Archinect - News

PAO creates Beijing public restroom from single meandering wall

2023-06-30T11:19:00-04:00

People’s Architecture Office (PAO) has completed a public restroom in Beijing shaped by a single meandering wall. Named Amoeba Public Restroom, the project is located in Manshan Park, a popular destination in Mentougou, Beijing known for its markets, exhibitions, and music performances.

Image credit: People's Architecture Office

“Amoeba Public Restroom is an all-gender facility that is designed to [be] welcoming for all people,” the team explains. “The design features a single meandering wall, which creates distinct individual stalls while maintaining an open and interconnected interior. Conical spaces form light wells that draw natural light into each stall. The resulting spaces bring a sacred beauty to the most profane of activities.”

Image credit: People's Architecture Office

Each stall within the scheme has a unique shape and size. Stall doors do not seal above or below to create a continuity of sp...

New York City begins test pilot for parkbound modular public restrooms

2023-03-01T17:56:00-05:00

Nearly four years after floating the possibility, the city Department of Parks and Recreation is preparing for a trial run of prefabricated, kiosk-like bathrooms that cost a fraction of the multimillion-dollar price tag for building traditional restrooms. The modular bathrooms resemble curved newspaper kiosks, with slatted sides that are intended to provide needed privacy, but also enough sightlines to dissuade illicit behavior.

The New York City Department of Parks & Recreation says there will be one test toilet for each borough at a cost of $185,000 each. Five other “comfort stations” are also currently in the department’s construction pipeline. According to them, the new pilot is meant to “determine the feasibility of using this model in the future as an economical solution to building bathrooms in parks.”

The modular Portland Loo designs are a bit cheaper than the twenty JC Decaux-made facilities the city struggled to implement after signing a more expensive deal under the Bloomberg administration in 2006. Their presence, at a time when new chief public realm officer Ya-Ting Liu says she will move to make open streets and outdoor dining more permanent fixtures, is important also to the nearly 45,000 homeless people who live in the city.

If installed en masse, they'll join the new inventory of 5G towers cropping up around the city as the latest hallmarks of a changing streetscape remade by progressive d...

Marc Newson unveils the final Tokyo Toilet project design

2023-01-25T13:44:00-05:00

World-renowned Australian industrial designer Marc Newson has revealed his contribution to the Nippon Foundation’s ongoing The Tokyo Toilet public design project.

Located in the capital’s tourist-heavy Shibuya ward, the Urasando toilet completes the project’s offering of 17 facilities placed across the commercial district beginning in 2020.

Photo: Satoshi Nagare, courtesy of The Nippon Foundation

The design for the public restroom was inspired by elements central to vernacular Japanese architecture. Using a copper Minoko roof common to tea rooms, shrines, and other rural spaces, the concrete structure’s form engenders a “subconscious feeling of comfort and peacefulness” while providing users with an accessible facility whose material selection will, over time, help it blend into the urban fabric of the neighborhood.

Photo: Satoshi Nagare, courtesy of The Nippon Foundation

As Newson explains: “It is important to me that the Toilet feels trustworthy and honest inside and out: The bright...

San Francisco planning to build $1.7 million single-toilet public restroom

2022-10-31T11:49:00-04:00

A single-toilet public restroom planned for San Francisco’s Noe Valley Town Square is expected to take two years to build, but it’s already causing a stink. The reason: its $1.7 million price tag.

The proposed restroom would sit within a 150-square-foot enclosure within the town square, located in central San Francisco. While there are no designs for the project available, it is expected to be delivered by 2025. According to the city, the high price tag is meant to account for unexpected costs, including the rise of construction costs due to the pandemic, inflation, and global supply chain issues. This is in addition to being located in the most expensive city in the world to build in. As reported by the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco is also wary of costs from utility company PG&E, which owns the power lines used by the city’s public utility. The company has a history of stalling projects, forcing customers to buy specialized equipment to handle large amounts of electricity.

The project's massive cost and the lengthy timeline were met with outcry, which led California Assemblyman Matt Haney, who secured state funding for the project, to cancel a planned ceremony for the t...

New Yorkers can’t wait any longer for the installation of long-promised public toilets

2022-03-31T16:42:00-04:00

As public bathrooms continue to be one of the rarest commodities in the city, the Adams administration has not provided a timeline or any details for the installation of 15 automatic sidewalk toilets unused for more than a decade. But only five of the toilets have been installed and the city has struggled to find suitable new spots. For years, the others remained mothballed in a Queens warehouse but city officials declined to detail where they are currently located.

The toilets are a holdover of the Bloomberg administration, which signed a franchising agreement with Cemusa (later JC Decaux) in 2006 that was supposed to provide 20 such facilities at a cost of around $500,000 apiece. Recently, the city declared it will not force dining establishments to offer their restrooms to the public after an update to pertaining sections of its building code.

The issue has as much to do with providing what many recognize to be vital pieces of public infrastructure as it does with serving the city’s roughly 45,000-strong homeless population, which has been the target of recent Adams administration efforts to restore a sense of safety in the wake of an alarming two-year spike in crime. Critics, for their part, see it as part of a larger effort to “criminalize” homelessness, charging that the lack of facilities denies everyone a “basic human need.”

“It is not only a sanitation issue but also a public safety and civil rights issue,” Councilmember Sandy Nurse ...

Toyo Ito designs mushroom-shaped public toilets for Tokyo Toilet project

2021-07-29T19:34:00-04:00

Pritzker Prize-winning architect Toyo Ito has unveiled a public bathroom in the shape of three mushrooms as part of the Tokyo Toilet project.

Ito’s contribution is the 11th toilet to open out of the 17 spread and planned across Tokyo’s Shibuya district. The unique bathroom is located at the bottom of a staircase that leads to the Yoyogi Hachimangu shrine. The toilet is split into three cylindrical structures topped with domed roofs that create a form reminiscent of the mushrooms found in the forest surrounding the shrine.

The decision to create three separate buildings is also for the purpose of creating a space that has a high degree of security. The line of sight passes through the volumes, which makes the facility more inviting and calm. Replacing a pre-existing toilet, Ito’s project expands the space of each private room making them spacious enough to provide functions for elderly people and those with children. The functionalities are redistributed across both the men’s and w...

Japanese fashion designer Nigo creates house-shaped public toilet for Tokyo Toilet project

2021-07-16T12:22:00-04:00

Japanese fashion designer Nigo, the man behind the popular clothing brand, A Bathing Ape, has designed a public toilet that takes the shape of a small home as part of the Tokyo Toilet project.

The toilet is located in the Harajuku district within central Tokyo, which is the region of the city that Nigo is originally from. Modest and dainty, it was envisioned to starkly contrast the surrounding high-rise, urban environment.

“First and foremost, I thought about its accessibility and ease of use,” said Nigo. “In contrast to the ever-changing city of Tokyo with its sky-high buildings, I envisioned a toilet that feels like a good old home that stands quietly on a corner of Harajuku. The toilet may feel nostalgic to some and new to others, depending on their age and generation.”

The inspiration for the toilet’s design derives from the Washington Heights Dependent Housing complex, which was a large housing development built in the area by United States Armed Forces in 1946 following Worl...

Tadao Ando completes slick public restroom design for The Tokyo Toilet project

2020-09-14T13:51:00-04:00

THE TOKYO TOILET, an initiative launched by the non-profit The Nippon Foundation to create save, clean, and appealing public restrooms throughout Tokyo's Shibuya ward, just completed its latest facility: Jingu-Dori Park, designed by Pritzker Prize laureate Tadao Ando, features a simple, functional layout realized in the architect's trademark elegant and minimalist formal language.

Photo: Satoshi Nagare.

Five of the 17 planned restroom facilities, designed by Shigeru Ban, Fumihiko Maki, Masamichi Katayama/Wonderwall, and Nao Tamura, already opened to the public earlier this summer while more are expected to launch in 2021, including toilets created by Toyo Ito, Kengo Kuma, and Sou Fujimoto.

Photo: Satoshi Nagare.

"I sought for this small architecture to exceed the boundaries of a public toilet to become a 'place' in the urban landscape that provides immense public value," Tadao Ando describes his concept. "Using this clear and simple reasoning for the concept of this structure, I chose...

The Tokyo Toilet Project: Pritzker Prize winners Shigeru Ban, Tadao Ando, Toyo Ito, and Fumihiko Maki among designers of new public restrooms

2020-08-17T14:36:00-04:00

Noteworthy Japanese architects, and even some Pritzker Prize laureates, are among the creators of 17 innovative public restroom designs throughout the bustling Shibuya area of Tokyo. Launched by the non-profit The Nippon Foundation, THE TOKYO TOILET project hopes to create save, clean, and appealing facilities "to make them accessible for everyone regardless of gender, age, or disability, to demonstrate the possibilities of an inclusive society."

Five of the 17 planned facilities, envisioned by Shigeru Ban, Fumihiko Maki, Masamichi Katayama/Wonderwall, and Nao Tamura, have recently opened to the public while more are expected to launch later this year and in 2021.

The Tadao Ando-designed restroom is scheduled to open on September 7th. Toilets created by Toyo Ito, Kengo Kuma, and Sou Fujimoto will be available next year.

Take a look at the initiative's first five releases below.

Designer: Shigeru Ban

Project description: "There are two things we worry about when entering a public r...

COVID-19 should lead to lasting design code improvements of public bathrooms, experts say

2020-05-05T14:31:00-04:00

Public health experts, designers and architects say the Covid-19 pandemic has exposed fundamental flaws in the design of public toilets that risk spreading a second wave of coronavirus, and possibly even new pandemics. [...] Some of the suggested innovations include a greater uptake of sensor taps, fully self-cleaning cubicles, designing exits that don’t require human contact, and having bathroom attendants.

The Guardian laying out suggestions from health experts on how to improve hygiene standards in public restrooms, not only in light of the current pandemic but in preparation of the next one.

"We’ve almost got this little opportunity from the pandemic where people are going to listen and going to change," one respondent explained in the article. "What we do now to fix public bathrooms, people will actually follow."

The NYC Parks Department wants to shrink public bathrooms to cut costs

2019-11-15T11:15:00-05:00

The Parks Department is looking to curb the cost of constructing new public bathrooms — by making them smaller...the agency is exploring stand-alone units tested in other cities, such as the Portland Loo and trailer-like bathrooms in Boston.

Following a $4.7 million comfort station at Ferry Point Park West and the prospect of a $6 million bathroom for another park on Staten Island, Mayor Bill de Blaisio vowed to address the rising costs to taxpayers, reports THE CITY. Parks Commissioner Mitchell Silver has called the current phase an "exploration" to find "more inexpensive ways of building bathrooms."

This fun Instagram captures the quirky designs of Japan's public toilets

2018-06-19T15:34:00-04:00

Photogenic is probably not the first word that comes to mind upon hearing the phrase “public restroom”. But the Instagram account toilets_a_go_go by Tokyo-based photographer Hidefumi Nakamura proves that public toilets shouldn't have to look bland and gross.

Since starting the Instagram account last January, Nakamura has posted over 200 photos of quirky public toilets across Japan, and he describes the surroundings and unique design elements of each one in the captions. The idiosyncratic restrooms show off colorful art, sleek modernist forms, and tiled typographics, and a few are even shaped like storybook-themed tree stumps! Over time, he grew to appreciate the fun assortment of designs. “Perhaps because the architects can do it freely,” he tells CNN.

Photo via toilets_a_go_go/Instagram.

Photo via toilets...

m2.senos creates a public restroom coated in green ceramic tile for a cemetery in Portugal

2017-10-26T14:32:00-04:00

The very first public toilets were introduced in 1851 in London’s Crystal Palace. George Jennings, a Brighton plumber, installed what he referred to as 'Monkey Closets' in the Retiring Rooms of the glass-and-iron hall for the Great Exhibition, where over 827,280 visitors paid a pretty penny to receive a clean seat, a towel, a comb, and a shoe shine. After the success of Jennings' lavatory, public restrooms began to appear in the streets and are today ubiquitous despite becoming a political battleground for civil rights, and facing persecution all over America, and beyond.

One might not naturally think of the restroom as a central design element, but the humble bathroom has been shaping the spaces we occupy since Jennings' Hyde Park innovation. For instance, toilets are one of the first elements drawn in the plans for high-rise buildings before tenant's needs are worked out. Beyond the functional, restrooms can be quite beautiful as well from the resid...

Next time you need to go in Minturn, Colorado, visit America's Best Public Restroom

2015-11-17T13:15:00-05:00

But this year’s champion bathroom, crowned by voters on Cintas’ website, is not nestled inside some upscale restaurant in a major city. It’s a public restroom in Minturn, Colorado. A collaboration between the town of Minturn, LaN Architecture’s Monika Wittig, LGM 3d Studios, and Noble Welding, the restrooms are meant to resemble a passageway into a Rocky Mountain mine. “The town rallied together and showed the value of a restroom that’s creative and memorable for guests,” [...].

From the America's Best Restroom Contest website:

Founded in 1904, Minturn is rich in mining history and its new public restrooms reflect its past. The unique digitally fabricated shape of the men’s and women’s restrooms resemble an adit (horizontal passage way) into a Rocky Mountain mine. The concept is the product of several key players: the Town of Minturn, LaN Architecture - Monika Wittig, LGM 3d Studios and Noble Welding. The team came together to produce “functional art” that’s already captured community attention! “Our public restrooms prove how great it is to combine art, architecture and creativity. It changes moods, places and people,” said Janet Hawkinson, director of design and construction for the public restroom project. “It would be the best to win the contest and show the country what can be accomplished when everyone works together to create something truly memorable, as we did in small town Minturn!”

Related on Archinect:

For those with discriminating taste, a competi...

"Toilet Talk" – gender inclusivity in public restrooms, featuring special guest Susan Surface, on Archinect Sessions #42

2015-11-12T15:43:00-05:00

Special guest Susan Surface, former Archinect editor now at Design in Public, joins us on Archinect Sessions to talk about recent developments in the state of gender inclusive design – specifically, in public restrooms.

As the binary model of gender begins to slowly dissolve in the popular consciousness, in favor of a spectrum of different identifications, international building codes still often mandate restrooms (even single-occupancy ones) as strictly for either male or female. Those who do not identify as either face a difficult choice at best, and often harassment or exclusion. Various institutions are experimenting with more gender-inclusive designs and designations, but not without controversy. Advocates liken the advent of all-gender inclusive bathrooms to a civil right, akin to policies that guarantee equal access regardless of ethnicity or physical ability.

Surface, who has addressed more gender-inclusive amendments to building standards before, joins us to discuss the ways ...

Toilets for everyone: the politics of inclusive design

2015-11-05T13:31:00-05:00

With the issues of serving openly in the military and same-sex marriage now largely resolved, the fight for all-gender restrooms has emerged as the latest civil rights issue in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (L.G.B.T.) community — particularly the “T” part. Schools and universities (...), museums (...), restaurants (...) and even the White House (...) are recasting the traditional men’s/women’s room, resulting in a dizzying range of (often creative) signage and vocabulary.

For those with discriminating taste, a competition for the best public restroom in the U.S.

2015-09-21T20:00:00-04:00

“An out-of-the-ordinary restroom is very telling about the business itself,” said John Engel, spokesman for restroom cleaning and supply company Cintas, which runs the competition. “If they pay that kind of attention to their restroom experience you can bet the overall experience will be phenomenal too.”