Archinect - News

Zaha Hadid Architects designs world's first green hydrogen refueling network for recreational boating

2024-02-10T08:00:00-05:00

Zaha Hadid Architects has designed the world’s first green hydrogen refueling infrastructure for the recreational boating industry. Refueling stations will be installed at 25 Italian marinas.

The project is being spurred by an approximately $108 million investment led by NatPower H, a global developer of technologies for the production, storage, and distribution of green hydrogen. The refueling network will begin installation in the summer of 2024, with a target to grow to 100 stations throughout the Mediterranean over the next six years. There are further ambitions to expand to the world’s most popular regions for recreational boating.

According to the firm, the eventual 100 refueling stations will be operational by 2030 and will deliver up to 3,650 tons of green hydrogen annually. This will erase approximately 45,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions from the Mediterranean’s recreational boats every year.

Rendering: Tecma Solutions / Zaha Hadid Architects

This project addresses the ...

Architecture-inspired ship concept could become the world's first 3D printed superyacht

2023-02-28T15:36:00-05:00

Multidisciplinary designer Jozeph Forakis has unveiled the concept for a luxury superyacht, christened Pegasus, that he described as “invisible both in design and in her environmental impact.” When completed in 2030, the futuristic 288-foot ship will become the world’s first 3D-printed sea vessel that produces zero emissions and can cruise with near-infinite range.

Forakis says the inspiration behind the yacht is Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s Blur Building, a pavilion that sat above Lake Neuchâtelin in the Swiss municipality of Yverdon-les-Bains during Swiss Expo 2002. The structure was concealed by a mass of fog that was formed by pumped lake water and dispensed as mist through 35,000 high-pressure nozzles.

Image courtesy Jozeph Forakis

The yacht would be constructed via robotic 3D printing to create a durable and lightweight mesh framework for both the hull and superstructure. According to Forakis, this could allow the structure to be produced using less energy, material, and time compared to conventional construction.

The yacht is distinguished by its reflective façade and its multi-tiered glass wings. The PEGASUS 88m Concept is said to have a “near-infinite range” through solar energy used to convert seawater into hydrogen, which onboard fuel cells would convert into electricity.

Crossboundaries converted a motorboat into a flexible tiny home on the water

2022-12-30T14:07:00-05:00

Earlier this year, Beijing-based practice Crossboundaries redesigned a fully solar powered motorboat by adding tiny-home components making it a slow-moving home on the water.

Completed in March 2022 for a Berlin-based client, the project questions the relationships between the notions of public-private and temporary-permanent. The structure has an overall length of around 49 feet and a maximum width of a little over 13 feet. It features a set of interlinked and multi-purpose spaces.

Crossboundaries made functionality improvements to the boat by including a fully hidden bed and the ability to close the helmstand, which hides more technical equipment, freeing up space. They also featured a pop-up table for the kitchen and a hidden foldable desk within a cabinet.

As noted by the architects, “The boat is "smart and self-powered" due to a set of innovative solutions in terms of solar energy, heating source, water, and waste management.” On sunny days, the boat can be entirely powered b...

Louis Kahn's floating music barge is saved, finds home in Philadelphia

2020-12-07T12:27:00-05:00

The Point Counterpoint II, a boat designed by Louis Kahn for musical conductor and longtime friend Robert Boudreau, will dock permanently in Philadelphia after it was recently saved from the scrapyard. Yo-Yo Ma, the renowned cellist, made a plea in 2017 to save the vessel from destruction that resulted in a ripple of interest to preserve Kahn and Boudreau's creation.

Previously on Archinect: Louis Kahn's floating concert hall, Point Counterpoint II, is facing demolition, and Yo-Yo Ma wants it saved. Point Counterpoint II, Photo by josepha on Flickr

According to Architectural Record, a group including architect Lee Skolnick launched a successful effort late 2019 to salvage the ship. Due to open in 2022, the ship's interior will be refurbished before it serves as "the key musical component" of a new arts and culture hub in development at the abandoned Delaware Power Station in Philadelphia.

The University of Maine sets three world records by 3D printing a 25-foot-long boat

2019-10-21T19:20:00-04:00

The possibilities of 3D printing and fabrication have propelled design by pushing the limitations of digital computation and construction. Earlier this month, the University of Maine's Advanced Structures and Composites Center used the world's largest 3D-printer to break a whopping three world records by producing a 25-foot-long, 5,000-pound ship. Named the 3Dirigo, the 3D printed dream boat won three Guinness World Records for the World's Largest Prototype Polymer 3D Printer, the Largest Solid 3D-Printed Object, and the Largest 3D-Printed Boat.

The success of the project was not only due to the size of the 3D print, but also because of the materials used to accomplish it, wood. Yes, wood. The pivotal detail within the project is the implementation of using bio-based materials like wood as an alternative building material for large scale constructions that use metal.

Besides the accolades and recognition, the project helped realize a design alternative for manufacturing infrastru...

Philip Kennicott's plea for Washington D.C. to save Louis Kahn's floating concert hall

2017-08-24T14:25:00-04:00

The boat belongs in Washington, a city both blessed and socially determined by its rivers....Many of the most dramatic and some of the most exciting changes in Washington today are clustered along its rivers. The most visible transformation is the District Wharf development,...but projects like the 11th Street Bridge Park....transcend mere commercial development, and underscore the myriad possibilities of using the river as a means of connection, social equity and public discourse.

The saga to save the Louis Kahn-designed floating concert hall, Point Counterpoint II, continues. It all began back in mid-July when Yo-Yo Ma made a plea in The New York Review of Books to salvage the barge facing demolition on account of the fact that the owners—Robert Boudreau, whom doubles as the orchestra's conductor, and wife Kathleen—are ready to retire their duties as the boat's caretakers.

Both city officials and activists in the Hudson River town of Kingston, New York have expressed interest in acquiring the ship; they were expected to meet with Boudreau on August 4th to discuss the possibility. While the Mayor, Steve Noble, has agreed to offer his support, raising the funds for the purchasing and transport of the $2 million dollar vessel, that might now be going for as much as $4 mill, poses a problem for the city. Further, the competition is apparently stiff as there has been interest expressed in Buffalo, France, and Italy among others.

One of those places vying for th...

After Yo-Yo Ma's plea, Point Counterpoint II, Louis Kahn floating concert hall, may be saved after all

2017-07-19T14:14:00-04:00

Officials and activists in the Hudson River town of Kingston, N.Y., plan to meet with the boat's owner Aug. 4 to discuss the possibility of transporting the vessel there from its current berth on the Illinois River in Ottawa, Ill. Late last month, musicians performed aboard the boat in the town, some 80 miles southwest of Chicago.

Last week Archinect reported that Yo-Yo Ma sent a letter out through the New York Review of Books in an attempt to save the floating concert hall, designed by Louis Kahn, from demolition. The famed cellist pleaded: "At a time when our national conversation is so often focused on division, we can ill afford to condemn to the scrap heap such a vibrant ambassador for our national unity, so I humbly ask that your readers join Robert and me in finding a new home for Point Counterpoint II." After five decades of running the barge, the owners, Robert Boudreau and wife Kathleen, have decided to retire their duties as caretakers and have been struggling to find a new proprietor for the ship. However, with a little help from Yo-Yo Ma, they may have found the vessel a new home in Kingston, NY.

Reportedly, Hutton Brickyards is being considered as the floating venue's new home. The former industrial site that supplied bricks to New York City up until the 80s was acquired by California-based deve...

Louis Kahn's floating concert hall, Point Counterpoint II, is facing demolition, and Yo-Yo Ma wants it saved

2017-07-13T16:02:00-04:00

Anchoring in large cities and small towns, in busy shipping lanes and at public parks, the barge opens like a clamshell to reveal a glittering concert stage. Audiences on shore delight in the music, much of it specially composed for Maestro Boudreau and his American Wind Symphony Orchestra

Louis Kahn was commissioned to design Point Counterpoint II, a unique floating concert hall, by conductor Robert Austin Boudreau in the mid 1960s. Launched in 1976, the 195-foot structure carried an orchestra up and down America's waterways for five decades. Robert Boudreau and his wife, Kathleen, have recently decided that they cannot keep running the barge. At the conclusion of the Orchestra's 2017 tour, it will be broken down to scrap in a Louisiana shipyard—despite the owner's best efforts to find a new guardian for the unique, mobile cultural institution.

Drawing of Point Counterpoint II, by Louis Kahn

Point Counterpoint II, Photo courtesy of American Wind Symphony Orchestra

Point Counterpoint II, Photo by josepha on Flickr

Point Counterpoint II, Photo courtesy of American Wind Symphony Orchestra

Yo-Yo Ma, a French-born Chinese American cellist, recently wrote about his admiration for Point Counterpoint II, i...

Frank Gehry designs his first yacht, "Foggy"

2015-10-08T13:15:00-04:00

Fashioned out of traditional larch wood but accented with titanium and a glass latticework that glimmers like a school of fish, she looked schizophrenic, a hybrid of past and future. [...] Gehry is an avid yachtsman, and sailing informs much of his most famous work—think of the billowing motif of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, New York's IAC building, and, most recently, the Louis Vuitton Foundation [...] "On a boat like this, it's about romance and romantic encounters," the architect says.

It took him nearly 87 years, but Frank Gehry has finally designed his first yacht, for developer Richard Cohen – joining the ranks of Zaha Hadid, Norman Foster, Renzo Piano and John Pawson who have all taken a stab at nautical design. Gehry's personal sailboat, a Beneteau First 44.7 named "Foggy 1", resides in Marina del Rey.

Check out more shots of the boat and its interior in the image gallery.

Olafur Eliasson opens ship-themed pedestrian bridge in Copenhagen

2015-08-24T12:18:00-04:00

A pedestrian bridge designed by Olafur Eliasson has opened in Copenhagen, inspired by the Danish-Icelandic artist's childhood in Iceland. Reminiscent of sailing boats, Cirkelbroen, or circle bridge, is made of five circular platforms in different sizes, each with its own "mast", according to Danish foundation Nordea-fonden [...]. Spanning the Danish capital's Christianshavn canal, the bridge, some 40 meters-long (131 feet), has a section that swings open to allow boats to pass through.

Olafur Eliasson in the Archinect news:

Airbnb celebrates London's Deregulation Act with floating house on River Thames

2015-05-18T20:39:00-04:00

Airbnb is sailing a full-size floating house along the Thames this week to celebrate new rules to support home sharing in London. The publicity stunt follows the passing of the Deregulation Act last month, which means Londoners are now free to rent their homes for up to 90 days a year without risk of fines or having to secure planning permission before doing so.

For more information and your chance to stay in the floating house click here.

Zaha Hadid Designs Superyachts For Blohm+Voss

2013-10-15T11:47:00-04:00

The striking exoskeleton structure of the upper section is an interwoven network of supports that vary in thickness and lend a natural aesthetic to the yacht’s external appearance; evoking the organic structural systems found in nature. This exoskeleton connects the various levels and decks seamlessly via expressive diagonals. Where traditional yacht design adheres to a strict horizontal order, Hadid has created an intense connectivity between the various decks and elements of the design.

Section of L.A. River through the Valley opens to tours

2012-07-16T13:13:00-04:00

The 70-foot channel has for years operated as a flood-control channel, wildlife sanctuary and escape valve for treated waste water befouled with chemicals and trash. Now, the soft-bottom swath of weedy islands, dense brush and willows draped with fast-food wrappers, plastic bags and clothes is one of the newest summer attractions in town.

Obscenely Rich Tech Folk Are Still Building Their Island Utopia Off The Coast of San Francisco

2012-05-10T18:31:00-04:00

The project, which is now called Blueseed, is led by a team of execs plucked from Thiel's Seasteading Institute. Although the original plans for the floating tech village looked something like a fancy oil rig from the future, the latest plan is to either convert a cruise ship or remodel an old barge in to a swanky island anchored just outside the jurisdiction of the United States.

Click here for the Blueseed website.

Badboot Lido Coming to Antwerp this Summer

2012-05-01T18:15:00-04:00

One of the world’s biggest floating openair swimming pools will open on the Eilandje in Antwerp, Belgium at the Kattendijkdok in mid-August. The pool, with a total length of 120 meters (394 feet), can accommodate 600 people and consists of a swim basin, two event venues, several floors and a restaurant with a lounge terrace.

'Badboot' was designed by architect Pieter Peerlings and Silvia Mertens of Sculp(IT) Architecten, known for the narrowest house in Antwerp (remember this incredibly popular Archinect Showcase Feature?).