Month: April 2022

A new exhibition at the Japan House in London explores the large-scale art and architecture project driving the transformation of the Japanese island of Inujima for the past 13 years. Titled Symbiosis: Living Island, the show co-curated by the project’s artistic director Yūko Hasegawa and architect Kazuyo Sejima showcases how the innovative scheme of accessible art, pavilions and creative projects brought together artists and locals in the effort to revitalize and secure a future for this island in the Seto Inland Sea confronted with diminishing population. Running from 21 May to 4 September 2022, the exhibition takes visitors on a journey around the island that illustrates the transformative impact of the Inujima’ Art House Project’ through architectural models, photography, videos and testimonies of the residents.

Plywood, laminated timber, MDF sheets and OSB boards are all good, can be economically viable and efficiently fulfill certain functions, but none of them offer the same atmosphere as solid wood. The nobility of this material is usually accompanied by a high cost, but the aesthetic and sensory qualities are unparalleled.

For quaint riverfront views, historical fortifications, and castles, head to Luxembourg. For sky-high remnants of the steel industry, there’s the country’s second largest city, Esch-sur-Alzette. Suffering, until recently, from the 1970’s steel manufacturing exodus, Esch, 10 miles to the northeast of the border of France, is emerging as an unexpected cultural mecca, where industrial infrastructure is being converted en masse into cultural and learning space. This rebirth is being celebrated thanks to a generous flow of cash via its designation as Esch2022: Esch-sur-Alzette European Capital of Culture 2022 (Kaunas, Lithuania and Novi Sad, Serbia, also named European Capital of Cultures this year, share the designation for 2022). For Esch, the title comes with $54.8 million in funds from EU, national, local, and private sources.

The volumetric formalization of the building, in interconnected autonomous pieces, responds to the need to solve two different programs: Auditorium and School of Music, with different needs but with a certain required programmatic link. Thus, a large volume is located at the north end of the plot that houses the auditorium and its related rooms: entrance foyer, dressing rooms, administration, rehearsal room, etc., and the rest of the smaller rooms that house the different classrooms from the music school. This volumetric atomization has a double intention: on the one hand, to escape as far as possible from a massive building, in a natural context in the park in which it is inserted, (still in execution), next to the banks of the Pisuerga river; and on the other hand to minimize the noise pollution between classrooms, so common in facilities of these characteristics. This subdivision originates open “patios” on one of its sides as an extension of the park itself that illuminates the connection corridor between classrooms.

Architectural renderings are a great way to showcase projects. They provide an impression of what your built environment will look like once completed. Thanks to real-time rendering software, you can now do more than present beautiful images.

“It couldn’t have been much different in Ur 5,000 years ago: the same painstakingly created bricks … the same spaces around a courtyard, the same walls, the same transition from light to dark, the same cold after heat, the same starry nights, same fears, same dreams …´´. Aldo van Eyck.

DDAA surrounds the maruhiro porcelain flagship store and museum with a park, open as a gathering space for all lovers of pottery making.
The post DDAA honors pottery-making heritage of hasami-cho with ‘maruhiro’ porcelain store appeared fir…