The Antepavilion program, a joint venture between the Architecture Foundation and the Arthouse Foundation, launched an international competition to design a £25,000 pop-up rooftop at Columbia and Brunswick Wharf in Hackney, north-east London. The goal was to invite architects, artists and designer to explore innovative ways of living within the city while engaging with issues of sustainability. After shortlisting five designs, PUP Architects—a London-based studio—was selected for their duct-shaped pavilion.
Called the H-VAC, the structure is built of a timber frame, cladded in shingles made from peach iced-tea Tetra Pak cartons. The design playfully subverts planning legislation by disguising the dwelling as air conditioning equipment. Their design exploits loopholes for mechanical rooftop equipment that does not require planning permission due to relaxed permitted developments rights. The firm stated that "while permitted development exists for large scale infrastructural roof installations, little challenge has been made for other viable and productive uses for rooftops. By subverting the form of the permitted and giving it a non-standard use, we hope to bring into question this order of priorities."
The project has been sponsored by the property developer Shiva, whom has had issues acquiring planning permissions in the past and wanted to call attention to the way in which the UK's planning system often feels 'gamed.' Russell Gray, director of Shiva Ltd. said "we are delighted to sponsor an initiative to encourage young and emerging architects, designers and artists with an appetite for hands-on construction, freed of the oppressive web of aesthetic, regulatory and commercial constraints that govern most urban construction projects."
6 Comments
I LOVE THIS SO MUCH!
So incredibly smart.
I did a paneling like this for my final project before graduation. Professors hated it. Wasn't "dynamic" enough. Oh well.
Depends how and why you apply it I guess, oh well chin up!
Oh I didn't care in the least of their opinions. I believed that what I did was the correct path with what I wanted to get across.
See also the Louisville Slugger Museum, where that huge bat isn't a "sign" per ordinance, it's a protective wrap on a plumbing vent stack. Really.
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