Steven Holl Architects’ Campbell Sports Center Breaks Ground at Columbia University

Campbell Sports Center designed by Steven Holl Architects began construction over the weekend. Complimenting the existing Baker Athletics Complex, the Campbell Sports Center will create a necessary and inviting new gateway to Columbia University’s complex at its location on the corner of West 218th street and Broadway.  The five-story, 48,000 sqf facility will include an auditorium, strength training and conditioning rooms, offices for varsity sports, a hospitality suite, and student-athlete study rooms.  Led by Steven Holl and Chris McVoy, the Campbell sports Center is scheduled to open in fall 2012.

Steven Holl shared, “We are honored to collaborate with Dianne Murphy and Columbia Facilities in creating this new state of the art athletics facility. Its inviting architecture indicates the invigorating presence and future of intercollegiate athletics at Columbia University.”

The Sports Center aims at serving the mind, the body and the mind/body. The design concept “points on the ground, lines in space”—like field play diagrams used for football, soccer, baseball—develops from point foundations on the sloping site. Just as points and lines in diagrams yield the physical push and pull on the field, the building’s elevations push and pull in space. External stairs, which serve as “lines in space,” and terraces extend the field play onto and into the building and give views from the upper levels over the Baker Athletics Complex and Manhattan with the Empire State and Chrysler Buildings in the distance. At night the building is up-lit with glowing light on its Columbia-blue aluminum soffits.

Umbrella-Coat Raincoat

This raincoat is a combination of a rain coat, an umbrella and waterproof trousers. Depending on the weather conditions and the amount of rain it can be adjusted to different levels of protection. With this raincoat your hands are free: you can protect them from cold weather, you can carry things and you can work with them. Also, it can be perfect for people with walking disabilities. In addition in a crowded street you do not bump into other umbrellas.

Designer: Athanasia Leivaditou (Greece) 
Material: Waterproof fabric 
Colours: Varies 
Dimension: Varies

From DesignSpotter

Darling Quarter by ASPECT Studios with FJMT Architects

ASPECT Studios, one of Australia’s leading landscape architecture companies, has designed a new public domain precinct and urban play space and in Sydney’s Darling Harbour. Commissioned by the Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority (SHFA) and Lend Lease, the project is now known as Darling Quarter is a 1.5 hectare place-making project for Sydney with a public park, new cafés, restaurants, bars, 6 star green star commercial buildings (Commonwealth Bank Place), and an innovative children’s playground as its centre piece. At over 4000m² it is the largest play space in the Sydney CBD and with its interactive water play facilities it will strengthen Darling Harbour’s reputation as the most visited destination in Australia.

Darling Quarter builds a strong pedestrian link to the city and reinforces the movement between the Entertainment Centre, Cockle Bay and beyond. The new project revitalises Darling Harbour by upgrading ground plane materials, lighting, furniture and planting, and setting a new benchmark with an emphasis on premium quality and highly sustainable initiatives. It provides a family focused core both for city dwellers, particularly those in neighbouring Pyrmont and Chinatown, and for tourists and visitors alike. In addition to an extensively redesigned playground, it provides generous grassed community areas and planting, civic water features and a children’s theatre.

Roca London Gallery by Zaha Hadid

Earlier this month, bathroom fixture design company Roca opened a new flagship located near Imperial Wharf in London, called the Roca London Gallery. Pritzker Prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid, whose firm is based in London, designed the undulating, white concrete space. Fittingly, the architect drew inspiration from the idea of flowing water for the design, which has an organic shape and somewhat cave-like sensibility.
In a statement Hadid says, “Using a formal language derived from the movement of water, the Roca London Gallery has been eroded and polished by fluidity; generating a sequence of dynamic spaces carved from this fascinating interplay between architecture and nature.”
In addition to displaying Roca’s products, the almost 12,000-square-feet will host a range of activities, like exhibitions, seminars, and debates for the design community.

Post-It Note Watch

These Post-It Note Watches made me smile.

Les Grandes Tables de L’île by 1024 Architecture

Paris studio 1024 Architecture have completed a cafe made from scaffolding and shipping containers on an island on the Seine in Paris. Les Grandes Tables is located on the Île Seguin, where architect Jean Nouvel is currently converting a car factory into a museum.

Elevated amidst the scaffolding structure is an oriented strand board box, which houses the first floor restaurant. A staircase at the front of the building leads visitors up to this dining room, whilst an open space below is used for informal events and parties.

Here’s some more details from 1024 Architecture:

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Les Grandes Tables de L’île

A restaurant/bar/open-air café positioned on Île Seguin in the middle of a temporary garden whilst waiting for the architect Jean Nouvel’s macro project to be implemented, Les Grandes Tables de L’ile is a place to meet, for haute cuisine and why not even parties to accompany the reconstruction of this island steeped in history.

The project is an architectural hybridization between an agricultural greenhouse, a barge and a timber-frame house. Modelled after a large wood fibre box suspended in a scaffold structure from which freight containers are hanging, all encompassed beneath a transparent umbrella…

An eye-catching iconoclastic assemblage with an area of 300m2 to accommodate 120 covers and the cuisine of Arnaud Daguin, a chef with stars to his name.

Constructed from scaffolding, wood fibre panels and containers, according to the principle dear to the 1024 duo, the restaurant can be promptly extended by video and lighting effects by changing with the assistance of mapping for the duration of a party or a particular event.

‘A meeting place aimed at initiating the reoccupation of the venue. An architecture which must be able to disappear without leaving any traces…’

Client: Les Grandes Tables (Paris/Ile Seguin)

Team: Pierre Schneider and François Wunscel (Architects) / Stéphanie Grimard (project monitoring)

Nursery in Sarreguemines by Michel Grasso and Paul Le Quernec

Visitors enter this nursery in northeast France through a curving concrete orifice. Architects Michel Grasso and Paul Le Quernec designed the nursery, which is located beside a noisy road in the town of Sarreguemines.

The undulating entrance walls lead into a round reception room at the centre of the building. The rest of the nursery is arranged like a human body cell, with classrooms and playrooms encircling this central nucleus. Ceiling heights in these surrounding rooms slope down to just over two metres-high to create a comfortable environment for young children. Rooms around the building’s perimeter open onto sheltered terraces and a surrounding garden.

Here’s a short description of the project from Michel Grasso:

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Nursery in Sarreguemines (France)

It’s with a feeling of total freedom that we designed this project. Our first intention was to provide a protective and protected building, for comfort and safety of children, but also for the tranquility of their parents. Our second intention was to introduce the concept of double standards within the building, the children and adult, because we don’t lose sight that it is primarily children who are the main subject of this institution. Finally, our third purpose was to find a way to modify the perception of the building. Indeed, the requirements impose a development on the ground floor of the 1350 square meters of the building…

The project was designed as a body cell with its nucleus (the nursery), its cytoplasm (the gardens) and its membrane (the wall closure). The perception of the nursery is a bush of bamboo with small boxes bringing the light into a building with curved lines. The project: 1 350 m2 / 2 400 000 euro

Client: Communauté d’Agglomération Sarreguemines Confluences 

Architects: Paul Le Quernec & Michel Grasso

Spaceport America by Foster + Partners

Foster + Partners have completed the world’s first space terminal for tourists in New Mexico. Flying displays by Virgin Galactic space vehicles WhiteKnightTwoand SpaceShipTwo marked the opening of Spaceport America.

The low-rise building is dug into the landscape beside the El Camino Real road and is entered through a cleft between the two wings. Full-height glazing wraps around the end of the building, facing onto the runway beyond.

The spaceport hangar is located in the centre of the building, with administrative areas to the west and flight training and preparation areas to the east. The project was designed in collaboration with New Mexico architects SMPC and project manager URS Corporation. Operators Virgin Galactic are currently running a test flight programme.

Pantone Christmas ornaments

Not ready for christmas but I admit these Pantone Christmas ornaments made me chuckle.

Frieze Art Fair Pavilions by Carmody Groarke

London architects Carmody Groarke arranged temporary timber pavilions around the trees in Regent’s Park for this year’s Frieze Art Fair. The three pavilions surrounded a series of courtyards, through which the trees emerged.

Translucent plastic wrapped the exterior walls and roofs of the structures, creating windows across voids in the timber. The pavilions housed VIP rooms in addition to public seating and dining areas for the event, whilst artworks were on show in neighbouring tents.

Passing Cloud by Tiago Barros

If you’re not worried about where you go or how fast you get there, this enormous inflatable cloud is the mode of transport for you. Predominant winds would determine the routes and speed of the hovering cloud, which would move from place to place without any fixed destinations.

Passengers would board the cloud using ladders and would simply sit on the surface during travel. Inside the nylon-covered balloon, a steel skeleton like that of a zeppelin airship would support the object’s structure.

New York architect Tiago Barros proposed the design for a transport network of floating clouds in the sky to the Van Alen Institute and the Department of Cultural Affairs of New York City, who were expecting competition entries for a high-speed rail network.