/26.-29th June 2009 HTWK Leipzig

Leipzig`s 1st Parametric Design Workshop at the HTWK Leipzig (FH) in Germany started on June 26, 2009. 6 international tutors and 40 participants from different backgrounds and origins made in only 4 days (and nights) of intense work with a big amount of enthusiasm and camaraderie filled this intense and productive workshop happen.

This event was dedicated to explore techniques and concepts of parametric processes from conceptual formulations, to design development, to final fabrication, as instruments for an architectural exploration using Rhino Grasshopper.

Check  out the following link to see all student projects  http://141.57.80.18/wordpress/

Leipzig, 26^th -29^th of June 2009 in Leipzig

Registration open until June 13^th -> mail to: RAMBOW@fbb.HTWK-Leipzig.de

From June 26th until June 29th  a group of young architects from Greece, Chile, Puerto Rico and Germany based in Barcelona is organising Leipzig`s 1st Parametric Design Workshop at the HTWK Leipzig (FH) in Germany. We are looking forward to collaborate with Dimitrie Stefanescu from Bucharest, Professor Henning Rambow and Patrik Bedarf from the HTWK Leipzig.

This 4 day intense workshop is dedicated to develop techniques and concepts of parametric processes as instruments for architectural design and fabrication using Rhino Grasshopper. Students are going to develop parametric Light and Shadow objects in a digital way and will then fabricate them in 1:1 scale in form of a physical model. The workshop includes a general Introduction to Parametric Design and Fabrication, five Grasshopper Tutorials, a lecture on Performative Architecture, a short Origami Session and finally the Fabrication  using laser cutters. It is a central part of the learning process to take all steps of the process – from design to fabrication.

The international team of tutors will provide technical assistance and accompany all individual projects from the initial idea to the digital modelling and the fabrication process.

The workshop will be an intense and exciting experience for all participants. On Monday the 29^th of June all results will be exhibited at the HTWK Leipzig. Opening of the Exhibition will be at 19.00.

Tutors:

Barcelona

Luis Fraguada, Ioulietta Zindrou, Maite Bravo, Verena Vogler

Bucharest

Dimitrie Stefanescu

Leipzig

Henning Rambow, Patrik Bedarf

This summer a group of young architects from Greece and the U.S. are launching the Apo Mechanes workshop in Athens. From the 27th of July until the 11th of August they are planning to investigate together with students from all over the globe new modes of algorithmic processes in architectural design and fabrication.

Luckily I have the possibilty to join them in sunny Greece . The registration is still open.

The coordinators :
Ezio Blasetti,
Dave Pigram,
Roland Snooks
Ioulietta Zindrou

EZIO BLASETTI, registered architect TEE-TCG, holds a masters of science in Advanced Architectural Design from Columbia University after graduating from the National Technical University of Athens. Founder of algorithmicdesign.net Ezio is 1/3 of Serge Studio, his recent collaborations include Acconci Studio, biothing and a|Um studio. He has taught at Columbia University, the Architectural Association, The Pratt Institute.

DAVE PIGRAM is the founding Partner of supermanoeuvre, Dave Pigram has taught at Columbia University, the Architectural Association, The Pratt Institute, The University of Michigan and The University of Canberra. He has exhibited and lectured on his work internationally and was formerly a project director for Studio Daniel Libeskind.

ROLAND SNOOKS is the founding partner of Kokkugia, he teaches at Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania, having previously taught at Sci-Arc, University of Southern California, UCLA, Pratt Institute and RMIT University. Roland was the curator of the Australasian section of this year’s Architecture Bienale Beijing

COMPETITION PROPOSAL FOR THE ARCHITECTURE FACULTY IN DELFT “LOSS AND OPPORTUNITY“

/project by Ioulietta Zindrou, Georgia Voudouri and Verena Vogler

The Bouwkunde building goes back to the 60s with a typical modern Campus.

The destruction of the Bouwkunde building caused a striking architectural void as well as striking disturbance of its Social Network. Suddenly, a central and important building was missing in the Campus Grid.

In our approach, we face this moment of social discontinuity with the transformation of the original campus grid. Particularly, we use a mathematical algorithm which has many applications in evolutionary biology as well as developmental biology:

Fibonacci algorithm:

1 – 2 – 3 – 5 – 8 – 13 – 21 – 34

Apart from its biological component, the Fibonacci algorithm has an geometrical component, since it can be used to infer the Golden Section:

¹ /₁ = 1,   ²/₁ = 2,   ³/₂ = 1·5,   ⁵/₃ = 1·666…,   ⁸/₅ = 1·6,   ¹³/₈ = 1·625,   ²¹/₁₃ = 1·61538…

By applying these algorithms several options appeared of where to place the new building. In the end, the new building can fill the gap and re-adapt the void. The result is a transformed Bouwkunde Campus which can successfully encounter the social discontinuity.

Panels

#1

# 2

 Topview of  proposal

Text: Johannes Engelken

Section and Floorplans: Ioulietta Zindrou

3D Model: Verena Vogler

The winners of the competition are announced here

The Expo 2008 Zaragoza took place in between the 14th of June and the 14th of September. The topic this year was “Water and Sustainable Development“. I was very curious about the exhibition and went to Zaragoza this August.

With the following photo stream I would like to share some impressions .

 Bridge Pavillon over the Ebro River by Zaha Hadid and Arup engineers, Spainish Pavillon with its columns out of clay designed by Francisco Mangado, 3 Cubes

Since a couple of days the Expo Zaragoza closed its doors to the public. From now on the area will be transformed into a sustainable Business Park which is promised to be the most modern in Europe. Here you will find some informations -> Zaragoza  after EXPO

ADAPTABLE ARCHITECTURE GALLERY on the Thames River

In the end of July I’ve sent my Thesis project as a proposal for the Urban Competition 2008 to London. Almost 400 architects from all over the world took part in the competition. To check other proposals and the winners click here! Its worth it to take a look .

//PANEL

 Article_1  We have NO VISION by Verena Vogler

Buildings that communicate a message are the continuation of the centuries old tradition of prestigious architecture. Decorative columns and architraves, bell towers and domes, the impressively decorated palaces built by the nobility in bygone centuries and equally the modern skyscrapers – cathedrals of capitalism - have always been, and still are, designed as a statement of social status, not purely as practical considerations.

Prestigious buildings also have “something to say”, they have always intended to send a message:

Towers have always been a symbol of power and influence. The Crysler Building was the first building to surpass the Eiffel Tower in hight, until the Empire State Building won the title of the tallest building in the world.

Today buildings are about to literally incorporate the expression of a brand which are the manifestation of lifestyle choices through the intermediary of products and services.

There is no doubt that products of fashion, luxuary articles such as cigarettes or fragrances and certainly cars are contemporary lifestyle products. People buy specific brands because they feel an affinity with the style they represent, adapting the latter in their own lives. It is surprinsing that only a few of the biggest and best known global brands such as Coca Cola have grasped the opportunity of making use of architecture in their communication strategy. But for fact, in present, the large car manufacturers who base the design of their offices and showrooms on a distinct corporate identity and the transport industry is effectively the only sector to have truly grasped the extent to which architecture can underline and even enhance a service.

   

A new trend towards corporate identity appropriate architecture started to develop in the 1990s, in an area of buisiness activity that uniquely exemplifies the evolution and future of brand communication: the design of exhibition stands for the world’s major trade fairs. At the bianual Frankfurt Motor Show (IAA), the major German brands such as Mercedes or Volkswagen take over an entire hall of the trade fair center and, for the 13 days of the show , completely revamp the interior to such an extent that the average visitor has no idea of the physical structure of the building. They create a brand environment that fully negates the structural context. The exhibitor, by contrast, builds a stage set on which to produce a tangible experience of the brand, and that is a completely different matter.

What is the intension of communicative architecture? Its aim is not merely to create a recognisable image, communicative architecture tries not to visually represent the brand.  Instead it tries to translate brand values into the language of architecture. And because brands represent modern- day values, the architecture must also be modern- today with an opening towards tomorrow.

Cathedrals of Modern Time: Zaha Hadid’s BMW factory in Leipzig. BMW, one of the German major brands in the automobil industry, tries to communicate the brand value “dynamic: joy in driving”. Architects such as Zaha Hadid and Coop Himmel(b)lau collaborate mainly with BMW and are estimated by the company because they transmit best these values into architecture. Likewise, the Dutch architect Ben van Berkel works together with Mercedes Benz.

 Sex sells – and today? “Architecture. The New Sexy Subject for Fashion Moguls.” (1) Understood from this perspective, constructed reality, architecture, provides a visible, tangible setting and a symbol through which self-perception can be conveyed. This may not be a really new concept, in addition to its actual function, architecture has always served to express the philosophy and identity of its patrons.

The historical proclivity “form follows identity” paradigm was largly forgotten in favour of the rationale “form follows function” in the mid- twentieth century. Obviously a greater emphases was placed on functionality. Only recently has a symbolic content of architecture enjoyed rebirth through communicative and image- values. The famous architect has come to be considered a status symbol. The client is now happy to scale back his practical requirements in favour of of a more pretigious result. The architect himself becomes a brand. The goal is “form follows identity”- and objective that naturally takes functional requirements into account, while at the same time expressing the essence of the brand.

(1) Suzy Menkes, “Architecture. The New Sexy Sunject for Fashion Moguls”: International Herald Tribune, 23.01. 2001

Sources:

Zaha Hadid, Architektur- architecture, Ostfildern- Ruit 2003.

Architektur als Markenkommunikation: dynaform + cube, Basel 2002.

Mercedes- Benz- Museum, Konstanz 2007.

Bauhaus, Koeln 2006.

Wolfgang Hofmann, Goldener Schnitt und Komposition, Wilhelmshaven 1973.

Manfred Omahna, Plurale Räume, Muenster 2006.

Zaha Hadid, urban architecture Wolfsburg- Rom- Cincinnati, Berlin 2000.

Robert Venturi, Learning from Las Vegas, 1978.

A MAGAZINE ABOUT ARCHITECTURE FOR TOMORROW

We have NO VISION is a Blog created by us, a group of 15 young architects from all around the world that write and discuss about emerent topics in the field of architecture. Most articles pose a critical and provocative question.  We all have instincts about the future of architecture, and our own ideas about what it may hold, but we obviously don’t know for sure.

So if there is anyone interested in this plattform feel free to discuss with us:  www.wehavenovision.com

III INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF ARCHITECTURE, LANZAROTE (CANARY ISLANDS, SPAIN)

TOPIC WORKSHOP: “EL VIENTO- WIND”

left: final presentation, IAAC Group: Jürgen Weiß, Verena Vogler, Luis Odiaga
right: United: Jürgen Weiß and Verena Vogler (IAAC), Oliver Tessmann (Staedelschule), Ignacio Lopéz Busón (ETSA)

THE congress and the workshop has been organised by the Centros de Arte, Cultura y Turismo del Cabildo de Lanzarote together with the Museum of International Contemporary Art (MIAC) in Arrecife, Lanzarote.

Three Architectural Schools have been invited by the Organisation: Staedelschule Frankfurt represented by Oliver Tessmann and Anton Savov, ETSA of Las Palmes by Juan Palop and the IAAC Barcelona, where I was a part of. All together, 35 students came to the island in order to work eight days on different architectural approaches that concern the maintopic: El Viento- The Wind, which is a very basic and specific issue at Lanzarote island.

The workshop was based on direct environmental research and self- exploration around the island, which we enjoyed with the same intensity as the group discussions in between us. The organisation planned trips to the fantastic National Park “Timanfaya” full of Lava and to very special places that show a great impact by the wind as Famara Beach in the northern part of the island.

Projects and proposals have been developed by each School internally. In my opinion this was a pitty, because we lost the entire workexperience and the interchange of conceptual ideas  in between the schools.

Anyways, some architecture students that grew up on the island like Patricia Acosta and Monika Vina did an amazing job in helping us and gave us the possibility to get a very special  impression of their island.

In the end we ended up with three large proposals developed by each school, which was very interesting to see.

During our stay in Lanzarote we took a look at architecture on the site. A very special and unique type of architecture built on the “LAVA Island” has been done by the local architect César Manrique.

“HUECOS”

Three main subtopics which were quite interesting were given to each school: CURVES, POROSITY and HOLES. The IAAC group decided to deal with the HOLES, in Spanish HUECOS. We started to devide the group again in subgroups and to start with observations in different sites.

LAS SALINAS

project by:  Patricia Acosta, Maria Eftychi, Luis Fraguada, Verena Vogler

The group where I was lucky to be a part of observed natural and artificial pools along the island which produce salt through the impacts of the wind, waves, the location and topography of the site.

Natural pools are holes washed out by the water and the wind along the cliffy coast composed of lava. Throughout the wind and the waves they capture salt water inside. The heat of the sun plus the water- destribution of the wind allow the appearence of salt at the bottom of the hole.

The artificial pendant to the natural pools we found in Las Salinas. The Salinas are acricultural territories for salt production with an economical and traditional importance for Lanzarote. One amazing fact was that the salt farms worked in ancient times in a completly sustainable way. Windpower was used to generate windmills that pumped the water into the basins. Once again, through wind and sun the basins dried out and salt remained at the bottom. Today engines are used to pump the water into the Salinas, which today have a greater importance for tourism than production.

 I IDEA

The principal thought was to combine the idea of a pool for leisure activities with the salinas based on production to create hybrid-system empowered by the wind.

II DESIGN TOOL- The Gradient

We decided to design a system that adapts itsself to any site given over the whole island of Lanzarote. Mainly the hybrid depends on three main parameters:

1. the distance from the coast, because the salt water needs to be transported into the system

2. the direction and power of the trade winds that come from the northeast, their impact in the north of the island stronger than in the south

3. the distribution and the impact of the man- made infrastructure (cities, villages, acriculture areas)

We set up one extrem condition for a system based on these parameters that produces 100 % salt. Leisure activities would not exist: For an optimized salt production, the system should be placed with the smallest distance to the coast, the wind needs to be strong, beyond any infrastructure. We concluded that the size of the basins should be smaller and more regular to optimize the production.

If Leisure activity pools come into play, which are not based on 100 %  of salt production, the condition can vary. For example, the wind can be lighter, the distance to the sea could increase and the pools could be closer to the infrastructure centers. The pools itselves need to be larger and deeper in order to use them.

These relations we used to develop a grid for each parameter that includes a gradient information:

Fig A shows a grid which is an offset of lines according to the coastline. The distance between the lines is smaller near the coast -> smaller basins for saltproduction.

Fig B shows the infrastructural centers of Lanzarote

Fig C these are some intersectionpoints that were extracted from the three layers of grids on top of each other

Fig D shows a ZOOM. the site was picked randomly and is used as example

A script using RhinoMonkey was developed which connects the 4 closest points and converts them into a surface. Depending on the size of the surface area the surfaces get a different colorcode. The colorcode encodes the depth of the area.

The relation in this case is very simple: the bigger the area, the darker the colour, the deeper the HOLE! -> pool for leisure activities, the smaller the area, the lighter the colour, the flatter the HOLE -> for salt production

III PROPOSAL FOR THE LANZAROTE ISLAND

In order to download the presentation “Ecolandscapes” of the entire IAAC Group click here -> iaac_presentation_lanzarote_workshop

The German National Merit Foundation (Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes) organised in the beginning of June a 4 day Design Conference in the Bauhaus Dessau, Germany. Students from the field of design, architecture, audiovisual media, art, interface design, etc. gathered in the small town Dessau in order to discuss the “Zeitgeíst” of design. Prof.Christian Janecke and Prof. Bernd Kracke from Offenbach School of Design opened the series of interesting lectures. Besides these we went to visit the Bauhaus School and the Meisterhäuser of Walter Gropius.

Discussions: Sabine Starke, Julia Apitzsch, Ulrike Storost, Stefan Lausch, Hanna Bruchmüller, Verena Vogler

I exposed in this context some of my work done in cooperation with students from IAAC Barcelona

 exhibition: panels, models (3d printed and lasercutted) and a small booklet

on the rooftop of the Bauhaus School

Bauhaus Dessau