WAI ARCHITECTURE THINK TANK’S PROPOSAL FOR NCCA COMPETITION

The New National Center for Contemporary Arts (NCCA) is the new epicentre for the creation, study, and support of contemporary art in Russia.

Enhanced by the dialectic between the city and architecture, between art and the public, between landscape and building, the new NCCA marks a paradigm shift of international museology.

By creating a building that invites and embraces the public through its open spaces the new NCCA blurs the lines between building and context, between art and life.

The NCCA is not a building in the city; it is an extension of it. The flexible autonomy of its spaces either enclosed or outdoors, makes it the first archetype of Museum as City.

Instead of emulating the boundary that usually separates museums from their context, the new NCCA building is an Open Museum. The arrangement of the volumes on the ground level allows the public to freely circulate through its open spaces creating a new urban museum experience.

The new NCCA is not a building within a park; the park and the building are inseparable. Linked by way of a harmonious symbiosis, a series of paths direct the public between metro station, park and building in an effortless journey that offers glimpses of outdoor sculptures in an environment for the contemplation of art.

The new NCCA brings art to the public. The building creates a promenade in which people interact with exhibition pieces featured in the public space and on the multiple terraces of the building.

The layout of the NCCA consists of a ground level that contains public programs, creative residences, office space, conference halls and the collection repository, and three volumes of varying heights that intersect at different points creating a maze of flexible exhibition space.

Location: Moscow, Russia 
Architect: WAI Architecture Think Tank 
Project Team: Cruz Garcia, Nathalie Frankowski, Edgar Garcia, Zhang Yanping, Yu Yihua, Anna Popova, Ilyas Sadybekov 
Structure: +G (Felix Cruz Marcos, Laura Gil Santana) 
Technology and Sustainability:  Alejandra Garcia Hooghuis 
Museology Consultant:  Evgenia Novgorodova 
Area: 45,000 m2 
Year: 2013 
Client: National Centerfor Contemporary Arts (NCCA)

ANTONIO CITTERIO PATRICIA VIEL AND C+S ARCHITECTS WIN SAMS-STA COMPETITION

The Italian joint-venture between ACPV andPartners and C+S Architects, in collaboration with a swiss Engineering team wins the international competition for the requalification of the railway station area of Chiasso in Switzerland.

The team proposes a soft urban design aimed to give value to the pre-existing buildings, which are substantially maintained and sewn to the newly designed complex of two fashion schools: SAMS and STA, the Art and Craft School of Fashion Design and High School of Fashion.

The team designs a urban hub, which is at the same time, a hinge between the city and the territory and metaphorically between practice and culture of fashion. The new volumes are open and transparent.

They produce a urban space, a walk through commercial and cultural places. The activities which will happen and the people at work both participate in the scenary of this new urban design for Chiasso.

The team translates in this way the role of the school buildings in contemporary: they are manifestos and windows of what happens inside, small cities of knowledge exchange, spaces where the process is exhibited as well as products and finally a place at disposal to be activated by the community after the school hours.

The jury, headed by architect Cattaneo, from Bellinzona, defined the project as the one which fits in the context in the best way and particularly appreciates the layout structure of the new school complex.

Location: Chiasso, Switzerland 
Architecture, Urban Design, Landscape: ACPV& Partners with C+S Architects 
Acpv & Partners Team: Mattia Cattaneo, Alberto Maria Ficele, Valerio Pozzi 
C+S Design Team: Luca Caroti, Laura Frasson, Nikolina Lukin, Alessandro Mimiola, Alessandro Pizzolato, Giada Saviane, Davide Testi 
Structural Engineering: Pini Swiss Engineers SA 
Mep: Visani Rusconi Talleri SA (VRT) (Impianti RCVS), Piona El project Sa 
Acoustic: Think Exergy SA 
Safety: Visani Rusconi Talleri SA (VRT) 
Traffic Consultants: Studio d’ingegneria Francesco Allievi 
Year: 2013

THE WINNERS FOR LONDON CINEMA CHALLENGE

The challenge of the competition is to design a cinema, located on Newman Street in central London.

 

First prize: Cine'stival by Etienne Fabre and Jean-Emmanuel David

Project description: "Cine'stival provides an insightful take on the state of cinema today. Anchored in research, the proposal offers a beautifully visualized response to the issue at hand. By inviting the public to fully participate in all aspects of the cinematic experience, the mix of program reinforces the proposal's premise, with the architectural space corresponding appropriately.

As a venue dedicated to promoting independent movies and at the same time inviting the general public to take part in Q&A's and lectures, Cine'stival presents an interesting and credible way of maintaining the cinema as vigorous part of culture in the future. The coherent presentation ties it all together into a fully dedicated and accessible film festival venue - a truly rare thing these days."

Second prize: Symbiotic Venue by Nada Alqallaf and Jaime Sevilla

Project description: "By incorporating a film school into the cinema allows the proposal to grow beyond being 'a cinema and a school that happens to share the same building'.

This is strengthened by the architectural composition, which works very well with the idea: the concept of looking back towards the English theatre creates a design that allows audience and students to effortlessly enter a symbiotic relationship, enriching the experience of both parties. Using the interstitial space as another theatrical vehicle allows everyday uses, such as circulation within the building, to become another opportunity for spectator viewing."

Third prize: Peep(le) Show by Shuping Liu and Jackie Krasnokutskaya

Project description: "Building on curiosity, Peep(le) Show aims to attract people into the world of cinema by playing on peoples native inclination to observe and explore.

By offering much more than just a glimpse into the production side of the industry, Peep(le) Show invites an audience straight into the heart of film production. The simple black box opens up to a dynamic interior, designed to meet the needs of both professionals and general public, at the same time allowing for subtle overlaps and encounters. The appropriate presentation style adds a final touch to the proposal."

OMA AMONG THE WINNERS OF THE NEW MEDIA CAMPUS FOR AXEL SPRINGER

OMA has been announced as a finalist in the competition to design Axel Springer's new Media Campus in Berlin. 

Springer has launched a corporate move from "print" to "digital media" - in which our building will act both as a symbol and a tool; a palace to lure the elite of (Germany's) digital Bohemia to its compound in Berlin.

The genius of print is that it is a cheap, physical, hyper-accessible embodiment of a complex collective effort, for which so far the digital has been unable to find an equivalent. Architectural offices are similar to newspapers in that they produce complex assemblies and selections from radically different sources of information.

As architects, we have experienced the advantages: speed, precision, smoothness. But we have also suffered one crucial consequence: the relationship between the worker and his computer, which isolates him in a bubble of introverted performance, inaccessible to collective overview.

In the classical newsroom, dominated by smoking, typing journalists, each inhabitant was aware of the labour and progress of his colleagues and of the collective aim: a single issue, with the deadline as a simultaneous release. In the digital office, staring intently at a screen dampens all other forms of attention and therefore undermines the collective intelligence necessary for true innovation.

We therefore propose a building that lavishly broadcasts the work of individuals for shared analysis. The new office block is injected with a central atrium that opens up to the existing Springer buildings - a new center of the Springer campus.

The essence of our proposal is a series of terraced floors that together form a digital valley. Each floor contains a covered part as a traditional work environment, which is then uncovered on the terraces. Halfway through the building, the valley is mirrored to generate a three dimensional canopy.

The public can experience the building on three levels - ground floor lobby, meeting bridge, and roof-top bar. The meeting bridge is a viewing platform from which the visitors can witness the daily functioning of the company and how it evolves.

The common space formed by the interconnected terraces offers an alternative to the formal office space in the solid part of the building, allowing for an unprecedented expansion of the vocabulary of workspaces: a building that can absorb all the question marks of the digital future.

PERKINS+WILL WINS BIOMEDICAL RESEARCH BUILDING COMPETITION

The project integrates with Streeterville’s vibrant urban setting and creates space for synergy and collaboration, builds a seamless physical connection to Northwestern’s existing facilities.

In its sculptural design, it reinforces Chicago’s progressive modern-architecture heritage and advances sustainable practices with green technology and design features that support environmental and personal health.

Perkins+Willdeveloped the building form and exterior in response to various internal and external drivers, including the creation of laboratory neighborhoods, access to daylight and views, connection to existing buildings and an acknowledgement of Superior Street as the main corridor for the research campus.

In its flexible conferencing suites and break/lounge areas, as well as collaborative spaces in lab neighborhoods, our design creates a dynamic, collegial environment in which important scientific discoveries will take place. The new Biomedical Research Building will anchor the University’s research facilities and be the hub of a world-class research and development enterprise.