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While Nestlé’s chocolate Factory in Mexico City (located in Paseo Tollocan near Toluca) was in need of an inner pathway for visitors to witness the production of their favorite chocolates, a group of experts put together by rojkind arquitectos and Traqs suggested bigger plans for the company. 

Why not create the first chocolate museum in Mexico and have a 300-meter long façade along the motorway as the new image of the factory. So the first phase took shape and required a 634m2 space that could accommodate the main entrance for the children to have the most pleasant experience and to start the voyage into the chocolate factory as soon as they enter this playful yet striking space, the reception area, the theater that would serve as preparation for the Nestle experience, the store or museum shop, and the passage to the tunnel inside the old existing factory.

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The design marks a new generation of Marni store designs and a direct shift in emphasis on product with the ever increasing collection of accessories. Like a modern temple this boutique plays with texture and light on a large sale with the use of hard materials for the walls and floor such as concrete and stone. Interlaced and scattered within the polished floor areas are a series of random stone and marble colours that play an important role to define various areas of the store. The shuttered concrete walls are injected with a series of bespoke display case of varying finishes (leather, plastic, fibreglass) for the display of shoes, lingerie, bags and accessories. These units have their own integral lighting and serve as a rich contrast with the concrete floor and walls. Certain areas of the walls are covered with brightly coloured high gloss fabric upholstery to create varying themes throughout the shop. The fluid stainless steel rails carry the ready-to-wear collections and glide up the grand concrete staircase to a curvaceous and separate shoe display room. A large stainless steel cloud hovers over this space and provides the lighting for the elliptical shoe display cases upholstered in Marni’s own leather. This area is carpeted with a large circular rug where a unique rotating circular display sits with perimeter leather pod seating. The fitting rooms have their own personal stainless steel rails and leather rugs on the floor. Upstairs one encounters a line of floating mannequins where the clothes shimmer and move with the use of fan units below them. Along the windows towards the front a long stainless steel rail continues the display of the ready-to-wear collection and opposite houses a display wall of many randomly placed cases for the display of jewellery and smaller accessories. The play of daylight and stone materials within this shop together with signature bespoke furniture pieces give this new Marni store a truly new adventure that should not be missed.




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Goettsch Partners has been commissioned by Guangzhou R&F Properties Co. to design a new 1,000-foot-tall mixed-use building in Guangzhou, China. The project totals 1,878,000 square feet and features a 180-key Park Hyatt hotel, 430,000 square feet of offices, 65,000 square feet of retail, 24 condominiums, 174 serviced apartments, and underground parking for 700 cars. The 66-storey building is located in the Zhujiang development, planned as Guangzhou’s new city center, near the Pearl River. The tight, two-acre site sits over a transit station at the intersection of two subway lines, with neighboring buildings that include the Grand Hyatt Guangzhou, also designed by Goettsch Partners; the city’s new opera house; the new Guangdong Museum; and what will be China’s tallest twin towers at more than 1,300 feet. The Park Hyatt tower is designed as a single volume that pinches in at the corners in relation to the changing programmatic functions stacked within. The field of staggered vertical strips on the façade stretches and compresses like tendons in response to the varying floor-to-floor heights required for each distinct function. The approximately $150 million project is currently in the schematic design phase and is expected to be completed in 2010.




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The Social Condenser project is located at the base of the Superstition Mountain Range in the town of Superior, Arizona which was founded in 1882 and has strong ties to mining of copper, silver and gold. The project is a renovation and expansion of an existing two-story block building and addition of an exterior dining terrace. The lower level is developed into kitchen, mechanical and storage spaces and the upper level is designed as an open gathering space. The south-facing wall of the upper level of the existing building is removed to expose the volume within. The remaining form is rendered to closely match the shadow tones of the surrounding hills and acts as both backdrop and anchor for the new addition. The project was informed by the concept of the “ public house”. The project is envisioned to be the living room of the community; a place to congregate, socialize, view work of provincial artists and enjoy the breathtaking landscape vistas that envelop the region. The project utilizes a reduced palette of cool-toned materials. Expanded aluminum panels, with fine openings, sheaths the street wall and entry canopy and draws the visitor to the stair tower that subtlety rotates to orient the visitor to the adjacent parcel and the new main entry door. The tower is wrapped in the same aluminum material and conceals an open expanse of grey glass behind it. Upon entry, the visitor is greeted by the expansive view of the creek and identifies that the twist of the floor plan geometry now aligns the building with the axis of the wooden footbridge and the creek. The visitor then continues the spiraling journey around the open common space, through a large operable glass wall panel out to the dining terrace prow with a sweeping view of the full extent of the creek in the foreground and Apache Leap rock formation in the distant hills.




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清華大學餐廳競圖設計案, 新竹, 2007

這個案子是公司(清沐設計)首次協助角度設計一同參予清華大學的餐廳競圖，設計部分主要由角度設計的負責人，我們的大師『發哥』掌控，清沐設計負責表現圖的呈現，這個案子不管是在建築的外觀或者是空間串聯都是非常有趣的作法，平面圖礙於還在比圖中沒辦法提供出來，清沐這邊提供3D的部份給大家參考。

White Noise / White Light was one of 9 temporary interactive urban installations commissioned and installed for the Athens 2004 Olympics at base of the Acropolis as part of the Catch the Light Program. The project inserted a luminous interactive sound and landscape within the plaza to create a constantly choreographed field in flux. Semi-flexible fiber-optic strands responded to the movement of pedestrians through the field, emitting white light and white noise. Activated by the passersby, the fiber optics transmit light from white LEDs while the speakers below the raised deck emit white noise. Just as white light is made of the full spectrum of light, white noise contains every frequency within the range of hearing in equal amounts. This field of white noise creates a unique sound-scape in the city and masks out the noises from the immediate context, forming a place of sonic refuge within the bustling city. Each stalk unit contains its own passive infrared sensor and microprocessor. If motion is detected, the white LED illumination grows brighter while the white noise increases in volume. Once motion is no longer detected, the microprocessor smoothly decreases the light and fades the sound to silence. The movement of pedestrians creates an afterglow effect in the form of a flickering wake of white light and white noise, trailing and tracing visitors as they cross the field. Depending on the time of day, number of people, and trajectories of movement, the project is constantly being choreographed by the cumulative interaction of the public. The field becomes an unpredictable aggregation of movement, light and sound.




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Following the lineage of the Schindler house as an experiment in modern living in close relation to nature, our proposal "Fake Plastic Trees" is an attempt to investigate the formal, spatial and atmospheric potential of a vertically sustainable garden in synch with the most advanced technology for plant growth. The garden is composed of a branching circuitry network made of plastic PVC tubes. These tubes circulate and distribute water with a nutrient solution that nurtures aerial vegetation of different kinds. The section of the tubes diminishes as the trajectories they describe move up and away from the ground. The flow of water is induced by water pumps from several reservoirs located in the ground. Water is distributed directly to the plants base by pumping up from the reservoirs or indirectly down by dripping from the upper branches and then moistening down. Depending on the section of tubes, their capacity to carry more or less water, different scale of plants can grow from and within them. The artificiality of plants growing directly on water, the modulation and scaling of them as they detach from the ground, the dynamism of the branching and choreographed vegetation and its likely wind induced oscillation, and the occasional forms of animal life negotiating temporary shelter within the garden, amounts to an advanced living ecosystem that both challenges and amplifies the assumed relations between the architecture of The Schindler House and its surrounding “natural” environment.




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Based on a radical geometric contextualism, our concept for the 8746 Sunset Blvd attempts to produce an architecture of subtle sensations by inducing a physical and optical dynamism that both challenge and enhance the movement of the body. The formal logic of the facade is the outcome of a productive negotiation between geometric operations governed by the column grid of the existing building and driven by spatial conditions allowed by the singularity of the adjacent context. The spatial performance of the store is based on the bending effect of two reciprocally ruled surfaces: the façade that bends inside up and the pliant stair that bends outside down, create a magnetic field that gravitates towards the interior. The bent façade operates as a responsive skin that by means of local inflections senses the dynamics of pedestrian activity on the sidewalk and nearby strip. The interior bent surface fluidly shreds into steps allowing the emergence of a differential hybrid that operates as a stair and display system at the same time.




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Svärmisk Resort Apartments are located at the end of the picturesque Kiewa Valley at the foot of Victoria's Alpine Resorts. At the edge of the Mt.Beauty township, on what was known as the 'old Chalet site', covering a 5 acre sloping site. The landscaping and architecture carefully respect the sites mixture of exotic & indigenous trees, natural contours and state forest surrounds. The dilapidated Mt.Beauty Chalet & accommodation wings were largely removed but recycled as materials to be used in the new works. This submission involves the completion of the first six of twelve planned self contained units, along with general site establishment, roads and services. Based on a simple 6.0m X 6.0m footprint the units are a flexible accommodation model, 2 or 3 level, free standing or attached with internal zoning options for various uses. They are a compact yet articulated form with projecting decks, carports and offsets adding an expressive vitality. 5-6 Star energy ratings have been achieved. Colours and materials have been developed to produce an honest, economical, low maintainence, environmentally responsive design fully integrated with the landscape principles for the whole site. For instance storm water runoff collection, base gabion rock retaining and feature walls add to the rich existing landscape and site reponsive design. The northern orienatation, offering spectacular views down the valley, present the 'face' of the development to passing traffic heading to Falls Creek Alpine resort. Internally, almost all features are built in, utilizing an array of materials from plywood, recycled timber, fibreglass, to the colours of ceramic tiles, upholstered seats & simple laminated surfaces. Svärmisk Resort Apartments are a compact, site responsive and adaptive accommodation model with just a twist of scandinavian. 





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Construction has begun on a new Foster + Partners project in Jordan. 'Living Wall' is a 150,000 sq m mixed-use complex at the heart of Amman, close to the new Al-Abdali city centre. The site, an extraordinary carved-out rock shelf, its geology and history have been the inspiration for the scheme’s unique concept. Set against a sheer 30m backdrop, the project presents physical challenges that are not unlike those faced at ancient Jordanian sites such as Petra, where the buildings were carved out of the rock itself. A rough-hewn podium has been inserted with strong, vertical cuts into a line of natural rock. Grouped together on this podium will be a set of six inter-connected, sculpted towers.They include a boutique hotel, a variety of residential units, and offices. The podium on which they sit contains shopping and leisure activities. The deep spaces between the towers house a variety of sheltered public spaces, including a sunken amphitheatre and a large, sheltered piazza. The towers have double-skin façades with screens whose horizontal lines again recall delicate rock strata. The screens’ function is to stimulate air circulation and to provide shading, and these become denser where the potential heat gain is greater. The spaces behind the screens provide balconies and terraces where people can enjoy outdoor space – thus helping to animate the complex as a 'Living Wall'. With transparency both at the higher levels and at the base of the towers, views across the city are unimpeded; there is a strong sense of place and, with so much permeability and connectivity, both laterally and vertically, the scheme also creates a vivid sense of community.




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Erick van Egeraat has won the international competition for the National Library in the Republic of Tatarstan's capital, Kazan. The new National Library has a gross floor area of 81.000 m2 and is situated at the Tukay square on the South-Eastern edge of the city centre. Besides offering all traditional facilities of a state library, Erick van Egeraat wants to "invite citizens to explore and experience knowledge. The building provides a home to all modern ways of accessing information, but its flexible setup allows for future forms of working with knowledge, too." Erick van Egeraat designed the building as a covered extension of the city centre. A multi-functional, 18 metre-high atrium serves as a portal between the library and the city. "The building becomes part of the public domain, a portal between the city and the library, a place where the collective and cultural qualities of downtown spaces are combined." The entrance space can be meeting point, boulevard, gallery, living room, garden and educational facility at the same time. Embedded into a hill, the building continues the shape of the landscape and offers a park on top of the building. By linking the existing Hermitage Park, the new library park and the National Library to the adjacent Tukay square, Erick van Egeraat transforms the area into a vibrant hub of Kazan city life. Consequently, Erick van Egeraat proposes to extend the proposed site and allow for the development of the Headquarters of the National Bank, for high-quality offices, luxury apartments and retail. The project is a cornerstone in the urban redevelopment of Kazan and sets an example for other urban regeneration schemes throughout the Russian Federation.





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This project provides the opportunity to develop two themes: one on the geographical anchorage of the structure on the river, the other on the sign of modernism attached to the technological and artisanal capacities of contemporary China. The project combines a complex structure fashioned by multiple arches developed in space according to the unchanging necessities but also developed on the essential links between these arches which were labeled in the project as “the petals”. These petals have two objectives: to connect the arcs to form a rigid structure resistant to the buckling of the very fine members of its arches, and to capture the light day and night along with the movements of the sun , and in function with the orientation of the cars on the roadway. The 9 arches of the central span consist of box-girders welded together, where their dimensions are reduced to 40 cm wide by 55 cm high for a span of 127 m. They are shaped along the curves developing in the space permitting a global variation of the inertia of the structure according to the needs of the course of the forces. 128 petals link these arches to align and account for the internal stiffeners of this spatial structure. They are of 64 different types, varying between 2 m x 3 m and reaching up to 9 m in their maximum dimension. They form double curvature surfaces aligned by the geometric links between the arcs and their position in space. The tailoring of these petals is a very particular expression of the connection between very advanced technology (reinforced polymerized fiberglass resin and metallic structure) and learned crafting in the fabrication of 64 molds of complex and elaborate geometries. By day, the petals capture, in their east-west orientation, the movements of the sun in the Tianjin sky. By night, they serve as large diffusers of light and transform the structure into a succession of orientated and separated reflectors floating above the river.




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Thom Faulders has created an exterior building skin for a new four storey multi-family dwelling unit with photography studios in Tokyo, Japan designed by Hajime Masubuchi of Studio M. Located in the Kitamagome Ota-ku district, the site was previously occupied by the owner’s family with a residence uniquely wrapped by a layer of dense vegetation. Since the entire site is to be razed to accommodate construction for the new larger development, the design invents an architectural system that performs with similar attributes to the demolished green strip and creates an atmospheric space of activity. Conceived as a thin interstitial environment, the articulated densities of the new open-celled meshwork are layered in response to the inner workings of the building’s program. AirSpace Tokyo is a zone where the artificial blends with nature: sunlight is refracted along its metallic surfaces; rainwater is channeled away from exterior walkways via capillary action; and interior views are shielded behind its variegated and foliage-like cover. The complex pattern for Airspace Tokyo is developed in collaboration with Proces2 Design in San Francisco using parametric software. The dual-layered skins are constructed of an aluminum and plastic composite material often used for large billboards. 





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The two buildings are organised around a central square next to the existing cultural centre. In opposition to that centre, they appear as smooth volumes, covered with an articulated and semitransparent skin of pivoting mesh panels - open buildings, clearly readable for every visitor. The building of the administrative centre tries to push the concept of durability as far as possible. Modular open-plan offices on concrete floor slabs, without beams and without false ceilings, maximise the flexibility and allow free positioning of partition walls. All technical equipment is recessed in access floors. The same type of construction will be used for the library (phase 2, completion 2007 - 2008). Pluvial water from the roof is stored in concrete tanks in the basement, from where it is recycled for toilet flushing, as fire fighting water, and as a source of cooling in the summer. Hot water is provided by solar panels in the glass shed roof of the central atrium. Auxiliary electric power is generated by photovoltaic cells. A fine tuned system of free cooling and night cooling allows affordable thermal comfort in the summer combined with very low power consumption.




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This building is located in a 10 mts. wide plot, in a typically urban block in Buenos Aires. The 12 two-storey residential units are split in two compact blocks bridged by a lightweight steel tower which connects them. This structure contains the lift shaft, the main stair and the connecting bridges. Due to the fact that the street was so narrow, the building was recessed to gain privacy from its neighbours, but recomposes the street front with a light frame. This steel grid with wooden deck floors attached to the building façades act both as the apartment expansion terraces and as louvers that guarantee filtered natural light and heat control. During the night the building interacts, turned on as a light box, with the steel frame making it look like a Chinese shadow puppet. Both blocks float over the ground floor, resting on eight concrete columns and gaining lightness and visuals from the street entrance through the rear yard, which was kept like a small garden.





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Lord Falconer, the Lord Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Justice, visited the new Manchester Civil Justice Centre as Denton Corker Marshall’s Guest of Honour at a special preview on Wednesday 30th May 2007. Founding Directors John Denton, Bill Corker and Barrie Marshall will fly from Melbourne to Manchester today to host the event which marks the practice’s first major civic building in the UK. John Denton, Founding Director of Denton Corker Marshall added, “We are delighted that Lord Falconer is able join us in Manchester to celebrate our practice’s first major public project in the UK.

We wanted to create a building that would not only signal and display the transparency and accessibility of the courts and courts system, but that would also become a strong sculptural urban marker for the city. It forms an integral part of Allied London Properties regeneration of the Spinningfields area in the city and we hope that in time, it will help promote civic confidence and pride in this part of Manchester.” Stuart Lyell, Allied London Development Director said: "Outstanding architecture lies at the heart of all Allied London developments. The international design competition for the new Civil Justice Centre has resulted in a truly world-class signature building and Denton Corker Marshall are to be congratulated on realising their vision. 

This magnificent civic building gives Manchester a new iconic landmark an important contribution to the huge success of Spinningfields, one of the most significant office-led mixed use developments in Europe." Manchester Civil Justice Centre is the largest court complex to be built in the UK since the Royal Courts of Justice in the 19th Century. It will be the new HQ for the Ministry for Justice in the North West, providing accommodation of around 34,000m² on 15 levels. It houses 47 courtrooms, 75 consultation rooms, in addition to office and support space. Sir Richard Leese, Leader of Manchester City Council said: "The Civil Justice Centre is an exemplar of how cutting-edge architecture can be incorporated within the existing city fabric to provide a building of world-class design quality for a world class city. The building provides an exciting addition to the city's skyline and is a key contributor to the regeneration of Spinningfields."




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Takei-Nabeshima-Architects (TNA) architects have designed a striking mini-tower on spec for a planned community in the town of Karuizawa, some 185 miles northwest of the Japanese capital. The Ring House is wrapped in rings of glass and wood and has an uninterrupted 360-degree view of the forest. In an area that was dark, on uneven land and with no neightbours this plot of land was originally unmarkable. But TNA Architects were undeterred by the conditions and set about designing the house. TNA designed rings around the facade so that areas of private space and utilities could be met. The height of each ring was decided by the function concealed behind it. The glass between the rings allow you to look straight into the forest, so the whole house appears to dissolve into the forest. Built on Owners' Hill, a resort in the Karuizawa forest near Tokyo, Ring House occupies one of the hundred or so plots set aside for city dwellers to build weekend retreats.




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The new Austin City Hall and Public Plaza is located at the edge of the dynamic Warehouse district on the shores of Downtown Austin’s Town Lake. The project is dominated by landscape and incorporates limestone, copper, glass, water and shade to create the city’s living room. The 118,000 square foot building contains several city departments along with the Mayor, City Manager, City Council offices, Council Chambers, and a café and city store along urban Second Street. Austin’s Warehouse District is rapidly being transformed into a tight grid of restaurants, nightspots, housing, and mid-rise office spaces. A massive, arcing Lueders Limestone wall, emerging from bedrock at the lowest level of the parking garage below, anchors the project to the site. Morphing out of this wall is a limestone base that encloses the first two stories. A copper skin, resting on the limestone base and capped with a folded copper roof, shelters the upper levels. As the arcing wall cuts through the building, it creates an open four-storey lobby transected by catwalk-like bridges at each level. A reflective copper ceiling over the lobby bounces light into the gathering space below. The plaza winds its way around the limestone peninsulas of the terraced building. Water runs through a group of monumental limestone boulders in the plaza to symbolically return to Town Lake through a vortex. Amphitheater seating spilling down from the terraces can be used informally or to view performances on a Limestone stage. The amphitheater is protected from the sun by a photovoltaic glass trellis, supplying ten percent of the building’s power. The environmentally intelligent approaches in this project earned it a LEED Gold Certification.




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Foster + Partners has revealed these images of what it claims to be the first zero carbon, zero-waste city in the world. 

The Masdar development in Abu Dhabi is a 6 km sq, car-free “walled-city” scheme. The development is being driven by Abu Dhabi’s Future Energy Company and will include a new HQ for the company as well as a new university. Norman Foster said: “The environmental ambitions of the Masdar Initiative – zero carbon and waste free – are a world first. They have provided us with a challenging design brief that promises to question conventional urban wisdom at a fundamental level. Masdar promises to set new benchmarks for the sustainable city of the future.”

Unveiled today at the Cityscape conference in Abu Dhabi, Foster + Partners said Masdar would be a dense, walled development constructed in two stages. The first phase would see the construction of a large photovoltaic power plant, which would later become the site for the second phase. The surrounding land will contain wind, photovoltaic farms, research fields and plantations, so that the city will be entirely self-sustaining, the architect said. he development is set to open in late 2009.




ArchitectureWeek

Florida based architectural firm Glavovic Studio, recently unveiled The ArtsPark at Young Circle, a new public art project that takes the form of a ten-acre park. Located in downtown Hollywood the ArtsPark was conceived as an integrated artwork that transforms from an organic landscape into a constructed landscape, The ArtsPark provides daily, interactive, cultural experiences for the general public and comprises multiple activity spaces without walls designed for the activities that occur within them including a place designed for sedate activity, a highly interactive Children’s Play Area The ArtsPark is a civic landmark that was created through strong female leadership; many women contributed to the realization of the project including Mayor of Hollywood Mara Giulianti and is now open to the public.




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