The home is a unique residential building displaying a contemporary architecture enhanced by its position. Nestled between natural landscape elements like the mountain that led to its shape and size and the forested land surrounding it, the modern home is a fortress-like construction offering a comfortable lifestyle despite the harsh conditions.

Located near Kelowna, BC, Canada, the residence that received its name from the neighboring city displays a massive brick wall supporting the interior spaces. Overlooking Okanagan Lake, the modern and imposing residence gathers views from many vantage points, both interior and exterior. Wood columns on the upper terrace support large overhangs and add an interesting character to the upper floor pavilion containing the social and entertaining areas, as well as the master bedroom. An infinity pool completes the luxurious features of this home.

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Of course if you enjoyed the Kelowna House, you can share this article with your friends on facebook or twitter, and we’ll appreciate it.

Here’s a brief description from the architects if the curiosity kills you:

Magnificent views towards the city from atop Siglap Hill inspired the design. Master and family room are placed on the third level having the best views.

Living and Dining on the second level, connected with external verandahs / terraces that flow upwards and fold into the roof form with deep overhangs for sufficient shade and channeling the breeze through the whole house.

Two resort style ‘Cabana’ bedrooms are located on the ground level by the pool with a large open/covered terrace for poolside parties. A sculptural metal ‘drum’ anchors the ‘ship’ to the ground and houses the toilet/shower and barbeque pantry.

Roof gardens and timber decks provide added insulation from the sun.

Learn more at the Aamer Architects site – here.
Photography by Patrick Bingham – Hall

Domplatz Linz – project description from the architects

The impressive neo-gothic Mariendom cathedral of Linz is clearly opposed by the unfinished Domplatz square, that had never been completed in accordance to the original idea to free up the entire quadrangle between the surrounding streets. This heterogeneous situation was unsatisfactory from the point of view of urban planning and was to be resolved by means of a competition, which also included the construction of a hotel and an underground car park as well as the revitalization of two existing baroque buildings.

By including the surrounding streets and by means of the solitary positioning of the new hotel a link to the heart of the city is created – a place at the square.

The new hotel is a confident, sculptural solitary building, on the one hand reacting to the arrangement and vertical extent of neighboring buildings and, on the other, offering a response to the simultaneously delicate and dominant structure of the cathedral.

Prizes and nomination for this project:

Prize: Clients’ Award 2009
Prize: Architectural award “vis à vis – exemplary buildings for culture, tourism, sports” 2009

Prize: regional prize for art of the federal state of Upper Austria:  “Hotel am Domplatz” in Linz was awarded the distinction “building of the year”

Nomination: Mies van der Rohe Award – European Union Prize 2011

More to come soon

Studio Aiko was founded by Yair Alony and Meny Hilsenrad in 2005, and is a young & dynamic studio, specializing in a wide variety of CG content and visual effects.

Enough talk, check the videos and share your thoughts:

Check out the official website studio-aiko.com

Enjoy!

SAU – Semana de Arquitetura e Urbanismo

Arquitetura na Cidade

Architectural Spaces

Ateliér 3

goeast

Frine Wence Arquitectura

Archetype

Gianni Baretti Architects

Logo Revista Urbana

Arquides

Geco arquitectos asociados

Roof

Rodriguez-Frank arquitectos

CoMo Arquitetura

Mayara

Matrix Architecture

B Arquitectura

This museum created by the french architect JeanNouvel, displays some of the best art on planet Earth, and has exhibits of both contemporary and international artists. It contains over one thousand works by three hundred different artists.

Structure: BMW Welt, Munich
Architect: COOP Himmelblau
Year Finished: 2007

This building was designed to present some of the best cars in the world – the BMW. And was built for the customer experience in mind. The thinking was that one of the best car brands in the world deserves one of the best buildings – and it worked.

Structure: Addition to the Nelson-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, Missouri
Architect: Steven Holl
Year Finished: 2007

This museum was built on classical principals and is known for its extensive collection of Asian art. Time magazine listed it as #1 on the list “The 10 Best (New and Upcoming) Architectural Marvels” in 2007.

Structure: Cooper Union building, New York
Architect: Thom Mayne (Morphosis)
Year Finished: 2009

This curvy and “sexy” (as called by Time Magazine) is a school. Could you imagine going to school in a building like this? Everyday would be like a crazy tour of spectacular genius in architecture.

Structure: Parc de la Villette, Paris
Architect: Bernard Tschumi
Finished: 1987

Another great design in architecture from Paris. This one is a playground. An estimated 10 million people visit the park each year to take part in an array of cultural activities. This is a pretty good way to let your kids let go of some energy – don’t you think?

Structure: Yokohama Port Terminal, Japan
Architect: Foreign Office Architects
Year Finished: 2002

This was a project to “dream of.” It is looked at as “simplicity” but is far from that. Its shape is very irregular and the fluid and uninterrupted lines are folded like an origami into an unique structural system that allows its boarding level to connect to the city’s underground level – very cool.

Structure: Saint-Pierre church, Firminy, France
Architect: Le Corbusier
Year Finished: 2006 (from a design by Le Corbusier, who died in 1965)

This design was stalled for many years. It served many purposes – it was a secondary school, a shelter, and a Church. The construction began in 1971, and wasn’t even finished until 2006. Over 30 years of greatness in the making!

Article written by Laura. By day, Laura works for the Movebuilder.com

1. Restructuring the Existing Centre

The layout of the store was not intuitive. Walkways were complex and confusing, and it was difficult to navigate. To improve this, the layout of the indoor levels (G, 1st, 2nd, and 5th) has been entirely re-designed and smaller retail spaces have been added. The key to designing the individual levels was to think “empty” in order to enable the future implementation of an improved orientation system. The preconditions for this complex undertaking were:

- For each rental space, a newer space of equal size but higher quality had to be provided.
- Each tenant had to be relocated twice during the construction time.
- The ongoing daily shopping activity should be only minimally disturbed.

2. Create a new Centre!

To this end, the atrium, with its escalator network, took centre stage. The atrium serves as the nucleus and has
become the store’s central orientation point.

3. The Atrium: a sweeping upward perspective

The atrium, which unites the horizontal and vertical visual axes, has becomes the store’s new nucleus and
central orientation point. The ceilings of the individual levels are rounded and “rolled” upwards. In this way, the atrium expands up towards the retail levels, appearing larger and more open than the atrium in its previous incarnation. The atrium and retail areas seem to melt together, bringing the individual levels into a mutual dialogue and making the store into a special continuum.

This effect is supported by the lighting and materials strategy:

Both the materials and the manner of material transitions within the individual levels are also present in the
atrium (large perforated metal areas appear as if emerging from a white foundation). The light fixtures, placed
freely on the ceilings of each level, cover the rounded bends of the atrium and the escalators, until they are
transformed into light points vertically set in the perpendicular cladding of the central room.
Overall, the atrium appears light and dynamic – the relatively short individual storeys now appear lofty.

4. The Interior

The retail areas of the new store are distributed like ice floes on each story. These floes are marked by a change
in floor covering and ceiling material, thereby forming a star-shaped pattern of paths on both the ceiling and the
floor.

In this way, the materials on the floor and ceiling facilitate orientation within the building. Paths and retail areas
are explicitly marked and visible from afar:

Large perforated metal areas in the ceiling demarcate the retail areas. These areas form a multifunctional, highly
flexible ceiling system and house the primary technical installations, security technology and product lighting. In contrast, the network of paths is mirrored with a high-quality plasterboard ceiling. Both ceiling concepts flow in rounded edges up over the entire atrium. Together with the escalator panelling, this creates a unified effect that stretches across the entire interior of the Gerngross department store. The interior is then expanded through
resting station, sitting lounges and temporary displays.

5. The Gerngross Facade

The facade of the new building forms the logical continuation of the interior: the ice-floe theme of the interior
space continues on the new facade. To this end, large-scale, amorphous colour fields were applied. Leaving some space in between, an ornamentaly designed, semi-transparent white area was then attached. Together, these layers form a conglomerate of light and colour. In the evening, this effect is reinforced by a lighting concept between the two layers of the facade.

A large-scale white frame also emphasizes some areas of the facade (e.g. main entrance, bay), thereby showing
them off to their best possible advantage. Due to the large scale of the facade, the entire building is harmonized, and the true size of the building is emphasized. Advertising media, such as logos and slide-in plates, have been aggregated and drastically reduced as compared to their former state.

The ornamental pattern was designed to ensure a continuous view from the building into the street space (50%
free cross-section). Furthermore, the entire facade was thermally re-engineered and technically modernized, so
the ornamental pattern functions simultaneously as sun protection.

6. The “Tilting Effect”

Depending on where they stand, viewers perceive the facade differently:

From a level viewing angle, it appears more like a white-ornamental field. As the viewing angle gets steeper, the
background colour of the house comes more strongly into focus. This creates a tilting effect, which follows the passers-by.

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Architect: Hossein Abbasi
Location : Pasdaran, Tehran, Iran
sheet Design : Vahid Rafie nia
Date: 2010
Site Area: 14000 m2
Project Area: 6150 m2

The training center was designed in Iran and Tehran,  website is located on the Pasdaran  street, with temperate climates. Height difference of 14 meters from north and about 12% of the slopes from north to south. Niavaran Park  is located in the north part of this series.

Ground floor plan spaces are: Chamber President, Assistant, Secretariat, coffee shop, exhibitions and … these spaces are located based on physical relationships

Spaces on the first floor plan include: office space, Amphitheater, Library and Documentation Center and lockers these spaces are located based on physical relationships

Second floor spaces in the plan include:  computer site  workshops training, theory classes , audiovisual room, training group ,a room and Scientific Association of Teachers based on physical relationships.

Spaces on the third floor plan include: workshops and classes according to the theory of physical relationships

it is tried in this project using the maximum ground ramp
Building begins the zero point of the ground slop  and finally like the site at the north reaches its  maximum height and  climax.

There is a short two minutes video of the building that you can see on our Facebook Page.

As usual if you welcome this initiative, please leave a comment and share this article on facebook or twitter.

In the past, the school has welcomed students from around the world, giving them a richer perspective on Italian architecture. Last year, the course attracted students from five different continents, all with the common interest of learning about Italian history. This is not surprising though as the course is specially made for students with strong interest in art, interior design, architecture and Italian ingenuity.

Architecture Course Background

To give more background, the Architecture course, to be lead for the 3rd consecutive year by Prof. Karin Templin, will feature a mixture of traditional and modern analytical approaches as well as a general overview of the Italian architectural history. Students of this course will be exploring the different Florentine architectural masterpieces like the Palazzo Rucellai, Palazzo Strozzi and Santa Maria Novella, to name a few. But among the course highlights are privileged tours of Santa Maria del Fiore which is considered in part to be one of the masterpieces of Italian architect Filippo Brunelleschi. The tours will also cover the Mannerist style Laurentian Library, and the Medici Chapel, which are all creations of the late great Michelangelo, in addition to the famous Palazzo Medici built between 1445 and 1460 (cited as the first Renaissance Palazzo).

If you want to learn about architecture, do it here

Indeed, there is no better place to learn about architecture than in Italy. Overwhelmed by rolling hills and picturesque landscapes, Italy – most especially Florence – is undeniably one of the most beautiful places on earth. As such, it not only serves as an inspiration to artists but also a nurturing habitat for innovators and innovations. Being in Florence, the school envisions their students to be surrounded by the best of what art and architecture has to offer.

Now apart from the Architecture course, Florence Institute of Design International will also be providing summer classes on Furniture Design and Graphic Design.

To get more information about the Florence Institute of Design International, visit http://www.florence-institute.com/

So here are some insights on the project. You will find more on every image.

Architects: Vahid   Rafie nia
Location: Pasdaran, Tehran, Iran
Date: 2011,january
Materials: Concrete, Glass, steel
Site Area: 12800 m2
Project Area: 5400 m2

Vahid even made a video of the building. You can check it on Archtopia’s facebook page.

If you welcome this initiative, please leave a comment and share this post on facebook or twitter with you friends and colleagues.