Interior Design Sense

Architects: Kirsten Gabriëls James Webb
Location: IJburg, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Project architect: Kirsten Gabriëls
Structural engineer: Strackee BV Bouwadviesbureau, Amsterdam
Services engineer: Wolf + Dikken Adviseurs, Wateringen
Artist façade panel: Yvonne Kroese
Contractor: Bouwbedrijf Stadswerk BV, Hoofddorp
Design year: 2006
Completion year: 2008
Constructed area: 285 sqm
Photographs: Marcel Van der Burg

A site with a south facing view to a canal on the Grote Rietland of IJburg provided a unique opportunity for a family to live in a free-standing villa within 20 minutes of central Amsterdam.

The family of four, a film score composer and a business film scenario writer with 2 teenage children required a house that provided opportunities in living together but also independently. The section of the house clearly describes the programme with children on the lowered level, parents on the upper, and the ground ?oor acting as the communal, family and social area (and also bufferzone).

Similar to a typical Amsterdam canal house the ground floor is raised increasing privacy from the street. The raised ground floor allows clear views to the canal at the rear and accommodates the basement below. This visual connection to the canal is maintained at all times – through the open stairs to the upper level and the absence of any doors dividing the ground floor area. The smaller living area of the ground floor steps down to the kitchen/dining area opening both horizontally and vertically in scale. The lower space opens to the outside terrace continuing the procession to the garden and canal.

The childrens lower level (complete with kitchenette and bathroom) is accessed from the street via external stairs and becomes an independent zone from the main house. The dividing wall between the bedrooms is nonload bearing and in the eventuality of the children leaving the family home the basement could be used and rented as a separate studio apartment.

In the upper level the parents functions of study, bathing and sleeping are ordered from street to canal side. From the bathroom views across the canal are possible, and the bedroom and bathroom unite as one space with a continous floor surface.

The house is transparent from the street to the canal with the main front and back facades of full height glazing. All walls perpendicular to the street are solid timber clad surfaces. A clear demarcation of the house‘s internal levels are revealed in the facade with white bands. Horizontally laid western red cedar boards further striate the volume. The entrance facade consists of a large full height glass door and an art piece by Amsterdam artist Yvonne Kroese. The lasercut steel panel features creatures found on and around IJburg and houses the letter box and other entrance hardware.

Architect: Beckmann-N’Thépé architects – Aldric Beckmann, Françoise N’thépé
Location: Rouen, France
Project Manager: Alice Auriau
Project Architect: Nicolas Gaudard, Laura Giovannetti
Assistant Architects: Nathanaëlle Baes, Frank-David Barbier, Caroline Huybrechts, Camille Lacoste
Landscape: Florence Sylvos (Paris)
Constructed Area: 950 sqm + patio
Project Year: 2008
Photographs: Stephan Lucas

On the basis of a town plan laid down by Nicolas Michelin agency, and more specifically on the site of an old 60s and 70s housing bar, the building designed by the architects introduces a cosiness that should encourage more dynamic social relations on the housing estate.

The buildings use an architectural style which is in keeping with the neighboring buildings designed by Marcel Lods and the slab constructions. Thereby creating a very horizontal look on the border of two sectors, one being the “rue César Frank” business area and the other the shopping precinct on the square side (cyberbase, doctor’s surgeries, etc.).

Divided by landscape designers Claire Gilot and Daphné Mandel-Bouvard, the planted patio highlights the project’s transparent, fluid, transverse qualities. The 2 plots are synonymous with sobriety, using basis but quality materials: metal for the roof and awning, placed over silk-screen printed glass on the facades.

Architects: Kann Finch, UAE
Location: Meydan city, Dubai UAE
Project Team: Jean-Sebastien Herr (associate/design architect), Damian Lambkin (Project architect), Claudio Nunez , Ulysses Lalu, Francis Contreras, Milica Vukasinovic, Clinton Bull, Jamie Madrazo, Mauricio Zulueta, Alaleh S
Interiors: Nicholas Tedford
Structure: E-construct
MEP: Jain Consultants
Building Envelope: MFT
Landscape: Kann Finch
Acoustics: WSP
Client: District development
Contractor: DCC, Dubai Contracting company
Project year: 2010
Construction area: 45,980 sqm

This proposition reconsiders the stereotypical residential tower, in pursuit of a unique structuring of a new language, that the vertical organization of apartment living might allow.

The formal constraints that the site demands are eroded to realize a rich expression of three dimensional image, surface and livability. The fundamental elements of the colonnaded street edges with the podium base establish the urban continuity upon which sits the tower form in its street structure.

The landscaped through site link to this base provides for a connected vertical green intervention that informs the physical structuring of the tower, whilst providing a garden outlook to the apartments. The basic tower is eroded to an ‘H’ plan with a central core. The legs of the H connected at every fifth level, generate extensive roof gardens at interplay with the vertical landscape that brings a multifaceted greening to the apartment outlook as well as assisting in the moderation of the vertical microclimate.

The twenty-six levels of the tower with its roof amenity, locate a repetitive five level sense that are structured as: one floor of three, two bed units, two, two storey four bed units and two floors of two, three bed units. Each unit enjoys an open quality that extends internal living areas to extensive balconies with fully operable uplifting window walls that provide a seamless indoor / outdoor experience.

The vertical surface of the tower to the East and the West are layered with a rich patterned, solid / glass screen that not only develops a unique expression appropriate to location and culture but provides privacy to the immediate tower neighbors to those facades.

The tower is further eroded at its second to fifth levels and the twenty second and twenty third levels to allows the vertical landscape to enrich the ‘H’ structure via its multifaceted planting frames, the landscape expression is as though an organism that has invaded the tower and caused the formal erosion.

This multi layered formal proposition, offers a quality of vertical living that at once is generous, unique and delightful. Its simple structure supports a lifestyle and experience, that tower inhabitation does not normally provide, whilst enriching the urban streetscape with a sculptural interplay of form, surface and light for both its resident and extended community.

This is a major contribution to a fresh urban language that addresses the ‘greening’ of our cities with responsible and unique architecture.

Architect: Paul de Ruiter
Location: Rhenen, Netherlands
Project Architect: Paul de Ruiter
Project Team: Michael Noordam, Sander van Veen, Dieter Blok, Lei Coppus, Hannes Ochmann, Mathilde Joosse, Willeke Smit, Monique Verhoef, Björn Peters
Advice Installations: Halmos bv / Milieukundig onderzoek- en ontwerpbureau BOOM
Lighting device: Van Dijk en Partners
Landscape Ecology: Buro Zijaanzicht
Landscape Design: Sytze Hager
Constructed Area: 344 sqm
Project Year: 2001
Construction year: 2002
Photographs: René de Wit, Rien van Rijthoven

The senior couple Mr and Mrs Deys bought the first of the four building plots in the Schoutenboomgaardweg in Rhenen. This purchase included a sketch design for the villa by Paul de Ruiter. The main criterion for the design was the wishes of the customers. It also had to satisfy the stringent requirements imposed by Paul de Ruiter himself that the house must merge into the landscape and should preferably have a grass roof.
The clients primarily wanted a practical home where they could go on living until an advanced age. And because both wanted to keep fit and love swimming, integrating a swimming pool into the design was an important wish. All the above is fulfilled in a villa that can be adapted over time to the age of the residents.

The living functions of Villa Deys are placed around the swimming pool and spaciously blend into each other. The house is completely integrated into the landscape. If you look down from the Cunera hill just behind the house, all you see is the sedum roof, the front façades of gabions and the side façades, which are covered completely with slats. It strongly resembles the many farm outbuildings that can be seen in the area.

INTELLIGENT USE OF SPACE

Paul de Ruiter divided the house into three strips. The southern strip contains the living room, kitchen and workroom, while the northern strip houses the bedrooms and the garage. The middle strip consists of the swimming pool with portals on each side, which act as entrance and as conservatory. The strips are offset in relation to each other, yielding the largest possible outer wall surface so that the admission of daylight is maximized.

Light is the key concept in the design of Villa Deys and it is not just the large outer wall surface that contributes to the maximized admission of daylight. The entire southern façade is made of glass. The roof of the swimming pool strip -which also incorporates several skylights – is lower-lying than the adjoining roof surfaces, and the difference in height is inset with glass, thus allowing plenty of light to enter the house. The swimming pool acts as a light well in the middle of the house and the light-colored floor of synthetic material, white plastered walls and ceilings and the water and the glass walls of the swimming pool reflect the light optimally and ensure that it penetrates deep into the house.

ELECTRICAL

The entire house was designed to satisfy the wishes of the owners. Everything is on the ground floor, without thresholds and with sliding doors. Almost everything can be operated electrically, to ensure that the residents can continue living in the house even when they grow old and infirm: lighting, curtains, the wooden exterior sun blinds and the front door. The large garage that is situated in one section of the building could be converted into accommodation for nursing staff if necessary.

In spite of the extensive level of automation in the house, the mass of technology present is barely noticeable. This is possible because the technology is primarily located in the basement, in the floors and in the ceilings.

MIDPOINT

The swimming pool is literally and figuratively the heart of the house. The water surface is at the same height of the surrounding floors and surrounded by glass, it forms the middle of the three strips that make up the villa. The glass used around the swimming pool is partially sand-blasted. Only a 50 cm high strip at floor height is transparent. As a result, a swimmer in the pool can see into the living room, without being visible himself. The fact that the swimming pool is surrounded by glass not only has an aesthetic effect, it also prevents moisture problems in the rest of the house. Dark tiles, a glass overflow rim and a stainless steel drain ensure that the swimming pool does not overly dominate the house.

CLIMATE SYSTEM

The water in the pool has a constant temperature of 27°C, which of course uses energy and costs money. However, by linking the pool heating system with the low-temperature heating system of the house, in combination with a water pump, the pool area re-emits the energy it has absorbed and becomes part of the energy-saving climate system in the house. The swimming pool therefore helps to achieve the maximum yield from the energy available.

FAÇADE TECHNOLOGY

The entire length of the southern façade consists of sliding doors of glass and aluminium, giving the residents a breathtaking view over the river and the water meadows, and at the same time allowing the sun free entry. To keep out excessive heat and sunlight, a sunblind was developed consisting of 10 panels with horizontal wooden slats, made of western red cedar to blend in with the farm outbuildings that are scattered in the surrounding landscape.

To adjust the sunblind, the panels as a whole are moved, rather than the individual slats. Each of the 10 panels consists of two sections with a horizontal join in the middle. When they are opened, either manually or by electronic programming, the panel is lifted to form a porch above the glass door. When the panels are closed, they fall into a lock at the bottom. This makes it possible to keep the sliding doors open without the risk of burglary.

ATTRACTIVE AESTHETICS

Villa Deys contains a large amount of technology, is modern and full of detailed design elements, but is at the same time fully integrated into its surroundings. For example, the ground level is lowered on the west side, so that the living strips ‘float’ above the water of the pond that has been constructed here. The floating roof construction, which is necessary because most of the walls are of glass, reinforces the attractive, modern appearance of the house. Villa Deys proves that aesthetics, sustainability, energy efficiency and ease of use can very well go hand in hand.

ARCHITECTURE AND AGE

Although Villa Deys is a house for senior citizens, there is nothing in the outward appearance of the villa that indicates this. Architecture can cater in many ways to the wishes and the infirmities of people who are growing older, without sacrificing modernity and appearance. Villa Deys is all on one floor without tresholds and almost completely electronically operatable, but it is not that which makes the villa such a pleasure to live in. Daylight plays a particularly important role here, but it is often the details that improve the ease and comfort of a house for the elderly. Take for example the deterioration in vision and the ability to distinguish colours that often goes with advancing age. A completely white bathroom can cause great problems, because there are no orientation points and no contrasts. This can make elderly people lose confidence and it increases the risk of falling. The simple use of different colours in a bathroom can make a great deal of difference.

Architects: KPMB – Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects
Location: Denver, USA
Project Team: Bruce Kuwabara (design partner), Shirley Blumberg (partner-in-charge), Bruno Weber (project architect), Myriam Tawadros, Javier Uribe, Bill Colaco, Jose Emilia, Richard Wong, Roland Ulfig
Structure: Halcrow Yolles
MEP: ABS Consultants
Civil Engineering: MB Consulting
Building Envelope: Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates
Landscape: MP Consulting
Acoustics: D.I. Adams Associates Inc.
Client: Urban Villages, LLC
Project year: 2008
Construction area: 13,460 sqm
Photographs: © Tom Arban

This mixed-use development project introduces a new strategy for making contemporary architecture within Denver’s historic Lower Downtown Heritage District (LoDo). The design responds to the precise urban design guidelines for LoDo, while helping the local Review Board to expand its guidelines to include contemporary buildings within its historic context. The architectural solution balances a larger vision of the building in the evolving context of LoDo with a specific contemporary response to the adjacent, heritage 1904 Sugar Building, the most important historic building in the district.

The client’s specific functional and performance goals included building for longevity as a form of sustainability, achieving cost savings with energy efficient systems and enduring design, and creating an active street-related base to contribute to the revitalization of the district. The program is broken down into three distinct volumes and organizes retail space at street level, offices from the second to the fourth floor, and residential space from the fifth to the tenth floor. The design establishes relationships to the adjacent historic Sugar Building in the dimensions and proportions of the massing, masonry piers, and punched grid of windows. The glazing composition varies at different levels of the façade to create vertical emphasis, shadows and depth within the grid of the masonry.

The project is located on the 16th Street Mall, a major public pedestrian thoroughfare that runs through the city of Denver. The building features a central ten-storey volume in manganese-coloured brick, and two building volumes wrapping around it at its base, one rising 4 storeys and one six storeys, both in buff brick. The six-storey volume on the 16th Street Mall wraps around the base volume in a way that relates specifically to the wrapping of the adjacent Sugar Building’s ornamental façade around the corner against the laneway and then brought to a full stop, establishing a clear hierarchy through the articulation of a zone addressing the main street. The transition between commercial office and residential uses at the top of the fourth floor is marked by deeper setback of operable glazed windows within the 16th Street masonry façade. The 16th Street façade in turn references one of the mid-bands within the façade of the Sugar Building. The top of the parapet of SugarCube is set at a height that aligns with the underside of the upper cornice of the Sugar Building. The roof of the masonry base buildings on the 16th Street Mall and Blake Street provide generous outdoor terraces for residential units on the 5th and 7th Floor.

A cubic brick volume rises through the centre of the two wrapped volumes, and is set back from the base on all sides. The darkness of the cube’s brick and the way it interacts with Denver’s strong light creates a dramatic contrast with the lighter masonry volumes, and inserts an iconic, modernist form on the Denver skyline. The scheme explores alternatives to conventional balconies associated with residential developments to create drawer-like projections from the building, three of which project beyond the building to create views around the corner and create an unusual interplay of form against Denver’s brilliant blue skies and distant views of the Rocky Mountains.

This villa is located in plot #07 of the ORDOS project.

Architects: Lyn Rice Architects
Location: Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China
Architects in Charge: Lyn Rice, principal, with Astrid Lipka, associate principal
Project Architect: Ivan Chabra
Project Designer: Benjamin Cadena
Design Team: Karl-Erik Larson, Steven Chen, Daria Supp
Design year: 2008
Construction year: 2009-2010
Curator: Ai Weiwei, Beijing, China
Client: Jiang Yuan Water Engineering Ltd, Inner Mongolia, China
Constructed Area: 1,000 sqm aprox

LRA is one of a handful of architects from the United States selected by Herzon&DeMeuron to design a 10,000sf villa in China’s Inner Mongolia province as part of acclaimed artist, Ai Weiwei’s 100 Ordos Master Plan. Situated on an arid grassland site, LRA’s Villa 007 will be one of 100 villas designed by 100 invited international architects and organized around a new Ordos cultural center which includes an adjacent museum and artist housing.

Situated on a corner site on the south side of the Ordos 100 development, Villa 007 draws the landscape and light deep into its interior. A traditional three-bay grid running normal to the odd-angled west façade organizes three landscape courtyards that draw the surrounding site into the living areas. Interior programmatic and structural zones are organized by these gardens and by a secondary grid running normal to the remaining facades. The addition/internalization of exterior space expands the program horizontally and creates the low building profile.

Villa 007 challenges the normative practice of consolidating residential programs into separate service, living and sleeping blocks. LRA distributed living spaces on each level, interspersing them with sleeping areas and service areas, and encouraging residents and guests to seek a broader range of experiences within the home. In an unconscious act of domestic migration, the home-owner will meander from space to space, drawn by the scale and material character of specific living spaces that resonate with their mood, as well as with the time of day and time of year. Living Level 1 is an active living environment of pool/exercise zones coupled with a lounge, hot pool and sauna. Living Level 2 distributes large entertaining zones away from the more intimate living, study, and dining areas with sleeping rooms mixed between. Living Level 3 is the owner’s bedroom suite with private lounge adjacent to an exterior rooftop terrace.

Architect: 1100 Architect
Location: Okinawa, Japan
Principal: Juergen Riehm
Project Architect: Joanna Chen
Project Managers: Bo Lee, Sebastian Kaempf
Designer: Jesse Wark
MEP Engineer:American Engineering Corporation
Lighting: Litelab/ Continental Lighting
General Contractor: Katsuko Tokuchi, Taishin Kensetsu
Project Year: 2003
Constructed Area: 650 sqm
Photographs: Shinito Sato

The Naha project includes a gallery, retail space, partially submerged parking lot, and three rental apartments that each occupies an entire floor. The varied programs are unified by a consistent focus on the permeable interface of interior and exterior. Transparent, translucent, or opaque glass is used depending on the amount of privacy desired. Clear glass showcases the gallery and retail space and opens up the living and dining areas of the apartments, whereas translucent and opaque glass envelop the apartment bedrooms and bathrooms.

The east and west walls are solid cast concrete. Light enters through small, deep windows placed along the stairwell on the east side and the apartment kitchens on the west. This design feature provides dramatic lighting effects without sacrificing a private, enclosed feeling. Cast concrete is a durable, affordable and widely used material in Okinawa. An engaging contradiction is achieved as channels cut out along the edges of these massive walls and floors evoke a lightweight appearance.

Architects: BIG Architects
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
Partner in Charge: Bjarke Ingels
Project Architect: Jakob Lange
Project Leader: Finn Nørkjær
Project Manager: Jan Borgstrøm
Construction Manager: Henrick Poulsen
Contributors: Annette Jensen, Dariusz Bojarski, Dennis Rasmussen, Eva Hviid-Nielsen, Joao Vieira Costa, Jørn Jensen, Karsten V. Vestergaard, Karsten Hammer Hansen, Leon Rost, Louise Steffensen, Malte Rosenquist, Mia Frederiksen, Ole Elkjær-Larsen, Ole Nannberg, Roberto Rosales Salazar, Rong Bin, Sophus Søbye, Søren Lambertsen, Wataru Tanaka
Collaborators: JDS, Moe & Brødsgaard, Freddy Madsen Rådgivende Ingeniører ApS
Client: Høpfner A/S
Engineering: Moe & Brodsgaard
Construction: DS Elcobyg A/S /PH Montage
Project year: 2008
Constructed Area: 33,000 sqm
Photographs: Dragor Luft, Jacob Boserup, Jens Lindhe, Ulrik Jantzen

How do you combine the splendours of the suburban backyard with the social intensity of urban density?

The Mountain Dwellings are the 2nd generation of the VM Houses – same client, same size and same street. The program, however, is 2/3 parking and 1/3 living. What if the parking area became the base upon which to place terraced housing – like a concrete hillside covered by a thin layer of housing, cascading from the 11th floor to the street edge? Rather than doing two separate buildings next to each other – a parking and a housing block – we decided to merge the two functions into a symbiotic relationship. 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.

The roof gardens consist of a terrace and a garden with plants changing character according to the changing seasons. The building has a huge watering system which maintains the roof gardens. The only thing that separates the apartment and the garden is a glass façade with sliding doors to provide light and fresh air.

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 north and west facades are covered by perforated aluminium plates, which let in air and light to the parking area. The holes in the facade form a huge reproduction of Mount Everest. At day the holes in the aluminium plates will appear black on the bright aluminium, and the gigantic picture will resemble that of a rough rasterized photo. At night time the facade will be lit from the inside and appear as a photo negative in different colours as each floor in the parking area has different colours.

The Mountain Dwellings is located in Orestad city and offer the best of two worlds: closeness to the hectic city life in the centre of Copenhagen, and the tranquillity characteristic of suburban life.

Architects: Longhi Architects
Location: Punta Misterio, Peru
Principal in Charge: Luis Longhi
Project Architect: Christian Bottger
Project Manager: Carla Tamariz
Collaborators: Hector Suasnabar, Ysa Jamis
Construction: Longhi Architects / Hector Suasnabar
Project year: 2006-2008
Constructed Area: 530 sqm
Photographs: CHOlon Photography

Conceived as the place where the arid Peruvian desert meets the Pacific Ocean, this beach house located at Punta Misterio 117 km. south of Lima, is an intervention where the integration of architecture and landscape was an important concern.

Sand garden roofs act as the extension of the desert; lap and recreation pools connect the ocean with the house, while a glass box hangs from the structure symbolizing architecture between sand and water.

Architect: 1100 Architect
Location: New York, USA
Principal: Juergen Riehm, David Piscuskas
Project Architect: Christine Harper
Project Managers: Bo Lee, Sebastian Kaempf
Designer: Jessica Spiegel
MEP Engineer: ESC Consulting Engineers
Structural Engineer: Robert Silman Associates
General Contractor: Hunter Roberts Construction Group
Exterior Consultant: Israel Berger
Project Year: 2008
Constructed Area: 2,973 sqm
Photographs: Sebastian Kaempf, Lisa Bubbers

The city elicits in our culture a stark duality – a desire to be immersed in its spectacle and a simultaneous craving for respite from its ceaseless activity. Avant Chelsea will provide for its residents both experiences. A modern, culturally sophisticated urbanite requires access to constantly shifting stimulation as well as a private space that can be adapted to their personal needs and sensibility.

This new condominium in West Chelsea will contain twelve floors of flexible apartments, upper-floor terraces, recreation areas, and a courtyard. The street façade is a window wall, skillfully proportioned to achieve a balance between the scale of the user and the building at large. The design is efficient with a refined elegance.