilitarian and more hopeful and communal. Instead of treating people like livestock, these shelters would treat people like human beings. Additionally, each proposal had to have amenities like outdoor common areas, food trucks that offered healthy options, and social services for those with mental health and substance abuse issues. The firms were paired off to create three total teams, each of which respectively designed a modular prototype shelter for 50, 100, and 150-plus users.

The proposal with the smallest footprint is JFAK Architects and RELM Studio’s design for a 50-bed shelter. The sleeping areas in it would be housed in larger buildings, leaving the majority of the actual site for lush groves with seating areas, mini courtyards, and a small welcome center.

The 100-plus bed proposal by SWA and Studio One Eleven offered housing options for both families and individuals. Community gardens, dog parks, restroom facilities, a central courtyard, tree-lined pathways, and public art are used to help the homeless community see the shelter as an actual sanctuary.

DLR Group and EPT Design‘s 150-bed proposal boasts an allure comparable to that of a modest resort. Accessible from the street via an entryway lined with garden areas, residents are welcomed and briefed at an administrative pavilion before being directed to their living quarters. Play areas for kids, recreational spaces for adults, dog parks, benches in communal spaces, grass, and trees make the shelter feel that much more like home.

Fortunately for Los Angeles’ homeless population, 15 of these community-based shelters will soon be built all over the county, each one a bridge to a hopeful, less nomadic existence. Unfortunately, far too many residents seem to be demanding gratitude as a kind of consolation prize in exchange for their embracing of these shelters. Proclaiming that “the homeless should be grateful” still shows a lack of human decency, which can only come from graciously lending a hand and making the disenfranchised feel like society actually cares about them.

The post Why We Should Support LA’s New Community-Based Homeless Shelters first appeared on Dornob.

British architect Norman Foster (of Foster + Partners fame) has just released his concept video for his firm’s latest master plan: an entirely purpose built, sustainable, urban utopia in India’s Andhra Pradesh. The new state capital, Amaravati, will be a fine example of architects focusing on urban planning and creating spaces where everything has a purpose.

Architecture and nature will be fused together to create a harmonious living and work environment that people from all walks of life will be able to enjoy and benefit from. Clay-colored buildings will cover the city to create a picturesque scene, adorned with trees and foliage to harness the natural magic of India’s landscapes. Running through the center of “the people’s capital” is a long park encompassing a needle-like building, which itself will host the central government of Andhra Pradesh — the firm’s version of a “city centerpiece.”

Situated by the river Krishna, Amaravati will span 217 square kilometers, with at least 60 percent of the city dedicated to creating green spaces, including a set of lakes and rivers that have been meticulously designed to interweave throughout the urban sprawl in order to provide its inhabitants with fresh water. Water taxis, electric car routes, bicycle paths, and covered walkways have all been incorporated to encourage future citizens to walk (or at least use public transport) rather than drive when navigating the city. For these reasons, Amaravati is one of the world’s first truly sustainable cities.

When, What, Who, Why?

Of course, the task of developing an entire city has placed a lot of responsibility on the firm, but the creative freedom that comes with such a paramount and influential project has also allowed Foster to break and rebuild boundaries that only a select few have ever been allowed to experiment with. The ambitious project was first reported to have been awarded to Foster’s firm back in January 2017, after they won a contest for their initial design of the central building.

Last week saw the unveiling of the official proposals. Set to cost $15 billion USD (or £11.2 billion GBP) to erect, the project will undoubtedly be one of steady growth, with news reports already commenting on the slow process of actually enacting the blueprints. But since the current village of Amaravati houses dusty farmlands, primitive dirt roads, and half-finished civic projects, it shouldn’t be any surprise that this new city’s development will take some time!

Locals fear that the developers’ initial promise to have the city housing “3.5 million dwellers” within the next five years isn’t so realistic — especially given the project’s lengthy timeline. Three years after President Narendra Modi laid the cornerstone for the government building, work still hasn’t seemed to exceed the planning stage. One political analyst even commented: “Nothing much has happened on the ground in Amaravati. It is still more dream than reality.”

Foster + Partners

Naturally, questions have arisen as to whether Foster’s sustainable fantasy will ever come to fruition for the people of India. Delving into the firm’s back catalog of civic projects, you’ll find that their execution and longevity in innovative builds remains unquestionable in terms of success. Foster + Partners’ work has been heralded all over the world, from their renovation of the Reichstag in Berlin to those of the Nazarbayev Center in Kazakhstan and the Treasury Building in the UK.

From libraries and public forums to labyrinthine office spaces and government buildings, the firm’s ability to devise and remodel diverse and dynamic structures that hold such ornamental power over the places they’re in lies in their unrivaled talent for fusing luxury and cutting-edge design. So keep your eyes on this space!

The post The Future of Cities: A Sustainable Man-Made Utopia first appeared on Dornob.

When Clouds Architecture Office proposed the world’s tallest skyscraper in late March of 2017, few people took it seriously — including this writer, who thought that it was nothing more than an early April Fools’ joke. The Analemma Tower would have no foundation, because it would be suspended from space by an asteroid. By a process Clouds AO calls “Universal Orbital Support System,” an asteroid would be placed in orbit 31,000 miles above sea level, with high-strength cables attaching it to a 101,706-foot-high building. The highest points of the building would be tens of thousands of feet above all commercial airline traffic.

Coming back down to earth, which according to Clouds AO would be accomplished by way of parachute, let’s take a moment to really think about this proposal. Despite the detailed explanation and research put into the Analemma Tower’s design, it all seems extremely doubtful. Nonetheless, the project still adds to the discourse on living off-planet and allows us to see what such a notion might realistically entail. Are proposals like these just admissions that our planet is doomed by climate change and that we should explore other living options? Do we feel comfortable with the built environment reaching into the clouds? What will humans living in the sky do to the environment? The Analemma Tower may be a fantasy, but the questions it raises are all pertinent.

Before you dismiss Clouds AO as being run by dreamers, you might want to know that they are currently one of just four finalists in New York’s “Gateways to Chinatown” design competition. Their proposal comprises a contemporary moon gate structure and some public space on a triangular concrete island.

Whereas the Analemma Tower goes way up, the “Big Bend” proposal by oiio goes up and comes back down. Conceived of as a response to the increase in tall and slender residential towers in New York City, the Big Bend would be the longest building in the world at 4,000 feet. But like Yitan Sun and Jianshi Wu’s 2016 eVolo competition entry of a sunken skyscraper bordering Central Park, the Big Bend is simply an inelegant idea. To be fair to oiio, the project is more of a critique of New York’s zoning rules than it is an actual proposal, and its absurdity still generates discussions about the types of cities that we want to live in, which is exactly the point of it. Do we want the future of our cities in the hands of crafty developers? Is there such a thing as too much density? Do we want horseshoe-shaped buildings in our cityscapes?

Speculative projects are often ignored because of their outrageous ideas and lack of intelligible solutions. However, it is not so much the proposals themselves that matter, nor the imaginations of the architects, but the commentary that each proposal makes, intended or otherwise. When speculative designs contribute to meaningful discussions, they are also contributing to a general body of knowledge that can be used to develop more realistic solutions in the future.

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Architecture studio 314’s proposal for a residential renovation in Corfu may be as modern as they come, but it retains that distinctly “Greek” feeling thanks to its traditional color palette and rounded arches. Rising above the treetops of an olive grove at the edge of a cliff, the villa is infused with all the drama we’ve come to expect from the Hellenic Republic.

While many cliffside homes are designed to blend into their surrounding environments, seeming more like an extension of the landscape than an artificial construction, 314 went in a bolder direction with this summer residence, which catches the sunlight by day and glows from within by night.

“House in Corfu” takes full advantage of the setting, which offers panoramic views of the Ionio Pelagos. It elevates and offsets its main volumes in a stepped arrangement to create a series of porticos and terraces that look out onto the sea. 314’s design would replace an existing structure in the same location on a 64,500-square-foot plot, the home itself measuring just over 3,200 square feet. The architects aim to stick to the same footprint to avoid disturbing the nature that makes the site so special.

Updating Corfu’s architectural vernacular for the 21st century is the studio’s main concern, and the highlight of their design is undoubtedly its incorporation of repetitive arches, as well as some openings in the roofs that allow full-sized trees to flourish. The flat, wide terraces formed by the home’s layout allow residents to take in extraordinarily clear views of the sky, which have earned the property the nickname of “The Midnight Stars.”

Roughly half of the ground floor is open to the air, providing transitional indoor/outdoor spaces that lead from common areas like the living room and kitchen out to the infinity edge swimming pool. Inside, an abundance of mirrored surfaces adds to the reflective qualities of the house’s white paint and textiles, multiplying the views of the surrounding nature.

The upper level contains master and guest bedrooms, private areas which feel a little more cloistered and protected than the house’s common ones. The bedrooms enjoy the best views of the sunset every evening. Though it appears to cantilever off the side of the level beneath it, this upper floor is actually set into a grassy hillside, which might explain all of the mountain goats wandering through the renderings.

The architects explain that they used white cement plaster on the floors and walls to mimic the look of ancient stone and that the patio and swimming pool will be made from uncoated concrete. The curving ceilings, also evocative of traditional Greek architecture, come together in “intersections of domes and arches” for a soft and welcoming effect. There are no harsh contrasts or unnecessary details in this design that would detract from the home’s dramatic silhouette.

The post Modern Greece: Summer Villa in Corfu Updates Ancient Style with Minimalist Flair first appeared on Dornob.

That’s exactly what the committee judging the Ross Pavilion International Design Contest was looking for, so it’s no wonder that this proposal from the American architecture firm wHY took home the top prize, beating out a number of strong contenders from big-name firms like the Bjarke Ingels Group. The shortlisted proposals were selected from 125 entries and can all be seen on the competition’s website.

The brief called for an original design that would enhance Edinburgh’s reputation and image “as a dynamic and creative city,” rejuvenating the existing gardens and enhancing their biodiversity. The gardens not only act as a “green lung” for the city, but they also serve as a tranquil getaway full of visual and sensory pleasures. The brief also called for entrants to incorporate sustainable values, improved physical and intellectual access, a variety of changing usages from dawn to dusk, and a modern, flexible venue space that could host a combination of small and large-scale events 365 days a year into their proposals.

The winning design from wHY features a “butterfly” pavilion and a new visitor center subtly folded into the landscape, ensuring that the castle remains the primary focal point. Drawing inspiration from the gardens’ history and geological features, wHY’s Victorian-style “pleasure garden” offers entertainment, art, and thousands of botanical delights. Plus, sliding the architectural elements beneath the gardens maintains the greatest amount of green space relative to manmade surfaces.

“This is a special opportunity for a special place, not just for Edinburgh but for the world,” says Mark Thomann, wHY’s Landscape Design Director. “The new Ross Pavilion and Gardens draw from the rich natural history, heritage, and creative spirit of Scotland, embodying a model approach for integrating public architecture and urban space in a top global city. Our team looks forward to realizing this vision with the Ross Development Trust and the people of Edinburgh.”

Paved pathways meander around the gardens to provide views from a variety of angles, making them easy to navigate for all visitors. The lines are all fluid and organic. A big part of this proposal’s appeal over those by architectural titans like BIG and Sou Fujimoto is the sense of balance it creates, keeping everything within a human scale so that no one element overwhelms the design’s overall program.

“Their proposal is a landscape scheme that is really more like an energy-field: using animation and drama as well as open vistas, they transform the Gardens and create an experience that is much freer and organic,” says competition director Malcolm Reading. “As is their style, they conscientiously sampled local opinion and have come up with a design proposal that is engaging and refreshing.”

The new West Princes Street Gardens are expected to open to the public by December 2019.

The post Undulating Rooftop Garden Wins Edinburgh’s Ross Pavilion Contest first appeared on Dornob.

It may be a faraway-seeming concept, to be sure, but what a beautiful design and brilliant idea this transforming tornado-proof underground house is. A combination of formal choices and built-in technologies recognize the awesome power of nature, and attempt to adapt to rather than defy environmental conditions on the ground (or in the sky).

Under heavy winds, hydraulic systems kick in that shift the normally-lofted home down to safety below.  As the residence drops underground, a waterproof roof layer slides into place to protect it. At each step, a series of sensors tell the home what conditions it needs to adapt to, and when it is safe to come back out.

Photocatatlyic coatings and carbon nanotubes are built into the exterior skin to absorb toxins, pollutants and carbon dioxide while also powering the house itself. A kind of futuristic home-meets-bomb-shelter idea for all conditions and environments.

So while these may not hit the manufacturing floor anytime soon, how neat would it be to leave home knowing that if a natural disaster were on its way your flexible home would automatically transform to protect itself? Creative concept and incredible renderings by the architects of 10design.

“Isn’t the Wizard of Oz a clear example of the awesome force that a tornado can muster? How can Jaws drive people out of the ocean screaming when a house blown through the sky brings back nostalgic memories? Please stay out of the water… but feel free to build your home below flood level and out of cards in the wind. There is an urgent need to shift from an outmoded logic, ignorant of the forces of nature, to a point where the unabashed rush for profit and development can be balanced against the basic goal of providing shelter. Humanity is inexplicably driven to build in places where it should not-accepting the unavoidability of this folly is the first step to breathing in a new vision. We sought a way of turning the seemingly destructive acts of nature into creative blooms.”

“Can we spin this violent ever present soup into a stabilizing direction? We seek a new mobility for the home that is controlled not left to “chance” (there is nothing accidental about 100 year old weather patterns). We are currently working on the development of a prototype with a group of ship builders in the US and Africa.”

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