Cumulus is an urban strategy that conceives public spaces as related to the environmental dynamics of northern living. The proposal for a mixed-used development (re)binds the different social spheres, programmes and scales of an existing 70ties development and a new urban centre through a concept of water cycling and seasonal expansion and contraction.

An important local environmental force - rain - collected on roofs and facades of the inserted dwelling towers is stored to reflect light and skies into the apartments; it is partially used in communal laundries and finally released at a social event in nearing winter to flood the public in-between spaces of the development: Congealing it expands the central indoor ice skating ring into an open air skating surface. While this temporal icy plane serves encounters of existing as well as incoming communities, spring will drain the waters to bordering allotment ecologies.
Nothing new? Yet, Cumulus promotes a synthetic approach to environmental flows and urban inhabitation enhancing each other and triggering an architectural typology of its own.
 

Project Team: SMAQ: Sabine Müller, Andreas Quednau, Robert Gorny, Felipe Flores, Silvia Izquierdo, Martino Sacchi
Client: City of Oslo
Program: 195 apartments, 14.370 m2 retail and public program, 10.450 m2 offices, 8.500 m2 cultural and social facilities, 19.200 m2 underground parking
Awards: 1st Prize Europan 9 Competition