As part of an international competition called Zero Emissions, the studio has put forward building a city development underneath a valley-spanning bridge in Italy that is about to be decommissioned. The futuristic design looks like those curling streets from the head-spinning movie Inception and, judging by just how far out this design idea is, it may remain just a pipe dream.

The project, called Solar Park South, aims to utilise the already reinforced structure to create a residential development that would span from the valley floor to the underneath of the bridge.

The designers said:

“Rather than completely demolishing the old route, with its extraordinary reinforced concrete viaducts, now fully integrated within the landscape and the collective
imagination, the reuse and redevelopment of certain by-passed sections is proposed as a means of boosting the production of renewable energy; experimenting with new
eco-friendly technologies; favoring connections between villages and access to the valuable crops on mountain crests; and, finally, developing new forms of environmental
and land art capable of stimulating responsible tourism.”

More shots below.

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A massive plan to drastically cut the carbon emissions in downtown Chicago has scooped a prestigious award from Architect Magazine.

The fourth Annual R&D Award was given to the Chicago Central Area Decarbonization Plan by well-known Chicago-based Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture, which presented a large-scale and hugely ambitious plant to retrofit existing buildings to achieve a 25% cut in emissions below the 1990 level.

The ‘Plan’ involves eight key strategies, starting with one called Buildings, “which investigates how existing structures can be upgraded to improve energy efficiency, increase the value of aging building stock and tap into the potential to transfer excess energy loads back to the grid, all while offsetting the need for new construction.

Other strategies include Urban Matrix, which envisions increasing the residential density of the Loop by enhancing amenities, Smart Infrastructure which tackles how energy can be generated, stored, distributed and shared and Mobility, which assesses transit and connectivity.

Some of the key changes presented include:

• Completing and linking a below-grade pedway system that would make the Loop more walkable in extreme weather conditions
• Creating a green corridor and below-grade inter-modal axis on Monroe Street that would offer a place of respite for residents, commuters and visitors
• Repurposing the Loop’s underground tunnels as a pneumatic waste disposal system
• Extending the existing Chicago riverwalk and bicycle paths to increase mobility within and across the Loop
• Publishing The Green City, a textbook that would enter the public and private school curricula as a primer on urban design and decarbonization for public school students, in the manner of the original Wacker’s Manual of the Plan of Chicago in 1911-1927.

Check out some more photos below.

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When people talk about modern architecture you tend to think clean lines, curves, steel and glass. You do not tend to think meat. Hold on to your set square.

Cutting edge, and award-winning architect, Mitchell Joachim does though. Based at Brooklyn’s non-profit Terreform ONE practice, Joachim and his team are experimenting with ways to grow homes from a petri dish.

You may already have come across his Fab Tree Hab, which thankfully, uses trees and plants. See a photo after the jump.

Growing meat homes might be a few years – possibly decades – off but Mitchell is proposing the In Vitro Meat Habitat, using the “fabrication of 3D printed extruded pig cells to form real organic dwellings. It is intended to be a “victimless shelter”, because no sentient being was harmed in the laboratory growth of the skin. We used sodium benzoate as a preservative to kill yeasts, bacteria and fungi. Other materials in the model matrix are; collagen powder, xanthan gum, mannitol, cochineal, sodium pyrophosphate, and recycled PET plastic scaffold.”

Wild indeed.

Not the prettiest house you will ever see, and Joachim admits to that, but you got to give credit for taking architecture in a completely new direction.

See him talk a little about it in the video below.

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London-based Macolytes will be thrilled to know that Apple has opened not just another Apple store in their city, but the biggest one yet in swinging Covent Garden.

Designed by Pennsylvania architect Peter Bohlin, the three storey store on the site of former nightclub dwarfs the glass cube-fronted one on Fifth Avenue in New York – apparently, it could fit inside the main room of this one – check the video above from ElectricPig to get an inside view.

Bohlin designed the iconic store on Fifth Avenue as well as the cylindrical one in Shanghai – see some great shots here - and strange as it might seem, Bohlin is something of a dying breed since he designs using pencil (brand = Itoya) and paper, freely admitting to being useless with computers.

The store has rooms for each key Apple product set and breakout areas where staffers will help solve your every Apple dilemma while separating you from your cash. This is Apple’s 300th store and is set to be a real money-spinner too. The company’s existing London store on Regent St currently rakes in around $96 million a year – making it London’s most profitable store.

As with previous efforts, the Covent Garden store features lots and lots of glass, particualrly the giant glass roof over the main area. The pigeons will love it. Anyone who has been to London will know just how many rats-with-wings there are in central London.

Let’s just say that keeping that pristine glass roof as shiny and clean as the products inside will require a permanent team of iCrap Cleaners working round the clock.

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From Frank Lloyd Wright to Mies to Gehry to Piano to Ando etc. etc. etc. That’s not even taking in some of the heavy-hitting design firms.

But where are the ladies? Exactly.

The Women In Architecture Fund believe it’s time that female architects get a chance to contribute to Chicago’s architectural mix and so have devised a competition to find the best building design for a water front plot.

As they put it:

“For this award we call you, ladies, to design the next big thing on Chicago’s waterfront. In a property owned by the city, one with a desired yet ultimately unknown destiny. Could you connect and activate the space?”

According to the brief, the plot is “an odd shaped, narrow, vertically oriented, peninsula-like lot owned by the City”. It was part of the City’s proposal for the Olympics.

The ladies’ task is to ‘Connect and Activate’ the space to the city’s existing fabric. The public will be in charge of picking the winning design as the submissions will be on display at a Chicago city location, yet to be decided.

Find details and an entry form here.

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We’ve seen some stunning pavilions at the Shanghai Expo 2010 event: the Saudi’s desert oasis, the U.K.’s bizarre yet thrilling Seed Cathedral (see video footage of it after the jump) and, sadly, the most bland and boring pavilion of them all, the U.S. one which has been labelled by some ‘The Shopping Mall’.

Cruel, but true.

Still, one man’s mall is another’s Taj Mahal and you can now voice your opinion via the Expo 2010 Awards, being run by Exhibitor magazine.

Most awards will be judged by a panel of experts but there is the People’s Choice Award which will be decided by online vote. Other categories – open to those pavilion owners and companies with A/V and other technologies on show in the pavilions – are Best Pavilion, Best Exterior Design, Best Exhibit, Best Use of Technology, Best Activity/Interactive, Best Presentation and Elements and Details.

“This competition is an extremely exciting opportunity for firms specializing in design, interactive technology, fabrication, architecture, live presentations, exhibits, pavilions, and more to gain recognition for the work they’ve done on the Expo 2010 stage,” says Travis Stanton, editor of Exhibitor magazine. “Furthermore, it’s an opportunity for us to spotlight some of the most amazing examples of how design, technology, presentation, and storytelling come together to effectively communicate compelling messages. Those examples will hopefully inform and inspire today’s exhibit and event professionals – along with the next generation of face-to-face marketers. Because whether you’re creating an immense international pavilion or a small 10-by-10-foot exhibit, it’s often about making an impression, and the work on display in Shanghai does that in truly monumental and memorable ways.”

[More]

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There’s very few things – except maybe crude oil and coal – that can’t have the word ‘green’ shoved in front of it these days, in order to make it more eco-friendly. Many, sadly, are inaccurate and others are fads.

But when it comes to buildings, green building has become the new wave of construction. And right now, Norway is king of green building for the second year running, according to – take a deep breath now – the 2009 Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) Global Zero Carbon Capacity Index. Phew.

Their data covers 34 countries and considers criteria such as energy efficiency in homes, offices and transport, alongside national investment in renewable energy and policies to reduce carbon consumption from buildings.

The building sector is responsible for around 40% of greenhouse gas emissions said report author, Yvonne Rydin, who states that the sector has to do more to reduce emissions.

“This is an urgent responsibility for those building new developments as well as those owning, managing and occupier existing ones. Our homes, shops, offices, factories and leisure centres all need to make their contribution to the climate change agenda.”

Brazil secured second spot with the U.K. placing third for the first time. Ironically, this week saw the U.K. announce an early closure of its Low Carbon Buildings Fund to save £3 million – thank you ‘Global Recession’ – so expect the U.K. to slip back down the ranks. Other countries showing improvement in 2009 included France, Germany, the Slovak Republic and, to a lesser extent, the USA.

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The HOK design team certainly like to think so. This is how the winning team envision the revamp of one of the San Francisco’s most treasured historical buildings, the Mint, built in 1874 and survivor of the devastating 1906 earthquake and fire.

It’s now looking at a future as a new  museum and visitor centre for the city.

As you can see, maintaining the character of the original is paramount and the covered courtyard is a clever approach to opening up the inner space to the outside, while showing off the original stonework – much of which will have to rescued from ‘modernisation’ over the years.

Having spent decades pumping out the ‘green’, remaining green will be a key feature of the Mint going forward. The building is a passively ventilated and naturally lit structure that will aim to maintain its openess to the environment after new musuem and visitor facilities have been added.

Interventions act as intermediaries between the exterior environment and internal spaces which require variable degrees of control and comfort.

The largest intervention will be that massive glass canopy roof over the historic courtyard. The will also collect water and fog at its corners to provide natural irrigation for a terraced roof garden. The roof garden will become a new public space also.

Source

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Overlooking the site of the London 2012 Olympics, the new View Tube café is not what you’d normally expect from your local coffee shop. In fact, there are probably very few coffee shops built from old shipping containers and, if there are, they probably don’t look quite as cool as this one. We like cargotecture for a number of reasons and you can find a number of excellent and innovative examples in our previous blog ‘Thinking Outside The Container’.

This is ‘cargotecture’ at its best and it’s the 40^th structure built from old shipping containers at London’s Container City. It was created by Urban Space Management and is two storeys high. Old containers from China were scrubbed out and fitted offsite. It took 3 months to put together and just a couple of days to crane into position.

The whole structure is recycled and it’s green too, with lighting controlled by motion sensors, solar controlled glass, weather compensation controlled heating and low energy light bulbs.

Upstairs there is a large class room and the aforementioned observation gallery overlooking what will be the fantastic looking venue for the London 2012 Olympics. Right now, however, it’s a building site with enough cranes, diggers and builder’s butts cracks on view to put anyone off their panini and latte. More pics of the cafe below.

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It may not be the biggest pavilion at the Shanghai Expo 2010 event but the Arabian City is the most expensive.

This is the Saudi Arabian pavilion, loosely described as a ‘silk road treasure boat’ or more simply the ‘Moon Boat’, which cost a whopping $146 million to construct.

You can definitely see the oasis-style theme to the place which sits amid a ‘happy desert’ with the top deck planted with a hanging garden, complete with water pools and featuring full-grown date palm trees.

There are even tents erected on top to give visitors a chance to experience a little bit of desert life, just without the scorpions.

Chinese and Saudi architects combined to create the pavilion which covers 6,000 square meters.

It’s not all green though as the pavilion also sports the world’s largest 3D IMAX screen. You can forget catching Iron Man 2 on it though as it will only be used for short, cultural films.

See more shots below.

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