Since final crit is over and things are coolin' down I figured i'd throw another hot piece in ya'lls direction. Witness exhibt A, a firestation in Mexico City by at. 103 arquitectos that, in my humble opinion, is actually pretty sweet.
From worldarchitecturenews.com
Due to the site’s conditions the fire station has a space meant for the general public. The chosen project for the station presents itself to the exterior like a simple elevated box that almost disappears behind a façade that appropriates it’s context in a game of reflections, floating over the maneuver and tank-truck area, this last one extends towards the street or incorporates the urban space while generating it throughout the analyses of the truck movements. Inside the chromed box, both uses alternate and complement each other, organizing themselves through planes with perforations that vary in size providing light sources as well as communication between floor levels, as well as the classic steel tubes where the firemen slide down during an emergency. That way, making them share space thanks to the crossed sights in the patios, but without mixing them, the proposed solution achieves to intertwine both uses – the station and the so called, curiously, bomberoteca (library for fire men)—also connecting them, thanks to the height of the first level, to the street and whatever happens there. Once built the fire station, and emergency call will come and you can watch with delight the complete and complex performance of this urban piece that takes the most needed urban equipment as a reflection and architectural action theme.
To me it seems like a bit of a rehash of 60's modernism, especially in its exterior, and i can't help but feel reminded of that latin american heavyweight Oscar Niemeyer. I think that brand of modernism though has a permanence in Latin America, whereas in the rest of the world these kinds of buildings with their monolithic exteriors seem less elegant than they do down south. I love the way they float the mass and then play the red off against the white and i especially like the interior with its massive red glass object and rich materials palette.
i like Kalach, i think he's very intelligent in terms of urban terms, its a shame he blames everything which is wrong in his buildings to the poor quality of construction of the contractors, specially ICA, he has something for them.... TEN...mmmhh i dunno, and Fernando Romero no please!!!, at.103 (Julio Amezcua and Francisco Pardo) did this fire station w/Bernardo Gomez-Pimienta who is actually the ex partner of Enrique Norten in TEN, and mastermind of most of his buildings and projects already recognized, including, habita hotel and the new library for brooklyn in NY, Amezcua and Pardo are actually former workers of TEN as also couple of young architects who emerged from TEN (Gerardo Recoder, Hugo Sanchez, etc), so them joined with a couple of guys who started on their own (Rojkind, Dellekamp, Central Arquitectura, Sanchez+Higuera, etc), will or actually already make the new generation of young mexican architects, which i must say is sad to see some havent develop a better or richer language than their predecesors (like Sanchez+Higuera and CENTRAL Arquitectura who i think they dont contribute in anything but in the bussiness model of the profession), lets see how this whole story develops....
by the way funny this generation started so young that some of the young ppl who started also working in their studios now is also catching up quickly, like PRODUCTORA who is one of the participants of Architectural League's Young Architects Forum 07, and it was formed by people who worked in the beginings of offices like Michel Rojkind and fernando Romero
its funny when i was an undergrad in indianastan studying art history i discovered the work of luis barragan when i went out to neuvo mexico to study architecture each student did a slide presentation on architecture they liked. i did one on barragan and naively mentioned some connection between the mass found in his work and the mass of new mexican architecture. the prof had a cow and went off about how they had nothing in common etc. of course the hottest architecture project in santa fe is leggorettas zocolo which is a total rip off of barragan.
ha ha, yeah, i agree. legorreta is a barragan rip-off! i mean, some of his houses are kind of "nice." but overall, his stuff doesn't really do it for me the way barragan's stuff does.
ew, I had to go to that horrid Pritzker prize website, but those projects of Barrigan's were really something. Its amazing what you can do with some simple edge conditions, masses and colors.
Vado + Cris ur close to the truth, i cannot say Legorreta is a complete rip-off of Barragan, but for sure he takes advantage of the language that Barragan proposed, in fact (history repeating) Legorreta was once also a young architect who went into Jose Villagran's (partner of Barragan for some years) office and became a partner in the office, so im sure Legorreta despite the whole rip-off of the language of Barragan he learned also a lot about the massive volumes at Villagran's office.... internal info, another person (between the very many) who spends always long seasons studying and working in the actual house of barragan and his studio (across the street from Barragan's house) is Tadao Ando who is a devoted fan of Barragan's architecture....
The 60's ain't dead yet, they just went south: Modernism in Mexico
Apu's architecture discourses, part 3.
Since final crit is over and things are coolin' down I figured i'd throw another hot piece in ya'lls direction. Witness exhibt A, a firestation in Mexico City by at. 103 arquitectos that, in my humble opinion, is actually pretty sweet.
From worldarchitecturenews.com
Due to the site’s conditions the fire station has a space meant for the general public. The chosen project for the station presents itself to the exterior like a simple elevated box that almost disappears behind a façade that appropriates it’s context in a game of reflections, floating over the maneuver and tank-truck area, this last one extends towards the street or incorporates the urban space while generating it throughout the analyses of the truck movements. Inside the chromed box, both uses alternate and complement each other, organizing themselves through planes with perforations that vary in size providing light sources as well as communication between floor levels, as well as the classic steel tubes where the firemen slide down during an emergency. That way, making them share space thanks to the crossed sights in the patios, but without mixing them, the proposed solution achieves to intertwine both uses – the station and the so called, curiously, bomberoteca (library for fire men)—also connecting them, thanks to the height of the first level, to the street and whatever happens there. Once built the fire station, and emergency call will come and you can watch with delight the complete and complex performance of this urban piece that takes the most needed urban equipment as a reflection and architectural action theme.
To me it seems like a bit of a rehash of 60's modernism, especially in its exterior, and i can't help but feel reminded of that latin american heavyweight Oscar Niemeyer. I think that brand of modernism though has a permanence in Latin America, whereas in the rest of the world these kinds of buildings with their monolithic exteriors seem less elegant than they do down south. I love the way they float the mass and then play the red off against the white and i especially like the interior with its massive red glass object and rich materials palette.
humm. what was it again?
ehhhh... i like the facade, but the rest seems kind of busy for me.
i like these guys much better:
alberto kalach
ten arquitectos
fernando romero
I too like Ten Arquitectos, and that Fernando Romero apartment complex is quite cool.
oh, and it was a fire station orhan
wow....who cleaned up the thread?
*he's watching*
Romero!
i like Kalach, i think he's very intelligent in terms of urban terms, its a shame he blames everything which is wrong in his buildings to the poor quality of construction of the contractors, specially ICA, he has something for them.... TEN...mmmhh i dunno, and Fernando Romero no please!!!, at.103 (Julio Amezcua and Francisco Pardo) did this fire station w/Bernardo Gomez-Pimienta who is actually the ex partner of Enrique Norten in TEN, and mastermind of most of his buildings and projects already recognized, including, habita hotel and the new library for brooklyn in NY, Amezcua and Pardo are actually former workers of TEN as also couple of young architects who emerged from TEN (Gerardo Recoder, Hugo Sanchez, etc), so them joined with a couple of guys who started on their own (Rojkind, Dellekamp, Central Arquitectura, Sanchez+Higuera, etc), will or actually already make the new generation of young mexican architects, which i must say is sad to see some havent develop a better or richer language than their predecesors (like Sanchez+Higuera and CENTRAL Arquitectura who i think they dont contribute in anything but in the bussiness model of the profession), lets see how this whole story develops....
by the way funny this generation started so young that some of the young ppl who started also working in their studios now is also catching up quickly, like PRODUCTORA who is one of the participants of Architectural League's Young Architects Forum 07, and it was formed by people who worked in the beginings of offices like Michel Rojkind and fernando Romero
oh, one link more to make justice: http://www.kalach.com/
yeah fernandito has conections, be carefull
woot! they cleaned my thread!
OG's representin', biatches!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
yeeeaaaahhhh, mdler knows what's up.
luis barragan, one of my all time favorites.
its funny when i was an undergrad in indianastan studying art history i discovered the work of luis barragan when i went out to neuvo mexico to study architecture each student did a slide presentation on architecture they liked. i did one on barragan and naively mentioned some connection between the mass found in his work and the mass of new mexican architecture. the prof had a cow and went off about how they had nothing in common etc. of course the hottest architecture project in santa fe is leggorettas zocolo which is a total rip off of barragan.
ha ha, yeah, i agree. legorreta is a barragan rip-off! i mean, some of his houses are kind of "nice." but overall, his stuff doesn't really do it for me the way barragan's stuff does.
ew, I had to go to that horrid Pritzker prize website, but those projects of Barrigan's were really something. Its amazing what you can do with some simple edge conditions, masses and colors.
Vado + Cris ur close to the truth, i cannot say Legorreta is a complete rip-off of Barragan, but for sure he takes advantage of the language that Barragan proposed, in fact (history repeating) Legorreta was once also a young architect who went into Jose Villagran's (partner of Barragan for some years) office and became a partner in the office, so im sure Legorreta despite the whole rip-off of the language of Barragan he learned also a lot about the massive volumes at Villagran's office.... internal info, another person (between the very many) who spends always long seasons studying and working in the actual house of barragan and his studio (across the street from Barragan's house) is Tadao Ando who is a devoted fan of Barragan's architecture....
even though Legorreta is a Barragan rip off, there are worse people to be ripping off...
oh yea, of course mdler knows whats up...
yes, tadao wrote one of the intros to the book that was published for that big exhibit on barragan's work several years ago.
love his stuff too. like barragan, ando knows how to use light.
why does every architect have to do 'the wall which become floor then roof then wall again' once in his/her life?
referring to the apartment complex for artists thing
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