Architecture and Hooters go 'hand in hand' excuse the pun.

The below and the above

Over the spring and the coming summer I am going to begin discussing the veins and arteries of our cities that we don't really get to see or experience for ourselves. My memories take me back to when I was a little younger. Sitting on the roof of our house ( do not ask how I got there, apparently you can squeeze out of a window but just try squeezing back in when your 7 years old) and seeing the 'world' in a different light. Long before I was aware of le Corbusiers streets in the sky or team 10's fascination with high rise living and well before Stephen Holls linked hybrid, that 7 year old one summer realised for himself the elevated feeling of being high up of the ground and it was as simple as stepping out.

I also remember my first visit to Rome where I was taken on a tour of the cities ancient network of sewers and mines. It's a different world down there. Different from the world above.

I recently read an article in the National Geographic about the Paris underground. A network of ancient tunnels, catacombs and mines that the city almost 20 feet below the surface. It took me back that tour of Rome and how apparently 'all are equal' beneath the city, all are muddied, all are wet and dripping with excitement. Here is an extract from that article written by By Neil Shea, Photograph by Stephen Alvarez;

The cab glides through Saturday morning. The great avenues are quiet, the shops closed. From a bakery comes the scent of fresh bread. At a stoplight a blur of movement draws my attention. A man in blue coveralls is emerging from a hole in the sidewalk. His hair falls in dreadlocks, and there is a lamp on his head. Now a young woman emerges, holding a lantern. She has long, slender legs and wears very short shorts. Both wear rubber boots, both are smeared with beige mud, like a tribal decoration. The man shoves the iron cover back over the hole and takes the woman's hand, and together they run grinning down the street.

Paris has a deeper and stranger connection to its underground than almost any city, and that underground is one of the richest. The arteries and intestines of Paris, the hundreds of miles of tunnels that make up some of the oldest and densest subway and sewer networks in the world, are just the start of it. Under Paris there are spaces of all kinds: canals and reservoirs, crypts and bank vaults, wine cellars transformed into nightclubs and galleries. Most surprising of all are the carrières—the old limestone quarries that fan out in a deep and intricate web under many neighborhoods, mostly in the southern part of the metropolis.

Vertical Omotesando (Fashion Museum)/ Wai Think Tank | ArchDaily

Wai Think Tank have shared with us their proposal for the Fashion Museum Competition in Omotesando Street in Tokyo, Japan. The challenge consisted in designing a 100 meters high tower-museum, containing exhibition areas of 20th century fashion history and becoming a landmark for Tokyo.

See more images and architect’s description after the break.

Bjarke Ingels @ ETSAM, "Yes is more"

Bjarke Ingels @ ETSAM, "Yes is more" from mstrpln blog mx on Vimeo.


Bjarke Ingels (BIG) conference at ETSAM in Madrid, which took place on Oct 6th.

Video by Jorge from mstrpln blog.

Recent BIG projects featured at AD:
BIG’s proposal for the Audi Urban Future Award
LOOP City
8 House
Denmark Pavilion at Shanghai Expo 2010
MNBAQ Extension Competition entry (With Fugere Architectes)
Mountain Dwellings (with JDS)
P.S.1 2010 competition entry
Faroe Islands Education Center
World Village of Women Sports
Shenzhen International Energy Mansion
National Library in Astana, Kazakhstan
Tallin City Hall
Tamayo Museum (with Rojkind Architects)
Kaufhauskanal Metrozone (with Topotek1)
Zira Island Carbon Neutral master plan
 

INTRODUCTION

The Island Proposition 2100 embodies hyper-connectivity.

The IP2100 spine contains a looped system of hybrid infrastructures, initiating a new symbiotic relationship between the urban centres and their supporting territories. An extensive network on the multi-regional scale provides cites with the resources to become robust and responsive to future challenges.

Ruperra Castle_A Castles Plight

Buildings do not normally have to be beautiful or functional to require appreciation. Ruperra Castle near my home in South Wales has long been a place that has held my interest, not only because of it's peculiar design but also the history surrounding it and the controversies of a recent planning application by the business owner to complete a large residential housing scheme around the site. While this was sussesful with Clyne castle in Swansea, it is my own and many other peoples opinion that such a scheme would ruin the surrounding vistas and landscape and may act as a precedent in planning procdeure when concerning our national ruins. Two years ago I completed a report documenting the history, architectural style and recent events regarding the castle, apologies if it seems somewhat outdated but as of yet have not had the time to update it to a more recent version.

Open publication - Free publishing - More wales

A link to the Ruprra Blog spot can be found by clicking HERE, where you will find up to date information on the current state of the application and the appeal.

http://www.dezeen.com/2010/07/23/36-the-calls-by-fletcher-crane-architects/#idc-container

My Graduation, Ba (Hons) Architecture Part 1

A few photos from the big 'rainy' day, happy to get my Ba, but sad to say goodbye to some top class people, will really miss you all, 'We've only got each other' LADS ON TOUR !!

READ>>>

Some final Year Images

To visit more of my own and the MSA, U+L unit blog CLICK HERE 

Studying Controversies

How successful will New Islington be?

One of the modules of my final semester required me, working within a team to investigate a chosen architectural controversy. In a group 5, we delegated roles for ourselves and set about creating a website that explained, via a visual diagrammatic output how the controversy of New Islington Manchester developed over time. 

List of team members:

Jonathan Carter (Project coordinator)

Benjamin Hale (Webmaster)

Tim Stephenson (Reporter/investigator)

Edward Kilvert (Reporter/investigator)

Matt Parsons Brown (Statistician)

INTRODUCTION AND LINK TO WEBSITE >>>>> 

NICE BLOG

http://supercolossal.ch/page/2/

Sketching Manchester...

Afew sketches from my first year at msa, the project required us to detail Manchester through a series of sketchs and diagrams. It was my first shot at working a sketchbook and discovered a way of looking at a city in a completely different light. 







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Barcelona Study Trip

Analysis of some spaces in Barcelona Autumn 09


Sketchbook work


_Placa Reial

U + L Unit at the University of Manchester School of Architecture

msa UNIT U+L

CaixaForum, Barcelona

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Wish you all the best for the new year and the next decade !

CITY MOVEMENT_An some sausages to boot

A recent MSA Architecture trip to Stuttgart (late winter 2009) produced some interesting stuff:

Future of our City_Manchester city wall

DO WE REALLY NEED PUBLIC SPACE?

The scheme deals with the problem of, to coin the term 'inner city centralization' a common theme in many British and also post war European cities. I've discovered that Manchesters repeated attempt to reinvigorate the districts of Ancoats, Oldham road and provide a link between Picadilly gardens and New Islington have not been effective. The 'INNER CITY RIDGE' would provide the users with a green link into and out of the city, raised from the streets below.

Ossuary Orthen / Buijsenpennock Architects

When much needed landscape maintenance at the 150 year-old cemetery in Orthen required many graves to be emptied, a competition was held to design a new resting place for the remains of 12,000 people. Buijsenpennock Architects responded by designing an ossuary that can be seen as a series of walls, made by a mesh of rough oak columns and beams.

Grizedale Viewing Deck

Grizdale Viewing Deck, Lake District, England_

Architect: Benjamin Hale

The brief asked for a viewing deck/tower above one of three selected sites located in the Grizedale woodland area of  the Peak District, England.  The scheme proposes a hanging structure with a seated platform beneath that allows the user unobstructed views of the Northern Peaks aswell as a closer interaction level with the natural enviroment below.