The Mountain Dwellings

City:               Copenhagen
Location:       Orestaden 
Country:        Denmark
Design:          BIG Architects
Total area :   33.000 square metres (floor area)
Completed:   2008

 

The residents of the 80 apartments will be the first in Orestaden to have the possibility of parking directly outside their homes. The gigantic parking area contains 480 parking spots and a sloping elevator that moves along the mountain’s inner walls. In some places the ceiling height is up to 16 meters which gives the impression of a cathedral-like space.

 

The parking area needs to be connected to the street, and the homes require sunlight, fresh air and views, thus all apartments have roof gardens facing the sun, amazing views and parking on the 10th floor. The Mountain Dwellings appear as a suburban neighbourhood of garden homes flowing over a 10-storey building – suburban living with urban density.

 

Mountain’s formal conjecture cuts to the core of Modernism’s default rectangularity. A flat roof, it says, doesn’t satisfy contemporary needs. It questions the rectangle’s ability to make all equal and also its ecological performance. Mountain’s form in incredibly specific, but it’s strategies (roof terraces and a stepped massing) are transferrable. Like Le Corbusier’s Unite d’Habitation before it, Mountain makes a lifestyle rather than just a building, its argument is green without being greenwash, a rethinking of typological models rather than a reskinning with technology. It’s also cheeky. Denmark has no mountains. A mountain lifestyle there is one so different it nearly constitutes a category error. In order for the lifestlye to be transposed it had to be simulated.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Metropol Parasol Urban Centre

City:            Seville
Location:     La Encarnación square, in the old quarter of  Seville
Country:      Spain
Architect:    Jurgen Mayer H. Architects,
Material:     Wooden structure

It is one of the most pronounced and impressive examples of biomimicry in architecture.

The metropol parasol scheme, with its impressive timber structures, includes an archaeological museum, a farmer's market, an elevated plaza, multiple bars and restaurants underneath and inside the parasols, as well as panorama terrace on the top of the parasol.

Metropol’s interlocking honeycomb of wooden panels rise from concrete bases, which are positioned to form canopies and walkways below the parasols. 

 

Its role as a uniqie urban space within the dense fabric of the medieval inner city of Seville allows for a great variety of activities such as contemplation , leisure and commerce. A highly developed infrastructure helps to activate the square, making it an attractive destination for tourists and locals alike.

The project had difficulties, May 2007 engineering firm Arup informed the municipal authorities that the structure was technically infeasible as designed, given that a number of structural assumptions had not been tested and appeared to violate the limitations of known materials. Much time was spent developing a feasible alternative plans to buttress the structure, which themselves proved impractical because of the added weight. A feasible design using glue as reinforcement was finally settled on only at the beginning of 2009.

Maritime Youth House

City:             Copenhagen
Location:     Sundby Harbor
Country:      Denmark 
Design:        PLOT Architects
Total area :  1600 square meters
Completed:  June 2004 

The Maritime Youth House is shared by two clients, a sail club and a youth house, who had very different programs. The youth house needed outdoor space for the kids to play, the sail club needed most of the site to park their boats. 

The curved deck is not about introducing an advanced formal discourse or architectural philosophy to the project. It is an example of simple reasoning on the basis of the complexity of a programme and a limited budget.

The building is the result of these two contradictory demands: The deck is elevated high enough to allow for boat storage underneath while providing an undulating landscape for the kids to run and play above.

The common room, where most of the daily activities take place, is located in the front house, the workshop and storage is in the back corner building.