Archinect - News

Kengo Kuma hopes to 'blur the line' between outdoor activity and office work in San Jose

2022-05-12T13:45:00-04:00

Kengo Kuma and Associates has unveiled plans for a new biophilia-laden office complex in downtown San Jose, California.

Under the monicker “Park Habitat,” the massive new 1.3-million-square-foot development offers 20 stories of office and retail spaces which are beset by a network of internal and external parks and gardens.

In a new manifesto published by the group Westbank Campus, the international development group’s founder Ian Gillespie outlined his reasoning for choosing the influential Japanese architect for a design whose scope purportedly entails a focus on user wellness and local environment.

Previously on Archinect: BIG, Kengo Kuma, and Studio Gang tapped for Westbank's San Jose masterplan

“I chose Kengo for a very deliberate reason: Kuma-San has risen to the pinnacle of his profession by blurring the lines between nature and the built environment. His practice is dedicated to making buildings less definitive or solid and more ephemeral. In essence, creating a particular co...

BIG, Kengo Kuma, and Studio Gang tapped for Westbank's San Jose masterplan

2021-05-06T11:42:00-04:00

Vancouver-based developer Westbank has unveiled plans for a collection of mixed-use projects in downtown San Jose, California. The development will feature six new or renovated buildings by leading architects including Kengo Kuma and Associates, Bjarke Ingels Group, Studio Gang, James K.M. Cheng Architects, and WRNS Studio. The buildings within the Silicon Valley initiative will combine to deliver 700 new residences and 5 million square feet of workspace, in what Westbank sees as an effort to “inspire the next generation of innovators by creating a healthier, more beautiful community.”

While blending a variety of architectural forms, the six projects are linked by an effort to respond to the climate crisis, with each building targeting deep carbon reductions for both operational and embodied carbon. “What we are proposing is a collection of net zero life cycle carbon buildings adjacent to inspiring residential,” says Westbank. “We propose workspace that merges nature and office spac...

Construction gets underway at BIG's KING Toronto development

2020-06-30T18:19:00-04:00

The earliest stages of construction are unfolding for what is sure to become a prominent landmark on Toronto's King Street West. As demolition of some parts of the existing buildings on the site continues, the arrival of shoring rigs is marking the start of construction for Westbank Corp and Allied Properties REIT's KING Toronto, a 16-storey mountain range-shaped luxury condominium complex from acclaimed Danish architects Bjarke Ingels Group and Toronto based Diamond Schmitt Architects.

Following months of extensive demolition work, the site has been mostly cleared for what is shaping up to become a major urban redevelopment on Toronto's King Street West, reports Urban Toronto.

North elevation from King Street W. All renderings via the project's website.

West entrance into the courtyard

Courtyard looking east

Dubbed KING Toronto, the Bjarke Ingels Group-designed, Westbank/Allied-funded condo and mixed-use building was first proposed in 2016 and eventually won the city's approval in 2018.

Completion of the 16-story complex is scheduled for 2022.

Construction underway at KING Toronto, a 16-storey mountain range-shaped luxury condominium complex from acclaimed Danish architects Bjarke Ingels Group. #KINGToronto #architecture #toronto https://t.co/HPJikot0Js pic.twitter.com/5Gm9PBj3fF
— Westbank (@westbankcorp) June 30, 2020

The Bjarke Ingels-designed 2016 Serpentine Pavilion makes an appearance in Toronto before traveling further

2018-10-17T18:01:00-04:00

[...] the 2016 Unzipped pavilion by the Danish architect Bjarke Ingels was acquired by a wealthy collector: the Canadian developer Ian Gillespie, whose company Westbank was a sponsor of the London presentation. Last month, the shape-shifting 14-metre-high, 27-metre-long installation made the move to inner city Toronto, where it was unveiled on the site of the architect’s next commission for Westbank, a massively ambitious housing complex on King Street West.

Another member of the growing family of the Serpentine Galleries' annual summer pavilions has found a new home: the Bjarke Ingels-designed Unzipped pavilion — famously praised by The Guardian's architecture critic Oliver Wainwright as "possibly the Serpentine’s most impressive pavilion yet" when it opened in June 2016 — was recently unveiled to the public on a site in Toronto where BIG's mountain-shaped King Street condo building will rise soon.

View this post on Instagram Open till midnight tonight with live music. . . . . #unzippedtoronto #nbTO18 #architecture #toronto #exhibition #design
A post shared by Westbank (@westbankcorp) on Sep 29, 2018 at 9:48am PDT

The pavilion won't stick around for too long though and is scheduled to travel to other international cities before reaching its final, permanent site in Vancouver.

A rendering of the pavilion's final destination in Vancouver. Credit: Westbank.

Earlier this month, it was reported that the 2018 Serpentine Pav...

BIG's “experimental” Westbank residential project now approved for Toronto's historic King Street

2018-09-13T17:25:00-04:00

After 2½ years of negotiations, the condo project Westbank King Street has been approved and is about to start sales. [...] The new condo will be hard to miss. It could be the strangest residential building ever constructed in Canada. Certainly, it will set an interesting example for new housing. While new condos and apartments are often faulted for being soulless, this promises to be a carefully detailed building, a distinctive place, and a village that contributes to the larger city.

First proposed in 2016, BIG's Westbank King Street condo building in Toronto has been approved for development. With its "mountainous" forms and Habitat 67-inspired stacked design, the glass building is being described as a radical and experimental addition for richly historic King Street, a major thoroughfare in the city.

“How will this model – of intimacy and spatial complexity and surprising juxtapositions – work in an old part of a North American city? Mr. Ingels is optimistic,” writes Alex Bozikovic, architecture critic of The Globe and Mail, in the article.

A glimpse of Ian Gillespie's “Fight for Beauty” pop-up exhibition in Vancouver

2017-10-30T17:40:00-04:00

The exhibition “Fight for Beauty” is a physical manifestation of the book of the same name by Westbank founder Ian Gillespie, who Archinect previously interviewed here. Currently displayed near Vancouver's Fairmont Pacific Rim, the pop-up exhibition — just like the book — celebrates Westbank's evolution into a culture company.

Photo credit: Ema Peter.

Curated by Gillespie, the exhibition pays tribute to Westbank's many creative collaborations. Upon entering the magenta graffiti pavilion, visitors first encounter the poem Fight for Beauty written in neon. The self-guided exhibition features works like an expanded version of Omer Arbel's iconic sculptural glass forest “16.480”, a custom-made “Butterfly Fazioli” piano designed by the late architect Bing Thom, and architectural models like Kengo Kuma's Alberni, the Bjarke Ingels-designed Vancouver house and 2016 Serpentine Pavilion.

Photo credit: Ema Peter

Photo credit: Ema Peter.

Other pieces include vintage couture by Yves Saint Laurent a...

Westbank purchases BIG's Serpentine Pavilion, plans to move it to Vancouver

2017-04-03T17:11:00-04:00

The Canadian luxury residential and mixed-use real estate development company Westbank has announced the purchase of the Serpentine Pavilion designed by BIG last year. Part of the annual Serpentine Pavilion commission, BIG’s “unzipped wall” involved modular, glass fiber rectangular forms stacked into an undulating form.

According to an announcement, Westbank plans to display the BIG pavilion for periods of time in both New York and Toronto before finally installing it permanently in Vancouver. Westbank had also sponsored the pavilion when it was sited in Hyde Park.

“Westbank has a well established and growing relationship Bjarke and his team at BIG,” states Ian Gillespie, the founder of Westbank. “Purchasing the Pavilion was a very natural extension of that partnership and we want to give Bjarke’s creation the most interesting afterlife of any of the previous pavilions.”