Seattle Humane’s mission of serving pets in need of shelter and respite was constrained by its small, 1960s-era facility. The organization sought to build a new animal shelter that would increase the number of pets it served while providing a base of operations for their community outreach and educational programs. At 57,000 SF, their new facility does just that, providing shelter for 165 cats and 170 dogs, a 35% increase in capacity. This allows Seattle Humane to take in more pets from high-kill shelters and provides an opportunity to place more pets with adoptive families.
To limit disruptions to operations and programming of this vital community nonprofit, the new building was constructed adjacent to the existing facility on the same site, allowing the shelter to remain open throughout construction.
In light of global warming, Cool Spots were designed for use by anyone, however a primary focus was placed on providing cool temporary shelter for those who have no shelter or can’t afford to cool the shelter they do have.
Cool Spots are solar powered, public art, cylindrical shaped pavilions, designed to provide a cool place in which to retreat from the heat of the day. They were designed as prefabricated recyclable steel modules that can be placed almost anywhere.
Little Shelter Hotel is located in a quiet corner of Chiang Mai, the former capital of the ancient Lanna Kingdom. The city is rich with tradition, culture, and craft. The old cityscape and its vernacular architecture are characterized by wood structure with shingle pitched roof. The site is only a short drive from the 700-year-old ancient city wall. It is a small plot surrounded by large trees, facing the Ping river on the west and a quiet alley on the east.
The simple building volume is formed straightforwardly by set-back and height restrictions. The roof form inspired by traditional hip roofs as homage to the local architecture has a little reinterpretation with an asymmetrical form blending naturally with the surrounding tree top silhouette. The west side of the roof is partially carved out to become a roof deck for the guests to enjoy the panoramic river view at sunset.
Designed by London-based practice, Amos Goldreich Architecture, alongside local firm, Jacobs-Yaniv Architects, this shelter is one of only a handful in the world which has been designed and built in consultation with the staff who will occupy and run it. Led by pioneering human rights activist, Ruth Rasnic, for international charity ‘No To Violence’, the facility will provide a much-needed refuge for distressed and abused women and children from all localities and backgrounds.
According to World Health Organisation data up to 45% of women in Israel, like most countries in the west, will be victims of domestic violence at some stage in their lives and recent statistics indicate that 45% of children in Israel are subjected to violence. This is a worldwide epidemic.
Characterized by an impressive overhang, the flow of interior and exterior spaces and the creative use of a double ground level, the project draws its roots in the work of the modernist architect Richard Neutra who shaped the built environment in the Californian desert.
Right from the first visit the architects noticed that the clients had adopted the rock mound for their base camp. They had built a floating deck on its top giving a sense of owning the site and offering views of the surrounding forest. This platform inspired the conceptual approach for the project: delicately dropping a deck on the mound and carrying the aerial effect with a transparent livable bridge. The idea of creating a symbiosis between the house and the topography, along with the audacious design, seduced the open-minded couple who are nature lovers as well as contemporary art enthusiasts.
In Essen (Germany) the last two blocks of a homeless shelter were handed over to the users in 2018. The three clearly structured, parallel buildings characterised by exposed concrete and sky-blue glazed bricks are the result of an invitation to tender issued by the City of Essen. What was sought were new buildings for a homeless shelter for 119 people, as well as office space for 2 social workers and 2 housing administrators. RKW Architektur + won the public tender with its modular concept. Despite or precisely because of the tight budget, the architects were able to deliver a complex of noticeable architectural quality.
The workmen from the village wanted to tear down the black shed from 1934: draughty, weather-beaten and worm-eaten it was, they said. But we liked this black outbuilding of the mansard-roof house in the Vienna Woods that we had just renovated in a radical yet respectful manner.
»An old outbuilding became a writer’s workshop, a garden room for guests, and a children’s paradise«
The special appeal of this project lies in the appreciation shown for this old outbuilding in the shadows of the Vienna Woods villas. Back in the 1930s, few people could afford a basement, let alone a garage. And so they built their own sheds to store wood, raise rabbits or boil laundry in, which was then hung up to dry in the attic.
The project responds to the challenge of combining three different programs along Rue Stendhal in Paris : social housing, nursery and emergency centre. The organization of the building allows all three programs to coexist peacefully and take advantage of the unique features of the site such as: privacy, natural lighting in the nursery, independence, and large exterior spaces for the dwellings. The emergency shelter is arranged to be compact and provides multiple views and orientations. Sitting on a hill, the building stands in dialogue with the large horizon of the East Paris landscape. Its volumes are designed to maximize energy efficiency and user comfort. The courtyard, balconies and dwellings are oriented to achieve the best sun angles all year round. Each volume preserves distant views to neighbouring condominiums, and aims to blend cohesively into the skyline of the neighbourhood and eastern Paris. The inward facing elevation opens up to the linear garden at the rear of the building which brings light and fresh air into the dwellings and the nursery.
Studio Weave have been commissioned to design a hiking shelter in close collaboration with Bruit du Frigo and Zebra 3. The project, initiated by the arts and architecture collective Bruit du Frigo, establishes a pedestrian route connected by a series of shelters on the fringes of Bordeaux. Our intervention, Le Haut Perché, constitutes one of eleven other stay-over shelters.
Delta Shelter – a 1,000 square-foot cabin – is essentially a steel-clad box on stilts that can be completely shuttered when the owner is away. The 200 square-foot footprint of the house rises above a 40-acre, 100-year flood plain adjacent to the Methow River. The verticality, coloring and raw nature of the materials used for construction directly respond to the wildness of the setting. The owner sought a compact, easy to maintain, virtually indestructible building to house himself and his friends for fun and adventure in the mountains. With an exterior of steel, the house is virtually indestructible.
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