Category: Architecture

The Robin Juzon Architecture is a well-known agency, where the engineer with brilliant ideas creates design and architecture, focusing on every detail project for obtaining the best value of performance and quality design. The perfect example of their remarkable work is the two pavilions that were strategically assembled in the main points of the city, so that it can be seen by all the people who are passing by. The first pavilion was located in the courtyard of the CCIT Montpellier Hotel Saint Come, and the second pavilion was installed in front of the Tourism office in the La Grande Motte.

They succeed because of their free autonomy in making projects with a taste for simplicity but well done projects architecture design.

Robin Juzon Architecture participated in 2007 in the CIMBETON contest, where the engineering was awarded.

The pavilion’s influence was from Japan travels, where the designer discovered the refinement and minimalist design by using raw materials.

The Montpellier pavilion reflects simple geometric shapes, and it is made of massive and opaque wood panels with a design that reflect thin sheets of wood embedded into each others, which creates the opaque and transparent design depending on the view angle. The visitors can see and admire this sublime architecture, with simple natural geometric shape, that can be turned into a beautiful garden with colored flowers, or can be used as an information point, a reception from where people can enjoy sitting and relaxing.

Photos © Paul Kozlowski

The leading company Vechthorst ordered to the Farko architecture design to build in Dalfsen a number of 71 homes with are going to be used for housing service. For those who don’t know Dalfsen, it is a town in the Salland region of the Dutch province of Overijssel, Netherlands an extremely likeable and quiet place, with lovely people and fantastic food.

The most notable featuring of the Vechthorst housing service is reflected in the amazing enlarge ventilation systems idea by using high windows, actually the biggest size Fakro windows 131×50 cm, which can offer to those who will live in, a spacious and healthy environment with a fresh air and splendid view.

The Farko windows are equipped with FSC wood and also with Police safety, and of course these are standard for all the windows of the buildings. Also as you can see from the photos, this construction will have an exceptional and unique design, and for archiving such a spectacular architecture, the Van Dijk Construction first built a mock-up in, fitted remarkably well in the joinery. This way all the masonry and details plans combined together will reflect a surprising and brilliant design.

So, the Dalfsen aria will become a richer and beautiful place due to the 71 homes designed by Farko.

 

The Northern Europe’s largest aquarium is the recently opened “Blue Planet”, an oustanding and magical place that offers visitors a truly unique experience of the world beneath the surface of the sea. With an impressive structure  that extends over an area of almost 100,000 square feet, Denmark’s new National Aquarium is located on an elevated headland towards the sea, north of Kastrup Harbor, Copenhagen.

Designed by renowned architecture firm 3XN, The Blue Planet’s distinctive building took inspiration from the whirl streams of the sea, shoals of fish, and swirling starlings turning the sky black. The construction is visualized as a whirlpool which introduce visitors the fascinating world of the sea creatures.

Seen from above, it looks like a giant conch shell, that connects the sea with the landscape, being plain visible for travellers arriving by plane at the nearby Copenhagen Airport. In this way, the building’s organic form with outdoor ponds tells the story of what awaits you inside. Its expression modifies as the natural surrounding changes due to its facade covered with small diamond-shaped aluminum plates, known as shingles.

By following the first and longest of the whirlpool’s whirls, visitors get to the entrance. Inside the building, another world is revealing to you, a fabulous world seen by most of us only from TV documentaries. Sharks, dwarf crocodiles and sea lions, The Blue Planet is home to more than 450 different species and 20,000 fish and aquatic creatures. Exhibits of Africa’s lakes, the Amazon river and coral reefs are definitely something worth seen and visitors can explore them in the circular foyer which is the central point of navigation in the aquarium. Multiple routes are whriled in the slightly curved sequence of rooms, enabling flexible movement between exhibitions. A few meters away, there is a restaurant with a splendid view of the sea.

The new aquarium was estimated to attract nearly 700,000 visitors each year.

Photos © Adam Mørk

 

Project details:

Location: Kastrup, Denmark
Prizes: The prize ‘In-Situ Prisen 2013’ awarded by the Danish concrete association, Dansk Beton
Client: The Blue Planet Building Foundation (Realdania, Knud Højgaards Fond, Tårnby Kommune)
Function: Aquarium
Floor area: 9,700 m2
Completion year: 2013
Architect: 3XN Architects
Partners: Engineering: Moe & Brødsgaard // Exhibition Design: Kvorning Kommunikation og Design // Landscape Architect: Henrik Jørgensen LANDSKAB // Aquarium Techniques: AAT

 

The Blue Planet New Aquarium in Copenhagen

 

 

 

 

 

Over the past few years, the southern China’s largest city, Guangzhou, is an ever-growing city, becoming one of the most remarkable architectural places in China. This fabulous 106,500 sq complex consisting of hotel and residences is the latest addition to the new Central Business District of Guangzhou. Situated along the central axis of the district, with the main boulevard on one side and the residential building (part of the same urban block) on the other side, the development acts as an interface between its two different site contexts: the inner landscaped courtyard and the busy, public Xian Cun Road.

This imposing and glossy addition to the city showcases a distinctive architecture with an expressively rich composition that goes beyond the daily conventional. Two buildings with different functions ( a 317-room boutique hotel and 160 serviced apartments) are architecturally unified into one amazing monolithic block.  According to architects, the two sections are run by the same management, being practically mixed with the same overarching aesthetic keeping in the same time through subtle design features their contrasting elements.

The taller part of the building feature apartment units designed for permanent residents. To have the best living conditions, the residences  block is directed towards  the quieter south-eastern Xian Cun Road junction, while those who stay in the hotel rooms can see the Xian Cun Road / Jin Sui Road roundabout with a much livelier energy. A matrix of vertical glass fins delicately defines the dark granite and glass cladding of the  private residential part consisting of apartments and guest rooms.

Besides its functional role, to accomodate  bars, restaurants and spa, which means the public part, the transparent glazed boxes that visually spring out from the dark background of the building have also the role to animate the western façade. A gracious, welcoming, and surprising ambience is created through large vertical opening designed in the centre of the development. This feature connects both visually and spatially its tranquil inner park with the public street. It acts as a “Window to The City” allowing free passages of air, light, and different views. Spectacular appearance at night!

Photos © Liky Lam

 

Project details:

Architect: Rocco Design Architects Ltd
Local Architect: Guangzhou Foreview Architect Institute
Interior Designer: Yabu Pushelberg, Glyph, AFSO, A.N.D., DesignWilkes
Structural Engineer: RBS Archectural Engineering Design Consultant Co Ltd
M&E Engineer: J. Roger Preston Ltd
Hotel Operator: Starwood Asia Pacific Hotels & Resorts Pte. Ltd
Location: Guangzhou, China
Year: 2006-2013
Client: KWG Property Holding Limited
GFA: 106,000 sq m

 

An exhibition experience beyond the ordinary is expecting you this summer at the Danish Architecture Centre, Denmark, between 29 June and 29 September 2013. The international star architect Zaha Hadid is having her first solo show in Scandinavia, which opens today at 6 pm. Celebrating her work, the exhibition “Zaha Hadid-World Architecture” is an invitation to discover the architecture’s universe through the eyes of one of the most sought after, admired and discussed architects in the world.

Photo © Steve Double

“Everything needs to be perfected, everything!” are the words of the first female architect who has received the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize – ‘architecture’s Nobel Prize’ in 2004. Zaha Hadid name is synonym with revolutionary experimentation and research, design innovation and implementation of stat-of-the-art technologies into a sensual and expressive form language, which today have become iconic for the vision of the future global architecture.

Challenging the boundaries of architecture for more than 30 years, the Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid is one of the most sought after, admired and discussed architects in the world. Projects like the MAXXI: National Museum of 21st Century Art in Rome (2010), Guangzhou Opera House (2010), the BMW Central Building in Leipzig (2005), the Aquatics Centre for the London 2012 Olympic Games (2012), The Changsha Meixihu International Culture & Arts Centre  are excellent examples of her vision for fluid, dynamic and complex architectural structures.

Supported by Realdania and Kvadrat, Zaha Hadid Architects teamed up with the Danish Architecture Centre and developed this extraordinary exhibition where visitors have the opportunity to experiment a world of amazing towers, floating shells, selected projects and design objects, which take shape in a bordless advanced digital and geometric universe. Moreover, an interactive installation that changes in form and expression according to visitors’ movements in space will certainly be something worth seen.

There will be a pre-opening talk followed by the opening reception between 6-8 pm. For more other details, check out the Danish Architecture Centre’s website. 

 

Saudi Arabia’s biggest city, the capital Riyadh, has experienced a rapid growth since 1990, its population is now more than 5  million residents, two times higher than before, so current transport system maybe faces this situation with difficulty because at the end of 2012 the government announced to build a metro system in Riyadh and constituted a new Public Transport Commission in order to set out public transport services and private investment in the sector.  The project is progressing and ArRiyadh Development Authority revealed already details of the city’s public transport plans and said that the new King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) Metro Station in Riyadh will be designed by the renowned and awarded Zaha Hadid Architects studio.

Planned to be completed in four years, the ambitious project will be not only an intermediate place perceived through quick transitions which serves to city’s fast-growing population, but a powerful landmark, a dynamic and multi-functional public space highly anchored in the urban context of the financial district and responding to the Riyadh’s future vision. Six metro platforms featuring over four public floors and two levels of underground car parking will be of vital importance for the future public transport there.

The new KAFD Metro Station seems that will act as a key interchange for three lines ( Line 1, Line 4 -for passengers to the airport) and Line 6). The station will also allow passengers to access the local monorail through a skybridge.  The KAFD master plan and the astounding design shows the metro station will be at the meeting point of a network of pathways, sky bridges and metro lines. To improve internal circulation and prevent congestion, they mapped its internal structure with all pedestrian and metro routes very clearly delimited.

Its futuristic architectural concept is impressive and high-aimed seeing these images. The exterior building design resembling sand dunes generated by desert winds places the new KAFD Metro Station within its cultural environment. To generate the patterned façade with interesting geometric perforations, Zaha Hadid Architects will apply distinct subset of elements through symmetry, repetition and scaling. The outstanding design will be optimized by simplifying technical challenges but preserving its spatial quality. Take a look!

Photos © Zaha Hadid Architects

 

Project details:

Project: King Abdullah Financial District Metro Station
Location: Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Date: 2012 – 2017
Client: ArRiyadh Development Authority
Design: Zaha Hadid Architects
Project Director: Gianluca Racana, Filippo Innocenti
Project Architect: Fulvio Wirz, Gian Luca Barone
Design Team: Alexandre Kuroda, Fei Wang, Lisa Kinnerud, Jorge Mendez-Caceres
Structural Engineer: Buro Happold
Services: Buro Happold
Transport and Civil Engineering: Buro Happold
Fire Engineering: Buro Happold
Façade Consultant: NewTecnic
Cost Consultant: Davis Langdon
Size: 20,434 m2
Levels: 4 above ground, 2 below ground (car parking)
Metro Lines served: Line 1, Line 4, Line 6
Skybridge access to monorail: (6 train plattforms)