BIG architects are making it BIG

Danish architects Bjarke Ingels Group have won a competition to design multistorey, prefabricated wooden housing for Kouvola, Finland. The E2 (Ecology + Economy) Timber Competition aims to prototype and showcase large-scale sustainable wooden construction that can be replicated worldwide. Entitled PUU-BO, BIG’s design comprises prefabricated modules that could be reconfigured to make different building typologies in different environments, from townhouses to skyscrapers.


Previously to this they have managed to win about 3 major competition projects which will really start to put them more on the map more than they are already. Bjarke, the director of BIG has made his intentions clear to rethink how we design and how an architect should be seen in the public eye. He will still rarely dress up and often is very casual in what he wears. The other competitions that BIG architects have recently won are:

The National Gallery of Greenland

The building will form a ring round a central glazed courtyard.Its roofline and internal paths will follow the shape of the sloping site, which overlooks a fjord.








West 57:
A residential building for Manhattan, New York, with a rectangular plan pulled up at one corner to form a triangular tower. Called West 57th, the 600-apartment block will be organised around a central courtyard, providing residents with views of the Hudson River.The sloping roof will rise to a peak of 467 ft and its surface will be punctured by roof terraces.The other three façades will comprise balconies and bay windows serving each of the apartments.Construction is due for completion in 2016.









TEK:

A technology centre for Taipei, Taiwan, comprising a cube-shaped structure with round voids cut from its volume. Called TEK (Technology, Entertainment & Knowledge Centre), holes in the structure will create a spiral within the volume, forming access routes from street level into the building and up to its roof.The building will be made up of concrete lamellas, an arrangement of stacked thin plates, that will recede in the centre and function as a staircase where the holes have been cut into the structure.These stepped areas can also provide informal seating areas for visitors.The centre will comprise exhibition spaces, showrooms, an auditorium, restaurants and galleries, which will be organized around the central spiral.Retail spaces, a hotel and offices will also be incorporated.








Waste-To-Energy Plant
A power plant for Copenhagen with their design that will blow smoke rings and double up as a ski slope.The Waste-to-Energy Plant will replace the neighbouring Amagerforbraending plant and will function as a treatment facility that transforms waste into energy.The roof of the building will be a ski slope, accessed via an elevator running along a smokestack and providing views to the inside of the plant.The smokestack will expel rings of smoke 30cm in diameter whenever a ton of fossil Co2 is released, acting as a signal to raise awareness of ecological issues and energy consumption amongst the inhabitants of Copenhagen.The smoke rings will be illuminated at night by lasers that will be directed towards them.Construction is due for completion in 2016.







Danish Pavilion at the Shanghai Expo '10

Shanghai Expo 2010: the Danish Pavilion by Bjarke Ingels Group at Shanghai Expo 2010 opened to the public today along with the rest of the Expo.BIG’s double-loop structure has a cycle park on the roof containing 300 free bikes for visitors, and features as its centrepiece a pool overlooked by the Little Mermaid statue from Copenhagen – specially imported for the Expo – where visitors can swim.

South Kilburn Swap Shop

South Kilburn Swap Shop

The South Kilburn Swap Shop is a collaborative marketplace in which the inhabitants of South Kilburn and the wider area can explore the rising trend of collaborative consumption: an explosion in sharing, bartering, lending, trading, renting, gifting, and swapping.
People can meet and exchange their unwanted goods and items for a range of different products and services. They can participate in a variety of events or workshops. It is both a physical space and an online network. It is both social and commercial.

The Façade

The façade is painted in a striking bold colour with applied graphics and features a variety of different functions, including a ‘community chalkboard’ and a number of ‘storefronts’. Each ‘storefont’ has a unique graphic covering providing them with a sense of identity and ownership of their space.

Canopy

The canopy activates the façade of the building by creating an external exchange space. Community members can take advantage of this new sheltered area and enjoy reading the ‘community chalkboard’, gazing at many of the 'storefronts' displays, relaxing in the sun or even exchanging a product or service directly on the street.

Community Chalkboard

The Chalk board will serve as a community newspaper and act as a device to collect local stories from different cultural groups. People can chalk a story or a message for someone, whether it is to report something they found, announce something happening in the community, ask to borrow an item, warn people of something to watch out for, or simply to chat.

Store Fronts

The existing windows become storefronts which are linked to the studio spaces that are offered to local business and artists within the Swap Shop. These windows to the street can be used as a display area, a performance space or a kiosk counter for exhibiting artworks, staging impromptu events or selling products and services to passersby. The external area outside each of the storefronts are filled with planting boxes growing a variety of herbs, fruits and vegetables for use in the Swap Shop Cafe

Village Underground Readjusted Renders.. for now.

I was asked to re-do a few of the images that I have for the Village Underground Project, so attached are these images.

Aberrant Architecture: Work

So today whilst working with Aberrant in the studio and a man walks past and says 'Powerful Content Makers, Bless You.' Does he think we are Jesus and his disciples?

Friday 18th February

So the institute of IDEAs is pretty much arranged to have the 1st lecture on the 24th of this month. Under a week now!

Today has been spent working for Aberrant Architecture, drawing up plans for a Gallery project that we have been shortlisted for as well as a variety of other workings going on in the office. I am sitting here looking through to the O2 in the Incubation unit on a relatively nice day. Tonight I will be working at El Paso, Shoreditch on Old Street, running the bar downstairs for their monthly Everything Sucks night. This is a night featuring a couple of bands and then a DJ playing all in contemporaty, punk, rock, metal, Ska, and indie untill the early hours of the morning.

My current uni project is the retail project for a company called DePloy. Deploy is a boutique style clothing brand, that lives on its reputation for creating different clothing that can easily be adjusted using the poppers and hooks that hold different parts of the garments together. The idea is that a work outfit can effectively easily be turned into an outfit to wear at night. The design has to have a mixed use purpose so the idea of catering for the amount of Homeless in Covent garden at night could be an idea to be expanded on. Considering a large amount of the homeless people are ex military and male it could work well having this contrasting with the fact DePloy is a women's clothing brand?

The Institute of Ideas has started! This is a student based society aiming to hold a series of lectures and events for students to attend. They aim to get in high end designers to come and demonstrate their work and what they are about.

The first will be on the 24th February with Crossrail coming in! Crossrail are in charge of the masterplanning and redesigning and reinventing of London's underground system. Surely something to not miss!

You can follow them on Facebook and twitter!

http://twitter.com/#!/instituteofidea

Institute Of IDEA's

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A Weekend In Barcelona

From Thursday until Sunday I spent some time in Barcelons. The trip was designed to be a research trip which involved exploring some new and old buildings and designs. Each day involved a large amount of walking around the city but the things that we got to see made it special. A few of the real Gems that stood out in the city were Mies Van Der Rohe's Barcelona Pavillion; a place that managed to create a real cool, relaxing and reflective feel to it, something quite special when the site was effectively a building site.

Sagrada Familia, designed by Gaudi was something incredibly special. I have never honestly had shivers down my spine and been speechless by a space like I did there. The interior is pretty much completed. Although incomplete, the church is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and in November 2010 was consecrated and proclaimed a minor basilica by Pope Benedict XVI.

Though construction of Sagrada Familia had commenced in 1882, Gaudi took over in 1883, transforming the project with his architectural and engineering style — combining Gothic and curvilinear, Art Nouveau forms with ambitious structural columns and arches.

Gaudi devoted his last years to the project and at the time of his death in 1926, less than a quarter of the project was complete. Sagrada Familia's construction progressed slowly as it relied on private donations and was interrupted by the Spanish Civil War — only to resume intermittent progress in the 1950s. Construction passed the mid-point in 2010 with some of the project's greatest challenges remaining and an anticipated completion date of 2026 — the centennial of Gaudí's death.

Beautiful Music

When you hear that a few guys you know decide to release what would be their fourth album this year of course theres a right to be excited. But as I work now on redrawing some existing plans, sections and elevations of a building sited in Covent Garden, listening to what is The Architects new album called The Here and Now. Well it puts a smile on your face.

The album is Brilliant.

Tuesday 1st February

Today is the first day of the month and I find it very interesting to read on AJ that there are at least 300 'architects' in Ireland are not officially registered. This is something to worry about I guess? Surely if there are buildings designed and build by these such called practices in the UK there must be thousands worldwide who might not necessarily have the training or skill to properly design a building. At the end of the day a badly designed building can fall down and kill people. Not good.

Ravensbourne now has an Architecture and IDEAs student society, the name is Institute of Ideas, or OIO for short. The aim is to create a lecture series that will then in turn bring well known designers, architects and engineers to do talks in Ravensbourne to help us students to gain a larger network and to meet a variety of people from many different backgrounds.

We want to raise money, raise the knowledge of Ravensbourne and creatt a hub for design. A place of excitement to be useful for all students.

Our first lecture will be on the 24th February with the director of the Director of London's Crossrail scheme. This should be very interestng!


We had our first group meeting for the student society yesterday with what I feel is such a strong team with some amazing ideas. I look forward to working with every one who has joined my team.

Contextual Studies:

I have tried so so hard to concentrate on this but I am genuinely struggling. I understand why we do it at uni but I would just like it to really be a little bit more interesting haha! Instead, I found this: A Theatre in Australie. BEAUTIFUL

Final Report, Urban Environments

The Weekend

So.

Thursday was assessment day, after having very little sleep for a few weeks finally Thursday night i managed to get a few more hours than two worth of shut eye to wake up and create a report about the project.

Friday night was all about a bit of punk rock at El Paso. Having been asked to become the head barman on the downstairs bar in the Gopher Hole on my own from 7-2 was quite an effort but still a very rewarding night! Good music, good crowd, good atmosphere! What else could be needed!

The weekend has been spent reminiscing on old times with dear friends from back in the days of apple, sketching and doodling and watching films.

Bring on Deploy