Top Ten Architectural Works of 2018
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As the year 2018 comes to an end, we take a look at the highlights from the world of architecture. From museums and schools to memorials and a library, these 10 projects steal the limelight for their cultural and social significance.Children Village by AlephTop Ten Architectural Works of 2018
As the year 2018 comes to an end, we take a look at the highlights from the world of architecture. From museums and schools to memorials and a library, these 10 projects steal the limelight for their cultural and social significance.Children Village by Aleph Zero and RosenbaumRIBA International Prize winner Children Village is a new school complex on the edge of the rainforest in northern Brazil designed by Brazilian architects Aleph Zero and Rosenbaum. Funded by the Bradesco Foundation, it is one of the 40 schools run by the foundation, which aims to provide education for children in rural communities across Brazil. Children Village provides boarding facility for 540 children aged 13 to 18 years who attend the Canuanã School. Students come from remote areas of the country. Some even travel many hours by boat.“It has been a joy to see the children making the building their own and adapting the space to fit their needs,” said Gustavo Utrabo and Pedro Duschenes from Aleph Zero. “We wanted to be prescriptive without being overbearing, to be supportive without being patronizing, and to encourage growth and development without cosseting it.”“Children Village provides an exceptional environment designed to improve the lives and wellbeing of the school’s children,” said RIBA President Ben Derbyshire. “It illustrates the immeasurable value of good educational design.”V&A Dundee by Kengo Kuma and AssociatesScotland opened its doors to its first dedicated design museum, V&A Dundee, in September. Designed by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, the V&A Dundee design museum reconnects Dundee to the River Tay, the city’s historic trading route and source of economic growth for centuries. Kuma drew inspiration from the cliffs around Scotland to design the sculptural building. The architect has envisioned V&A Dundee, his first building in the UK, as a new “living room for the city,” a place for everyone to feel welcome.“The museum steps out into the River Tay, and has nearly 2,500 pre-cast concrete panels which hang from its complex curving walls. These panels cast shadows which change in different weather conditions and as the sun moves around the museum,” states Kengo Kuma and Associates in a press release.The Mwabwindo School by Selldorf ArchitectsWinner of the prestigious 2017 Panerai Design Miami/Visionary Award, the Mwabwindo School, serving primary school students in rural southern Zambia, opened in 2018.The project is a collaborative effort between 14+ Foundation, New York; Selldorf Architects, New York; and artist Rashid Johnson, with the addition of newly-commissioned furniture by Christ & Gantenbein, Basel. The collaborators have donated their services to the project to create an inspired place for learning, as well as to promote sustainable resource use, arts education, and community building through design. This is the second school in the region developed by 14+ Foundation, a New York-based non-profit organization committed to increasing education accessibility in rural African communities.The tall trees on the surrounding savanna, which serve as shaded gathering spaces, were used as inspiration by Selldorf Architects, New York, to design the school campus featuring mud-brick classrooms for 200 students arranged around courtyards and covered by a large corrugated metal roof canopy, along with housing for eight teachers, a vegetable garden, and playing fields. The campus has been constructed by local masons, creating employment and training opportunities for nearby communities. The energy efficient ecosystem of the building consists of rain water harvesting for use in the garden, solar panels for school and teachers’ housing, and a windmill to power the facility’s well water.National Veterans Memorial and Museum by Allied Works Architecture (Columbus, Ohio)National Veterans Memorial and Museum (NVMM) is the first national institution dedicated to honoring US veterans and celebrate their service. The museum, designed by Allied Works Architecture, opened to the public in October.Located in downtown Columbus, Ohio, NVMM has been designed as a civic and cultural institution that seeks to interweave the role of veterans and the act of service within a broader national context.“The National Veterans Memorial and Museum will be a crucial touchpoint for the nation through its mission to honor, connect, inspire, and educate visitors about the service and sacrifice of veterans,” said Lieutenant General Michael Ferriter, US Army (retired), who serves as President and CEO of the NVMM. “When veterans return home, they join communities as innovative leaders and teams who want to accomplish the next mission. In its design and program, the NVMM seeks to inspire reflection and remembrance, catalyze nostalgia into action, and amplify civic participation.” Through commemorative and civic events along with a full program of installations and exhibitions, the NVMM offers a glimpse of American military service around the world. Calgary Central Library by SnohettaCalgary Central Library, designed by Snohetta, is the city’s largest public investment since the 1988 Olympics, signaling the city’s focus on the creation and innovation of knowledge and culture. Snohetta and DIALOG won the international design competition organized by Calgary Public Library and Calgary Municipal Land Corporation in 2013 to select the architecture and landscape architecture teams to create the Central Library.“Calgary Public Library is one of the largest library systems in North America, where more than half of its residents are active cardholders, and accordingly, the new main branch was created for and inspired by its diverse inhabitants,” writes Snohetta.Institute of Contemporary Art by Steven Holl ArchitectsThe Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), designed by Steven Holl Architects, features dynamic exhibition spaces to support different forms of Contemporary Art. Architect Steven Holl says, “We designed the ICA to be a flexible, forward-looking instrument that will both illuminate and serve as a catalyst for the transformative possibilities of contemporary art.”The interior and exterior spaces are seamlessly connected through glass walls and windows. The first floor houses a 4,000-square-foot gallery and a 240-seat auditorium along with cafe, bar, and a concept shop. An outdoor garden, or “Thinking Field” as Steven Holl calls it, serves as a space for social gathering and hosting public programs. The second floor houses two more galleries, a learning lab, and public access to one of the four green roofs. “The fluidity of the design allows for experimentation, and will encourage new ways to display and present art that will capitalize on the ingenuity and creativity apparent throughout the VCU campus,” adds Holl. The Menil Drawing Institute by Johnston MarkleeThe Menil Drawing Institute, a $40 million building, opened in Houston. Designed by Johnston Marklee in collaboration with landscape architects Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, the institute is the first freestanding museum facility built expressly for the acquisition, study, exhibition, conservation, and storage of modern and contemporary drawings.“This quietly innovative architecture of the Menil Drawing Institute allows us to make drawing, the most personal of all artistic practices, accessible as never before, to artists, to scholars, to students, and to the public. The Menil Drawing Institute will engage with our community, with the entire world of arts, in an exciting new way — and we are immensely proud to welcome everyone to visit, explore, and enjoy,” says Rebecca Rabinow, Director of the Menil Collection.Fjordenhus by Olafur EliassonDanish artist Olafur Eliasson, along with his architectural team at Studio Olafur Eliasson, has designed his first building Fjordenhus (Fjord House) in Vejle, Denmark. The building opened in June.Fjordenhus forges a striking new connection between Vejle Fjord and the city center of Vejle as it rises out of water. Fjordenhus comes into view as one moves towards the harbor, across the expansive plaza of the man-made Havneoen (The Harbour Island), which happens to be a mixed-use residential and commercial area currently in development.“I am very thankful for the trust shown by the Kirk Johansen family in inviting me, with my studio, to conceive Fjordenhus. This allowed us to turn years of research — on perception, physical movement, light, nature, and the experience of space — into a building that is at once a total work of art and a fully functional architectural structure. In the design team, we experimented from early on with how to create an organic building that would respond to the ebb and flow of the tides, to the shimmering surface of the water, changing at different times of the day and of the year,” said Olafur Eliasson.The National Memorial for Peace and Justice by MASS Design GroupCommissioned by the Equal Justice Initiative, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, designed in collaboration with MASS Design Group, opened in Montgomery, Alabama. It is America’s first memorial dedicated to “the legacy of enslaved black people, people terrorized by lynching, African Americans humiliated by racial segregation and Jim Crow, and people of color burdened with contemporary presumptions of guilt and police violence.”Built with the goal to create a sober, meaningful place of reflection for America’s history of racial inequality, the memorial is located on a six-acre site featuring more than 800 corten steel monuments. Each monument is dedicated to one county in the United States which experienced racial terror lynching. The columns bear names of lynching victims, symbolizing thousands of people through history who suffered from brutality.National Museum of Qatar by Jean NouvelJean Nouvel-designed National Museum of Qatar is scheduled to open in March next year. The museum in Doha is inspired by the desert rose. Its fluid, contemporary architectural form sits in dialogue with the historical objects it will house.The structure made of glass, steel, and fiber concrete recalls the “blade-like petal of the desert rose, a mineral formation of crystallized sand found in the briny layer just beneath the desert’s surface,” says Jean Nouvel.The museum is located near the former Emir of Qatar Sheikh Abdullah bin Jassim Al Thani’s original palace, a famous landmark in Doha. The museum will “give a voice to Qatar’s heritage whilst celebrating its future,” as stated in a press release by Qatar Museums.The 21,000-square-meter museum space houses permanent and temporary exhibition galleries, a 220-seat auditorium, a heritage research center, a 70-seat forum, conservation laboratories, collection stores and offices, along with cafes, restaurant, and a boutique.Click on the slideshow for a sneak peek at the projects. https://www.blouinartinfo.com/ Founder: Louise Blouin Read more