KRØYERS PLADS - COPENHAGEN, DENMARK

Krøyers plads is a plot of land located in an extremely attractive area, right out to the Copenhagen waterfront, on the opposite side of the charming restaurant and bar area of Nyhavn. This plot of land has stood empty for over a decade, due to issues with finding an architectural project that suits the desires and needs of the local population in the Christianshavn area (a bunch that are always rather capricious and critical towards any new developement in the area). But after all this time, the local population, the municipality and the architects of this new project have finally come to an idea, which they all believe suits the needs and wants of all the parties involved. The result is a project that follows the historical structuring of the historical warehouse buildings along the waterfront, while giving the area a fresh new twist as well. With a new cyclist and pedestrian bridge being built across the channel in the same area, it is expected that life and social activity in this otherwise quiet area will grow at the completion of the projects. Do mind, that the pictures of the new project, are the ones right after the one underneath, which is the first submitted project, that was canceled, due to complains about its dominant height.

Above: The first proposal for the square, by the Dutch architect Eric van Egeraat.

Below: The current proposal, by Vilhelm Lauritzen Architects and COBE Architects. 

Further reading:

- http://goo.gl/mf8bn

- Andy Minchev 

VIRGIN GATEWAY TO SPACE - LAS CRUCES, NEW MEXICO

The Virgin Gateway to Space building is the world's first commercial space terminal. Designed by (unsurprisingly) Norman Foster, the building is located in an isolated desert landscape. The shapes, forms and not to forget the technology of the building clearly resemble a style that can be considered to be one that mixes architectural styles from various modern day sci-fi movies. The look of the building itself illustrates the purpose of the building quite clearly - Even an unknowing visitor would probably be able to guess that whatever is in the building, might probably get you up and above the clouds. There are some classical Norman Foster sustainable design methods used in this building for natural cooling and such, but these are not the noteworthy in this case. This building is the first of its kind, but clearly marks a new era in transportational architecture. Although the users of this building will be very few (not to mention their wealth!), one day, such commercial spaceports might become available to the common man, and it's surely going to be interesting to see how the building functions over time.

Further reading:

- http://goo.gl/LpQxG

- Andy Minchev

BLOG REDESIGN

Every once in a while, things need change and my blog is by no means an exception. Recently I've been working to simplify my presentational style, making it as neutral and minimal as possible, and I thought I'd carry this new design style of mine on to the blog as well. As you may have noticed first of all, the logo has been removed. Since it is a personal blog, and not that of some architectural studio or such, I decided that the logo is irrelevant. Also, the text on the blog has been shrinked a tiny bit, and I'm planning on putting an emphasis on the visual material rather than text, by gathering all the text in the beginning of the post and posting only images the rest of the way, making the blog more pleasant to the not-reading visitor. Finally, I've made the Blogger navbar black, since it stands in an aestethically pleasing contrast to the almost all-white blog. This is inspired by Google's black bar, which I believe stands in a very pleasant contrast to the white and simple start page. There are some minor changes I'm considering, such as removing the little frame from the images, but I'll leave it for now. Enjoy!

- Andy Minchev

CHAPEL IN AIRPORT - RIGA, LATVIA

Having been working with glass for very few weeks ago, I came across a certain project on Architizer, that shows our glass construction systems in real life (in a much smaller scale though). This project is a little chapel in Riga's International Airport. Although one may discuss the whether or not it is right to have a place of worship for a certain religion in a building that is intended for use by all nationalities and cultures, design-wise, the room is a true place of serenity.

The concrete surfaces of the room may at first seem like something from a dystopian sci-fi novel, but with the natural light above and the light wooden flooring, the room seems calm and peaceful. The forms in the room, in all their simplicity hint to Japanese architecture, which somehow justifies idea of having a place of worship in an airport. But most noteworthy regarding the glass construction part, is that one side of each bench is elevated by the use of glass, as seen more clearly bellow:

These elements of glass can safely carry the load of a concrete slab with up to four people on it, once again proving the surprising strength of the material. As I have earlier mentioned in my glass post, one of the greatest issues with glass, is that it can very easily break when exposed to horizontal forces, which is most likely why only one of the sides of the benches is held up by the glass element. Besides being constructionally impressive, it is also clear to see, that the glass elements give a certain special aesthetic touch, that underlines the elegant simplicity and calmness of the room. Read more about the project and view more images at Architizer (link bellow)

Further reading:

- http://www.architizer.com/en_us/projects/view/chapel-in-riga-international-airports-north-terminal/30645/

- Andy Minchev

LANDMARK DESIGN FOR YARD GALLERY

This project was something really special for all of us in our class, since the most suitable project was selected to be built in real life. We were to each design a project that we believed was suitable for a site and the image and needs of an art gallery. But it wasn't as simple as that. We were given a maximum of 110 abandoned sleepers to work with (the wooden elements that are placed under railroad tracks). With these sleepers, we had the freedom to design as we wished, as long as it was a realistically buildable structure.

Now in order to understand my personal concept for the site, first, I have to explain the condition of the sleepers. The condition of the sleepers was one that showed great decay. They had been used for railways, and were even somewhat soaked in diesel fuel, which is one of the reasons for their dark colour. With the gallery being absolutely white on the interior, I thought that the sleepers as they were would create a great contrast between the interior and exterior. Furthermore, this frontside of the gallery was rarely used, due to a lack of space for human interaction, and two front doors, that unfortunately were unconnected. I decided to solve both these problems by creating a rather simple, yet very flexible and practical terrace, that connects both doors, creates a space for interaction (where chairs and others can be placed as needed) and also creates an abstract extension of the gallery, in an outdoor space that contrasts the interior, while still preserving the industrial area feel to the area. 

Also, like the minimalistic and minimal interior of the gallery (as seen above) that forces focus on the displayed artworks, my exterior space is kept low so that the human interactions on the terrace are the true focus, with the surroundings remaining as they are. During the entire process, I had hundreds of ideas for the site and couldn't make up my mind until about 24 hours till the final presentation, so some details in my project were unfortunately left out. The result of my simple concept is the rendering bellow:

My project seemed to grab the attention of the gallery owner (especially due to the contrasting effect), but unfortunately wasn't chosen for construction. The honour went to my good classmate, Helge, who designed a project that was an abstraction of roots crawling out of the ground, forming benches and other inviting shapes. No doubt a project worthy of construction if you ask me! Helge may have the honour of having his first built project, but as a class, the experience of building it together has been just as exciting for us. Check out the links bellow, they show all the other projects, Helge's winning project and furthermore, the works of the gallery are really interesting, so check them out!

Further reading:

- http://www.yardgallery.dk/ (official site/blog)

- http://www.yardgallery.dk/?p=819 (vernissage)

- http://www.yardgallery.dk/?p=790 (winning project)

- http://www.yardgallery.dk/?p=798 (other projects - mine's the first one here)

- Andy Minchev

GLASS COLUMNS

During the last few weeks, we've had a workshop that focuses on load-bearing elements in architecture. The workshop is quite basic, and only focuses on the basics of construction methods, in order to give us a simple insight towards designing more stable buildings, while still allowing us to leave the details to the engineers. The workshop consisted of two parts (a week for each). During the first fase, we were to work with a single loadbearing element, while during the second, we were to design a structure which primarily makes us of the before mentioned chosen element.

During the first week, a joined a group that focused on the column as a load-bearing element. The column, being one of the perhaps oldest and most basic of all architectural constructional elements, was an interesting choice. But due to the simplicity of it's function, our group decided to try out something different in the world of columns. We decided to test the strength of glass as a material for a column. Now what you see above clearly illustrates the strength of glass. The sculpture consists of five glass columns which bear a large stone. The glass columns measure 21cm (height) by 1cm (length) and just 0,4cm (width). The glass columns are furthermore casted in a gypsum foundation, which doesn't have a load-bearing function, but is rather used to keep the glass columns firmly in place. The stone above measures 20cm x 20cm x 20cm (roughly) and weighs about 25kg. During the final experiment, we even had only four columns, and the stone still stood firmly and safely on the extremely thin columns.

As for the second week, we were to design a larger structure, and in our case, we chose to make a marketplace. The special thing about it, is that we've tried to create an effect, in which the roofing for the market place litterally illustrates an enormous chunk of earth that has been directly cut out and lifted from the ground, thus creating a space underneath. Following our project from the first week, we chose to work with glass columns once again. This time, we found out that 30 of such columns (in a quadratic column) were able to lift as much as 1500 tons of earth, concrete and vegetation that float above the market space! We were no doubt truely amazed by the load-bearing abilities of glass, but like so many good things in life, it has its issues. The thing with glass is that it is extremely fragile. It may carry remarkable masses on a vertical scale, but if the glass were to lean even the slightest towards a horizontal direction, the glass will unlike metal's bending and concrete's cracking, almost litterally explode. This great constructional danger is perhaps one of the reasons why glass isn't so common as a load-bearing material, but as far as I know, research is leading to stronger and more stable glass systems, which one day might just prove worthy for even large scale glass-only structures.

- Andy Minchev