Nyiragongo Villa I is the expression of resilience of the city and people of Goma. A city of one million people located on the northern shore of Lake Kivu, in the North Kivu province, DR Congo.
Goma lies only 13 to 18 km due south of the crater of the active Nyiragongo Volcano.
On 17 January 2002, after several months of increased seismic and fumarolic activity, a 13km fissure opened in the south flank of the volcano, spreading in a few hours from 2800m to 1550m elevation and reaching the outskirts of the city of Goma. Lava streamed from three spatter cones at the end of the fissure and flowed in a stream 200 to 1000m wide and up to 2m deep through Goma. About 245 people died in the eruption from asphyxiation by carbon dioxide and buildings collapsing due to the lava and earthquakes. At least 15% of Goma comprising 4,500 buildings were destroyed, leaving about 120,000 people homeless.
The Rio Vista Residence is a 2,160 square foot single-family residence located on a cliff overlooking the Trinity River and downtown Dallas. The site is situated on a cul-de-sac in an established neighborhood and has panoramic views to the north. The existing topography forms a natural clearing for the building in the center of the site with native trees to the south, east, and west.
Passive solar orientation for the residence is along an east/west axis with views and natural light to the north, morning light from the east, shaded breezes from the south, and minimal exposure to the west. Energy efficient building systems are paired with sustainable materials to create a high-performance, durable, low-maintenance home.
The building is a one‐family house in monolithic concrete construction. The 8×8 meter sized building stands free on a slightly inclined meadow interspersed with cherry trees and is accessed from a small road via a filigree steel bridge. The areas of cooking, living, sleeping are spread over three floors and connected by an open staircase. The material is limited to exposed concrete, raw steel and silver fir. The outer walls are made of 50cm thick isolating concrete. All surfaces are untreated. A floor construction was waived, the concrete surface was only polished. The heating takes place as concrete core activation with evacuated tube collectors. It is supplemented by a centrally located basic furnace.
This student focused multifamily project occupies a complex Ozark site adjacent to the University of Arkansas in Downtown Fayetteville. Extensive site topography defines the building characteristics in stepping massive forms and angular geometries that are the resultant of Center Street diagonally slicing the hillside, which creates an unusual trapezoidal block. These native characteristics drove the architectural concepts and delivered in built form a stark contrast to the most normative of all student-housing typologies: the Texas Donut. We argue that the Arkansas Bear Claw is a more adept model of dense multifamily living.
4514 S. Saratoga is another iteration of Starter Home*, an entry level housing program using inventive land strategies coupled with design to develop homeownership opportunities in urban neighborhoods. Like other homes in this program, it is based on the reclamation of an otherwise vacant and unused substandard parcel. The project, unlike previous versions, originated as a commission by private clients interested in replicating the program.
Single-family house, with low-energy consumption and wood-frame located in Thy Le Baudouin (Florennes).
Given the sun’s course at the back of the lot and the landscape forming a slope, the project proposes a different concept of traditional housing. The entrance to the house is made by a semi-buried level in contact with the road (entrance / cloak room / cellar / car-port for one car / bicycle storage and garden) and the living areas are located on the first floor (living room / back kitchen / dog area / games for children). Upstairs, (sleeping areas / dressing rooms / bathrooms) allows access to the back of the garden by a slightly sloping footbridge. It allows the children to access directly at the field level. The two lavatories are accessible from each landing of the staircase.
KNOF Design has created an elegant, colourful and layered interiors scheme for a private family home that merges a recently married couple’s tastes, in the form of classic French interiors and the geometry of the art deco period. The new scheme is for a 6-bed, 6,500 sq ft property in Mountain Lakes, New Jersey, which is part of a 4,000-strong lakeside community located within the Manhattan commuter belt.
Background
The project also had an emotional aspect for Susan Knof, Founder and Creative Director of KNOF Design, as one half of the client couple is a long-time friend.
“It was inspiring and special to know how significant the new home was for my friend, representing, as it does, the creation of a solid base for her new life chapter”, SusanKnof commented.
The scheme wasn’t just an interior for the couple, however, but also for their collective six children from their first marriages, as well their newborn baby son.
It is a single-family house that is developed in ground floor, with a rotund geometry that is folded to the southeast and opens up to the garden area and the swimming pool.
The local rural building typology has been reinterpreted through the use of a sculptural stone volume with a gabled roof which is combined with a horizontal piece built of exposed reinforced concrete. This concrete piece folds up over itself making up a covered porch and an indoor barbecue and family dining area. The importance of shadow spaces in the house is reinforced by a roof overhang on the south-facing elevation on the living room and dining area that creates another outdoor porch.
The design of this house is based on a very narrow and rectangular plot, semi-detached, with a quite limited area in where to build, due to urban planning conditions.
With this context, the project is conceived as a prism that is perforated in order to generate access paths and achieve proper lighting and ventilation, without compromising the privacy of its users. The purity of its volumes is transferred to materials and colours, looking for an elegant and simple image able to provide identity to this design.
It has always been our dream to build our own house on a vacant plot of land in a town or city. After three years searching hopelessly for vacant plots in and around Benešov we came across a ‘for sale’ sign behind the window of a terraced house just five minutes from the main square and in one of the few neighbourhoods of Benešov that was left largely unscathed by the urbanistic ravages of the communist era. A small house for demolition, a stone cellar with a brick vault and a small garden which, together with the neighbouring gardens, gave the illusion of a large orchard. What more could we have wished for?
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