Concrete colonnade wraps 54-metre-long house in Bolivia

A slender, lush garden is hidden behind the walls of this long concrete house in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, designed by local firm Sommet.

The architectural design studio completed Casa 54 in a gated community in the city with a simple form: a 54-metre-long (177-foot-long) one-storey volume.

It is constructed predominantly from concrete, including the elevated platform, roof and rectangular columns that run around the perimeter.

"In this house, we tried to use long-lasting natural materials that reveal the construction method in the house's aesthetics," Sommet co-founder Sebastián Fernández de Córdova told Dezeen.

"Concrete is the main material of the house," he added. "It is both the structure and the finishes.

"Therefore, we can say that in this house the construction method is revealed in its final image from the beginning, leaving no room for mistakes during the construction process."

A concrete wall runs behind the columns at the front of the property to shield a long and slender interior garden behind.

The form of the columns is also mirrored by a concrete pergola that allows natural light into the green space.

At the rear of the house, meanwhile, glazed walls are slightly indented to create a covered corridor that opens out to the back garden, where there is a pool and deck.

The rear glazing runs along the bedrooms, living room, and the kitchen and dining room. It also wraps behind an outdoor, covered dining area that is slotted in between the kitchen and the lounge.

"We used floor to roof windows in order to blur the boundary between interior and exterior spaces," Fernández de Córdova added.

"Being able to integrate the inside and the outside visually and physically was a key aspect on the design concept of the house."

Inside, the studio chose a simple palette to complement the exposed concrete. Marble floors run throughout while warmth is provided by dark wood that forms a bookshelf in the lounge, slatted walls in the bedrooms and a wall along the garden.

"Wood is used on the interior along the main corridor by the interior garden," the architect said.

"It not only gives a warmer atmosphere, but also casts the shades created by the concrete pergola," he added.

Other recently completed concrete houses include a residence just outside of Buenos Aires that contrasts the material with charred wood and a weekend retreat in Chile with a wavy concrete roof.

Photography is by Cristóbal Palma.

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Evoking West-African Masks, Faces Emerge from Cast-Iron Skillets by Artist Hugh Hayden

“Jazz 10” (2020), cast iron, 16 1/2 x 11 3/4 x 3 1/8 inches. All images © Hugh Hayden, courtesy of Lisson Gallery

New York-based artist Hugh Hayden (previously) visualizes the ways African traditions are embedded into multiple facets of American culture through a series of cast-iron skillets. Part of a larger exhibition titled American Food, the 26 pans are molded to reveal facial impressions that evoke West African-style masks, blending the cooking tool and cultural object.

Generally established by cooks who were enslaved, southern food includes many of the flavors, techniques, and ingredients prevalent in African cuisine, forming what Hayden sees as one of the foremost culinary traditions distinct to the United States. This direct impact is evident in the physical artworks—the expressive masks literally emerge from the pans—although it transcends the effects on the kitchen. As he writes about “The Cosby’s” (shown below) on Instagram, “I made this triptych as an homage to the indelible cultural impact of the African diaspora on the creation of American entertainment, food, industry, and society.”

Hayden creates the skillets through sand casting, a manufacturing technique that utilizes the granular substance as a mold, which the artist employs as a way to recognize “the imperfectness of the materials, their colonial histories, and the inherent loss of detail in the reproduction process.” He also parallels the sculpting process to the diaspora, considering how the original object is obscured and imbued with cultural significance when it’s finished. Ultimately, American Food celebrates “the indebtedness to African origins in the cooking—as a form of creation of America, Western culture, and Modern Art,” a statement says.

 

“Jazz 19” (2020), cast iron, 21 1/4 x 12 x 5 1/2 inches

“The Cosby’s” (2020), cast iron, three skillets, 12 1/8 x 8 1/4 x 5 7/8 inches, 14 1/2 x 10 5/8 x 4 1/4 inches, 18 7/8 x 14 1/8 x 2 1/2 inches

“Jazz 15” (2020), cast iron, 16 7/8 x 11 3/8 x 6 1/4 inches

Left: “The Cosby’s” (2020), cast iron, three skillets, 12 1/8 x 8 1/4 x 5 7/8 inches, 14 1/2 x 10 5/8 x 4 1/4 inches, 18 7/8 x 14 1/8 x 2 1/2 inches. Right: “Jazz 17” (2020), cast iron, 16 1/4 x 10 3/8 x 7 inches

“Jazz 18” (2020), cast iron, 19 5/8 x 9 5/8 x 5 inches

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Face masks by Barbara Kruger, Jenny Holzer and Lorna Simpson launch on MatchesFashion

Designs range from Kruger and Holzer’s signature typographic works to explorations of Black identity by Simpson.

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The Gondry brothers create paper-cut music video for Idles’ Model Village

Michel created the paper village and its population, then filmed it on lightboxes before Olivier brought it to life through CGI, all during lockdown.

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Technion students imagine architecture as "an agent of social, cultural and physical change"

A proposal that visualises Tel Aviv as a city adapted to climate change is among the architecture-focused student projects in this VDF school show by Israeli university Technion.

Curated by the university's Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, the 10 featured projects are the thesis projects of the school's final year architecture students.

According to Technion, the faculty serves as an "experimental laboratory" for students, and each presented project is "concerned with the role of architecture as an agent of social, cultural and physical change".

Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning at Technion

School: Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning at Technion
Course: Graduate thesis project
Studio: Final Project
Tutors: Gaby Schwartz, Ziv Leibu, Ronen Ben Arie, Liat Eisen, Or Aleksandrowicz, Elad Horn, David Robins, Etan Kimmel, Jonathan Dortheimer, Liat Eisen, Shmaya Zarfati, Yishai Well, Or Aleksandrowicz and Elad Horn

School statement:

"The studio serves as an experimental laboratory for provoking criticism and new ideas about the Israeli environment in various scales. It is composed of three units, each emphasising different themes – from society and politics to technology and materiality, consciousness and sustainability.

"All the projects are concerned with the role of architecture as an agent of social, cultural and physical change in the environment, paying particular attention to complexity and to that which was neglected or considered irrelevant: areas around borders; temporary, unstable or forbidden spaces; spaces of political ethnonational conflicts; borderline issues between matter and culture; the deployment of computational power and, of course, the pressing climatic crisis.

"Alejandro Zarh-Polo wrote in 1998 that 'today's architecture is measured by the ability of the architect to challenge the existing systems'. In order to respond to current situations, it is necessary to develop a wide range of tools and move beyond the familiar repertoire mainly based on precedents and knowledge of traditional and modern architecture."

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Unchosen by Adva Chefetz

"Preservation of the built heritage has a major role in the creation of a common identity based on the past. The Experimental Preservation approach questions the longstanding nature of preservation as a bureaucratic top-down policy. By choosing to preserve objects that are usually considered unworthy, preservation becomes a critical tool for rethinking official heritage.

"The project chooses an area unchosen for preservation and reveals a hidden infrastructure. Labelling it as a historic layer worthy of preservation turns the concealed infrastructure into a monument. Thus, by selecting the unchosen, the project challenges the authorised preservation process and questions what is worthy of memory or oblivion."

Name: Adva Chefetz
Project: Unchosen
Email: adva.chefetz@gmail.com

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Post-Private by Amal Barbara

"Since the 1980s, Israeli governments have been pursuing policies of privatising government companies, in which the privatisation processes led to the loss of important public buildings to the private sector.

"The Israeli postal company that controls huge assets in major demand areas in the country is undergoing a privatisation process, during which the state will sell some of its holdings in the company.

"In my project, I address the privatisation of the real estate assets of the postal company through one case study and show how the planning potential of those properties available for sale can be executed in a way that actually promotes the public interest."

Name: Amal Barbara
Project: Post-Private
Email: burbaraamal95@gmail.com
Video: youtu.be/rdxUWI2SzH4

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Uncanny Transitions by Amnon Verberne

"Our urban environments are becoming increasingly unhomely, calling for new architectural idioms that will help us adapt without concealing the imminent catastrophes of climate change.

"The project develops a responsive architectural alternative for the city of Tel Aviv-Yafo, where urban flash flooding and outdoor overheating are the two major environmental challenges created by urbanity.

"It does so in the city's largest flood basin, an urban desert consisting of large swathes of impermeable and heat-absorbing surfaces. A series of stereotomic actions shape the ground surface and the built masses as an urban sponge, absorbing runoff water and generating large shade patches."

Name: Amnon Verberne
Project: Uncanny Transitions
Email: verberne.amnon@gmail.com
Website: verberneamnon.wixsite.com/portfolio

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Diospolis – Georgopolis – Ludd – Lydda – Lidda– Lod by Cheyn Lambert

"Situated within the remains of the old city al-Ludd and the new modernist city Lod on-top, this project examines how architecture can profit from interpreting practices of archaeology to inform the creation of a collective process of narrating conflicting histories.

"Archaeology's systematic method serves here as a means to reveal historical layers, to open discussions over conflicting histories, to bring together mixed communities, and as an architectural language that draws from its forms, materials, and temporality. Thus, community discussions craft the landscape and daily lives of the city's narratives."

Name: Cheyn Lambert
Project: Diospolis – Georgopolis – Ludd – Lydda – Lidda– Lod
Email: cheyn.lambert@gmail.com

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Urban Strip by Dafna Zand

"Urban Strip offers a new look at the method of planning the city centre of Beersheva, particularly the detached neighbourhoods and main Boulevard, Reger. By analysing international precedents, a new planning strategy was formulated, which includes a redistribution of the city centre from bubble planning units to horizontal strips that penetrate to the depths of the neighbourhoods.

"The strip offers a planning alternative that integrates landscape and buildings throughout the strip and connects important nodes along it. The new plan adds residential and public programs that contribute to the different populations of the area and is adapted to the desert climate."

Name: Dafna Zand
Project: Urban Strip
Email: levine.dafna05@gmail.com

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Architecture Deters Violence by Jana Omary

"Considering the dysfunctional police performance in fighting the rising crime in Umm Al-Fahem, this project explores community monitoring and spaces of security as crime deterrence tools among Arab communities in Israel.

"Mainly due to its lack of visibility, the alleys in Umm Al-Fahem bear the highest probability to witness crime, whereas the vicinity of the mosques is the safest. Therefore, the project utilises existing social contracts in hope to intensify social control over crime. By enriching the roofs with common and social facilities, the project redesigns the normal movement in the city to surveil the alleys and maintain security."

Name: Jana Omary
Project: Architecture Deters Violence
Email: omarijana51@gmail.com
Website: jo-projects.com

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Public Space 3.0 by Livne Furmanski

"In light of its waning in the neoliberal era, the project suggests a new, alternative definition for the term 'public space' – one that is designed as a spatial reaction to existing contexts. The architecture that was once used by the state to maintain social order is now being adapted, reshaped from the bottom-up by and for the public.

"The space planned and moulded primarily by global economy receives a dose of public building rights, in an attempt to balance the forces that shape them today. By juxtaposing forces and elements in space, a new public space is created, one that belongs to all of its visitors and is shaped by their presence."

Name: Livne Furmanski
Project: Public Space 3.0
Email: livnefurmanski@gmail.com
Website: livnefurmanski.wixsite.com/projects

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Play-Ground by Nagham Zoabi

"This project proposes a network of public spaces in the built fabric of the Arab towns. The network intertwines with new shortcuts and paths within the existing built fabric that is currently characterised by stuffiness, structurally and mentally.

"The proposed public spaces act as 'breathing lungs' that open up places where suffocation occurs due to the growing boundaries between the various sections of the Arab society, boundaries that are the result of the deteriorating social cohesion and growing violence entailing the profound structural changes this society is going through.

"The intervention is based on the historical principle of the 'Hosh' that in previous times organised several living units of a 'Hamula' – an extended family – around a shared courtyard while maintaining intimacy and privacy through carefully devised elements."

Name: Nagham Zoabi
Project: Play-Ground
Email: naghamz333@gmail.com

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Soundscape Architecture by Ofra Baruch

"Noise impairs peoples' health and quality of life. Today, all acoustic regulatory codes apply to building envelopes and their interiors only. Urban open spaces are left neglected.

"The project deals with how architecture can reduce noise nuisances next to extreme noise sources. In this work, an airport is used as a case study whereby soundscape planning combines different strategies to increase the 'acoustic shadow' of building volumes.

"In addition, the study investigates a wide range of other noise amelioration strategies, both external and internal, which are implemented at varies scales. In noisy modern life, it is important for planners to consider the noise landscape. The project aims to raise awareness and provide new tools for the architectural design process."

Name: Ofra Baruch
Project: Soundscape Architecture
Email: ofra.ba11@gmail.com

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Inten-City by Rona Shaked

"One of the challenges facing planners today is to increase density while promoting the qualities of an urban-intensive life. The prevailing method for creating this intensity is a mixed-use development. Often how space gets used, however, does not match the expectations of planners – gaps are generated between the architectural intent and the actual use.

"The project tries to close these gaps by seeing the future use of space as an integral part of its planning process. Using a computerised algorithm based on a quantitative index that expresses urban intensity, this project optimises mixed-use planning."

Name: Rona Shaked
Project: Inten-City
Email: 238ronashaked@gmail.com

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Virtual Design Festival's student and schools initiative offers a simple and affordable platform for student and graduate groups to present their work during the coronavirus pandemic. Click here for more details.

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