Architectural Design Competition | Big O | Yeosu | Korea | H-Architecture

The “Big-O” Design Competition called for ideas to create a new coastal destination which will accompany the 2012 Yeosu Expo in Korea, and will further remain as a permanent local amenity beyond the Expo. In keeping with “The Living Ocean and Coast” on the southern coastal line of Korea, the main theme of the Yeosu Expo, H proposed a multi-faceted cultural arena which will engage and entertain patrons from around the world, and a facility that can be artistically and commercially renewed after the Expo. H’s design concept emphasizes the bubble in the newly created atmosphere of an inflatable canopy. This creates an Air Balloon Festival, a special program of the Big-O, based on a system of expressing the relationship between the sky and the water, summarized as “Oxygen x Ocean = O2.”

The inflatable bubble canopy system, a floating deck system on the surface of the ocean and a fish farm within the water create a symbiotic relationship of nature and spectacle. The system is a simultaneous experience of air, surface, and underwater. ..............more
The project was designed in collaboration with Haeahn Architecture.

Architectural Competition | World Trade Center Competition | Kevin Kennon Architects

United Architects has proposed a scheme that is in itself a memorial, consisting of an interconnected series of five buildings that create a cathedral-like enclosure. A vast public plaza and park is formed around the connected former tower footprints by a protective ring of new towers.

The inspiration for United Architects' design was to create a living memorial that develops over time. The entire World Trade Center site, from the earth to the sky, becomes both a monument to the past and a vision for the future. The two inviolate footprints frame the view upward to the United Towers that enclose and protect the site as the towers come together to form a continuous ring at the 60th floor.

The memorial experience continues into dedicated elevators that bring visitors up to a Sky Memorial at the top of tower one. The Sky Memorial, like the Victims' Family Viewing Room, gives a view back down to the site from a great height..........more

Mixed Use Design Proposal | Xiamen Dream City | Synthesis Design + Architecture

The design concept for Xiamen Dream City integrates the project with its beachfrontsite by materializing as a series of buildings imbedded within an urban landscape deck that appears to emerge from the beach itself. The contour lines of the natural topography of the site are conceived as a dynamic vector field which has been activated by the strategic placement of key programmatic elements. These elements act as invisible forces which disturb the field and re-organize the arrangement of the contours to form a continuous and rippling surface of undulating dunes, canyons, and valleys which define a network of public plazas, linear gardens, and winding pathways at surface level. Below the surface, the deck peels away to reveal the contents of the low-rise buildings embedded within the landscape. The dynamic and cascading effect of the openings articulate a series of protected terraces, waterfront views, and sculptural north-facing roof lights for the retail, dining, and entertainment venues at lower levels........more

Olympic Village | Queens | New York | Leeser Architecture

The Olympic and post-Olympic Village deserves intensity and visibility. This is proposed by dividing the given plot into two radical, synergetic elements: one empty, one full. An urban public space at the river faces a dense urban neighborhood: the Village on the Beach. The Village condenses all the program into a portion of the site to stimulate a NYC-style urbanity that would otherwise be diluted on the entire site.

By differentiating the towers in program and appearance, a collection is created that stimulates a sense of individuality and belonging. The ground level of towers contain public functions, lobbies and parking entrances. The higher floors house the apartments with varying floor plate sizes and incorporate private and public gardens........more

Wanghujiao Mixed-Use Development | Suzhou | China | Perkins + Will

The Wanghuijiao Commercial District, as envisioned, is a significant commercial component in the Wanghuijiao Region within in the larger Suzhou Industrial Park. Our planning solution views the development not as a single, stand alone development but a component is the larger evolving Wanghujiao community. Our approach is to apply, on an urban scale, many of the same concepts that would be applied to a modern shopping mall.....more

Architectural Competition First Prize Winner | Mixed Use Development | Shan ShuiI Hangzhou | Hangzhou | China | Steven Holl

At the heart of the "bowtie" plan are the Water Tower and the Mountain Tower, alluding to the spirit of Hangzhou. The Water Tower branches into tributary forms connecting to the north, while the Mountain Tower connects via landscape forms to the south. The winning design by Steven Holl Architects is comprised of five large scale elements, which hover between landform and architecture, connecting to the factory buildings at each end of the site......more

Mixed Use Development | Krøyers Plads | Copenhagen | Denmark | Vilhelm Lauritzen Architects

VLA and COBE's proposal for three new buildings at Krøyers Plads uses the historic warehouses as inspiration.

Folding roofs and the building's robust materials are important architectural themes that create a dialogue between old and new, and at the same time a modern and empathetic interpretation of the architectural uniqueness of the old Copenhagen warehouses.

The two new buildings facing the harbour are designed as office facilities. The dwellings are grouped in one building that is orientated towards the basin with an open glass facade, allowing for greater views of the harbour. The building's simple geometry with sloping roofs, relates to the surrounding cornice heights, and is designed with roof surfaces exposed to the harbor like the existing warehouses. The modern warehouses at Krøyer Plads are developed after a series of principles of sustainability, so the buildings meet the need for environmental, social, economic and resource-focused aspects of construction.........more

Bahrain Financial Harbour | MAKE Architects

The proposals will provide a dramatic culmination to the Bahrain Financial Harbour masterplan. A cultural quarter with an Opera House at the scheme's epicentre generates a heart to the scheme while providing the area with a prominent gateway icon.

Twin tower proposals have been conceived in a scissor formation to optimise views towards the harbour corniche and beyond to the Gulf. The building orientation minimises wind loading and exposure to the low sun angles with 'dart-like' forms exploiting and funnelling cooling breezes, while providing shade and a calming eddy at the ground plane............more

Dock Redevelopment | Castle Parc | Swansea | ACME

Castle Parc initiates the redevelopment of the river and northern dock area of Swansea adjacent to the medieval castle in the heart of the city centre. Currently occupied by retail sheds, the scheme seeks to change the occupation and appearance of the site as a city gateway. Historically, the site was the riverbed of river Tawe and the new Castle Parc will treat this space as a green space that retains its public and open character. Inspired by the hilly sandbanks across the shores of Swansea, the project re-creates a landscape visible from the city centre but is treated as a river front from the gateway. Integrated into this green landscape will be a new central urban square surrounded by a wide range of programmes. Retail units, restaurants and cafes, a large format supermarket and a multi-screen cinema are complemented by a new Swansea College, 100 units of student housing and an underground car park for 1400 cars.......more

Mixed Use Deevelopment | Open Fort 400 | Grasweg | Amsterdam | Remi Studio

The planning solution of the structure and site is based on the principle of openness and flexibility. This will allow the possibility of holding cultural, exhibitive and enlightening public or private shows of different levels - from small exhibitions and conferences to festivals and laser shows. As for recreational facilities, visitors can enjoy spending time in the cafes and small restaurants, which are located on different levels of the building, open-air cafes being provided for as well. Spacious underground parking is available. .......more

Architectural Competition | Rio Olympics Port | Rio de Janeiro | Brazil | JDSA

In a town such as Santorini the natural cliff sides make housing typologies which terraces downwards. Shops, cafes, rest spots all integrate to make an amazing typology of the city. What we wish to do in Porto Olympico is to find a hybrid development that combines these 2 extremes. We designed a method of urbanism that allows for variety while holding a strong identity.......more

Architectural Desugn Competition | Environment of Contemporary Architecture | Russian Organic City | Schiavello Architects Office

The platform of “Russia-Organic city” symbolizes the cultural and historical origins of Russia in a way that shows the relationship between the future and the past, between the sacred and the profane. Towers have always been a much loved feature of Russian architecture skyscrapers such as Kremlin, Lomonosov University and hotel Ucrainia where built with pointed tops, or inflated vertical turrets which gave an exotic air to the buildings associated with the Russian upper middle classes (the “Litejnij prospekt” or the “Petrogradskaja Storona”). These turrets had different uses they could house private chapels or simply be used as additional rooms in houses of the well-to-do..........more

Multi purpose Centre | Soverato | Italy | Schiavello Architects Office

Given the national importance that has a theme such as public space and the opportunity it presents to the promotion of the city of Soverato in Europe, the new project aims to: - find a solution for areas with a side will enhance the quality of urban and the other to establish a strong link with the dynamics of contemporary society through functional solutions that meet the needs of the day and night activities that take place in the area. - Retrain through a series of coordinated actions, an entire urban area, implementing the best design solution that combines the diverse needs of rationalization of traffic and the revitalization of commercial, industrial and cultural sites...........more

Architectural Design Competition | Mixed Development | Skytower | Amsterdam | MVSA

The design for the Skytower meets the demand for an icon in the Overhoeks district of Amsterdam North. The great potential of the North district, and the close proximity of the river IJ and the historic city centre, call for a dramatic design. The concept draws upon its immediate and wider surroundings, and transposes them into the development’s design principles.
Skytower is in the form of an equilateral triangle that faces out onto the square, Amsterdam North and Dam Square: a robust basis that provides the city with a unique new landmark.
This architectural beacon in Amsterdam North is utilised for special functionality. A hotel, wellness centre, exclusive offices, conference centre and entertainment centre (the Skytower), together with a viewing platform and wedding chapel, are brought together in a harmonious whole, and lend the building its characteristic dynamic........more

Corniche Tower | Mixed Use Project | UAE | Oppenheim

A captured beam of light solidified the park-this mixed use tower designed for a prime site in UAE blurs distinction between the park, sky and water. Conceived as totemic response to programmatic desires, the building emerges elementally from the circular footprint of the site as stacked assemblage of program floating within a diaphanous membrane.......more

Architectural Design Competition | Tropical Garden | Leipzig Zoo | Treusch Architecture

Towering facade formed a buffer area that covers between the tropics and city hall. The organic shape of the master plan takes into account the zoo and also symbolizes the outside of the historical of Gondwana.
The physical connection to the city edge of Pfaffendorfer's street facade is done with bent beams that rise bracing against the hull to an urban facade..........more

Mixed Use Development | MoMA Tower | New York City | Axis Mundi

As the city takes stock in a post-boom era, Axis Mundi sees this as the time to rethink the tall buildings that have become synonymous with New York City’s identity, proposing a conceptual alternative to 53W53rd, among the city’s largest skyscraper projects in one of the most overbuilt parts of Midtown.
Instead of disguising the tower’s mix of uses by containing them within a unitary, homogeneous form, the Axis Mundi design expresses that diversity in a re-organized way, reflecting an emerging reality for tall buildings as collections of domestic elements: dwellings, neighborhoods, streets. .......more

Skyscraper Experimental City | The eco tower | Nanjing | China | W2 Architects

The proposition of the 500m high rise skyscraper is for the southern urban neighborhood of Nanjing city, China. The site is on the upcoming High Speed railway station, central business district area. The idea to build a landmark tower in the zone celebrates the notion of the incredible advancement and ongoing development over the last decade in the historic city of Nanjing.

The eco tower is designed with a sustainable approach, integrating and implementing state of the art, energy harnessing and energy optimizing measures all throughout. To name a few of the advanced techniques projected in the design are, the application of green house for energy harnessing and air filter, waste water treatment/ gray water reuse, installation of wind turbines on the south east and north east high velocity wind zone and not to forget the green terraces which grows on the tower like an organic pattern. .....more

Redesign of the Central Hong Kong Waterfront | Architects Collective

The new waterfront of Hong Kong is at the heart of the developing city and should represent the position of the city as one of the leading metropolises of the world. The outdoor areas are designed to allow for generous open spaces. The proposal proposes a number of strips of cultural and leisure facilities including cafes, restaurants and terraces with freely usable public furniture inviting people to linger. The sand-dune-like landscape forms terraces which are oriented towards the sea and sheltered from the city. The Victoria Harbour Plaza contrasts this formal language as the port, the harbor front and the high-rise zone in the south intersect. The plaza can be used as a festival or market place. The Horizonscraper is an open connection link for the passengers of the ferry. The shopping complex in the north is divided into a commercial as well as a recreation area.........more

Mixed Use Development | Binlamdoun | Fez | Morocco | Klingmann Architects

This locally-inspired design enhances the relationships between visitors, artisans and residents by connecting Place Lalla Yeddouna on the western side of the River Fez with two new plazas on the eastern side, creating much needed public spaces within the old Medina. The activation of existing public spaces along with the provision of additional green spaces provide better accessibility. A continuous river walk connects the adjacent neighborhoods to the site and creates a vibrant waterfront.........more