October 09, 2007
Liquid curtains
Rubble
Russia emerging
Selling condotels
Exhibitions
Resources
Liquid curtains
Architects and engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are developing a structure with "liquid curtain" walls that can, at any point, "sense an approaching object and automatically part to let it through."
The concept will be unveiled at Expo Zaragoza 2008. "Water and Sustainable Development" is the focus of the three-month-long international event to be held in northern Spain next year. In support of the expo theme, the MIT team is designing a "digital water pavilion," complete with exhibit space and cafe.
"To understand the concept of digital water, imagine something like an inkjet printer on a large scale, which controls droplets of falling water," explains Carlo Ratti, head of MIT's SENSEable City Laboratory.
Interior and exterior building walls will use the new technology. The roof is a steel structure with piston-like supports allowing it to move up and down with the weather. (High winds, low roof.) When the show closes, the building infrastructure sinks into the ground.
According to the MIT researchers, "Since plumbing and electronics are not inherently expensive and recycled water is plentiful and cheap, water walls could conceivably be created on a large scale."
"Think about spaces that can expand or shrink based on necessity and use," MIT's Ratti says. "It is not easy to achieve such effects when dealing with concrete, bricks and mortar. But this becomes possible with digital water, which can appear and disappear."
Rubble
As a result of past and ongoing conflicts in Lebanon, much of the housing stock has been devastated, particularly in the southern part of the country. Over a million people have been displaced. Most are homeless.
Swords Into Plowshares is the original post-war recycling project. Nachaat Ouayda and Sami Markusa, two Beirut-based architects, have developed a temporary housing concept they call "Project R." "R", ostensibly, is for rubble, in this case the transformed battle by-product.
According to the Lebanon Daily Star, Markus and Ouayda have designed a system of lightweight and easily transportable wire mesh modules. These are "doubly coated with zinc and aluminum, and used for wall retention in architectural systems."
It is classic "gabion" construction, used historically for military fortifications, more recently for dams and foundations. However, the "filler" for these modules is not rocks or dirt, but rather what has been left of bombed-out homes. Five-to-ten inch pieces of rubble from a 1,500 square foot house can make a house about half that size. With a thin steel roof and concrete floor, the structure is earthquake-resistant and watertight.
Prototypes have tested well. Construction costs are half that of conventional temporary housing. Continuing turmoil in the region has prevented widespread application, the architects say. However, raw materials exist in abundance, and, unfortunately, the need continues to grow.
Russia emerging
Eyes worldwide will be fixed on Beijing next August. As host of the 2008 Summer Olympics, China will strive to present itself as a world-class, global success story. Construction for the Summer Games continues at fever pitch, rivaled in pace and intensity only by the Dubai boom. TV viewers next summer will be wowed by a slew of over-the-top sports venues and classy multi-star hotels.
China will take the gold. Then Russia is eager for its turn.
In May, the resort city of Sochi on Russia's Black Sea was awarded the 2014 Winter Olympics. Last month, Dutch architect Olrick van Egeraat announced a plan to construct an 800-acre "artificial archipelago in the shape of Russia" in the Black Sea near Sochi.
The project, according to Building Design magazine, "will consist of seven main islands, over a dozen private islands, and three breakwater islands with sandy beaches, dunes, grasslands, bushes, small forests and riverside. It will contain hotels, cultural, leisure and recreational facilities, beach residences, luxury villas and apartments, dune, river and cliff houses"--all dredged up, barged in, and built from scratch.
The Russian state news agency RIA Novisti reports that the centerpiece will be a 600-acre island, costing 155 billion rubles ($6 billion). "It will have two marinas, religious centers, roads, parkland and artificial rivers, mimicking Russia's major rivers."
Egeraat presented his grand scheme to Russia's President Vladimir Putin at a major investment conference in Sochi last month. The Prime Minister asked what were described as "some polite technical questions," and seemed, observers reported, quite pleased with the whole idea.
Selling condotels
One still shining niche in the current tarnished U.S. real estate market is the luxury "condotel." In several cities, these units are attached to "designer" hotels. Million dollar price tags are common. And, while is it is in no way a buyer's market, buyers are buying.
However, encouragement is required. Creatively "branding" such property has become a necessity.
Selecting the right name is important. It must resonate with those seeking exclusivity and the good life. PRINT magazine reports that a simple address can work, especially when it communicates "a whiff of understated, vaguely British refinement: 110 Livingston, One York, One Brooklyn Bridge Park."
An association with precious metals and jewels may provide the right panache. The Platinum, in Miami and New York, and Diamond House, in Manhattan, are examples. Marketers stress that the word "luxury" in promotional copy cannot be overused. Think Gucci and Chanel. Louis Vuitton. It is all about fashion.
Obviously, the jury is in recess concerning the long-term health of this segment. PRINT found experts on both sides. "I think a lot of the statistics don't apply to the top," Jasmine Mir, a marketing VP specializing in real estate, positively opined. Others, missing past mega-commissions, are less sanguine.
The Residences Mandarin Oriental Dallas is now under construction in downtown "Big D." Ninety-one luxury condos will pose prime and pricey 22 floors above a posh hotel and upscale offices. The advertising tagline: "Beyond the world you know. Beyond the life you expect. Beyond compare." Currently, reservations are at 300 percent. Hopefully, upon completion in 2009, a sufficient number of potential status seekers will find these condos also "within their means."
Exhibitions
Design: Isamu Noguchi and Isamu Kenmochi
Noguchi Museum
Long Island City, Queens
Through March 16, 2008
Japanese-American sculptor and designer Isamu Noguchi (1904-1988) and Japanese industrial designer Isamu Kenmochi (1912-1971) worked together for only a few weeks in Japan in the early 1950s. The result was their fabled bamboo basket chair--two "cushions" of traditional Japanese bamboo basket weaving supported by a lean, black metal frame.
"The chair," according to The New York Times, "was never manufactured and the prototype was lost." However, the brief convergence of the two designers was less ephemeral. Kenmochi sought to bring Modernism into the Japanese mainstream. Noguchi's work illustrated how core aspects of traditional Japanese design reflect the essence of what was then considered contemporary. The two formed a highly illuminating cross-cultural nexus. This exhibition examines their relationship and underscores the important role both played in influencing 20th-century design.
Resources
Natural Architecture
By Alessandro Rocca
Princeton Architectural Press
2007
From the title, one might assume that this mini-coffee table volume is yet another in the ever-expanding "green" category. It is certainly that, and more. The 66 projects described and illustrated are organic in the literal sense of the word. The artist and architects featured have creatively constructed, and, in some cases quite cleverly, "grown," beautiful and often fantastic installations using materials--"branches, twigs, pebbles, straw, and stone"--found at the particular site. (To describe these projects as "site-specific" would be a redundant understatement.) Some are functional. All entertain and enlighten as their creators explore the intersection of art, architecture, and nature.
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