Two celebrations for the pioneering SAWA project in one week. At the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, the founders of SAWA – Robert Winkel and Mark Compeer of Mei architects and planners and Nice Developers – were proud to be presented with the 8th architectural award for SAWA for best Conceptual Architecture in America’s prestigious Architecture MasterPrize competition. In the same week, during a festive ceremony, the symbolic starting signal is given for the construction of this very first circular wooden residential building of 50 meters high in the Netherlands. With this, the project team proves that SAWA is more than a groundbreaking and award-winning concept, but also a viable and practical reality.
From the top, Casa de los Milagros (House of Miracles) is all earth-colored mosaic glass curves and unexpectedly-shaped windows, the kind of place one might expect to find a caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland smoking a pipe.
The varying heights of the convex slopes that make up the roof bring to mind a large sea creature in motion. Looking at it from ground level, smooth, earth-colored concrete seems to support the top half like a particularly large stem of a mushroom. Finally, the curved base of the house gives it the appearance of a floating, organic creation. Indeed, the house itself is a kind of Rorschach test: like clouds or abstract art, the interpretation of its unique shape is in the eye of the beholder. According to owner Rosalinda Ulloa, it’s been referred to by different people as a mushroom, an octopus, a bat cave, a flower, and even pie-topping meringue.
October saw the completion of The Twins, a residential ensemble designed by KCAP. The project consists of two robust volumes set around a communal courtyard garden. Stepped green balconies, combined with the sturdy materialization and luxurious detailing, makes for a sensorially rich ensemble, like a three-dimensional oasis right in the middle of Amsterdam.
The house sits in a landscape of immense natural beauty, facing the sea and being aligned with many neighboring buildings.
The two key principles that defined the project were the importance of preserving the environment, based on ecological support – and, more specifically, protecting the dunes and the local vegetal species – as well as the need to ensure the inhabitants’ privacy.
The house is located in a 46 meters long parcel, with a width that goes from 7 to 9 meters. The natural ground rises from the East to the West and it has two buildings that sectorize and qualify the outdoor spaces left.
The main building is set back from the street and it is arranged in two floors. The ground floor is the older one, built more tan 150 years ago and presenting 75 cm width stone load-bearing walls. Very altered, this is where the living room and the kitchen can be found. The top floor, where the bedrooms are located, comes from a later intervention. This building is fully adapted to the topography, which results in a 36 cm jump on the middle of the ground floor.
Flexible facade house is a house combined with business function with unique architectural design and has many different features compared to typical city house architecture in urban Vietnam.
The most distinguishing feature of this house is the “double-skin” wave façade on the elevation: a wood-grained aluminum facade system with a unique shape-shifting ability.
Award-winning Singaporean architecture firm ADDP Architects today unveils its latest completed project, Park Colonial, a residential condominium consisting of six, 14- and 15-storey residential blocks created with the Prefabricated Prefinished Volumetric Construction (PPVC) method and located in the Woodleigh district of Singapore.
ADDP Architects was commissioned to serve as the full-service architecture firm from concept design, including interior design, through construction and until completion. For the project, ADDP Architects developed a design scheme and aesthetic that intends to bring tranquility and access to nature into Woodleigh, a bustling district of Singapore, resulting in an innovative residential-living experience for the modern urbanite.
The IC Residence is located in the city of Lagoa Santa, Minas Gerais. The land, measuring 5,000 m², is a relatively gentle slope, where the street-facing facade faces east. Solar orientation was a determining factor for the implantation of the house, located in a very hot region, where sun protection is essential.
As it is a weekend residence, leisure is a priority, special attention was given to the configuration of the outdoor spaces, and the way in which the architecture gives scale to these spaces. Although the plot is of considerable size, there is little residual space, most of the plot is usable. In this aspect, the interaction with the landscape project, by Luis Carlos Orsini, was fundamental.
Designed for a family of five, the D house hides its structural complexity through its volumetric simplicity. Large boxes placed on the highest part of the land organize the interior and outdoor space through their layout and orientation. That way, the house opens up to the outside through the spaces generated between them, while protecting its interior from what doesn’t matter. With a view over the city of Braga, the D house opens onto the landscape and faces south/west from the exterior and interior leisure areas. If, on one hand, the boxes placed horizontally establish a relationship with the surroundings, extending the interior spaces to the outside, on the other hand, the entrance is marked by one of these boxes placed vertically that calls us to its interior and at the same time articulates the two floors of the house.
Residence LF Santo André is located in Santo André, in the district of Santa Cruz Cabrália, Bahia, on a 20,000 m² terrain in Alameda do Araripe Condominium. The implantation of the residence was determined by the position of the terrain facing the beach. It is divided into 3 main blocks connected by covered, but open, circulations. Generous gardens separate them, transforming functional circulations into the enjoyment of nature.
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