Whenever I visit factories, I start having fantasies about moving in and converting the space into my home.
I love the polished look of well-worn concrete and the high ceilings. I love all the little observation decks and open plan spaces.
I just wonder how long I would have to save to buy one for myself a la Ricardo Bofill. What a gem it is… This one even looks great on the outside. How about you chip in some $? And we could go shop around for one in a few years?
Come on folks… How sexxay is that mezzanine?
This was the question posed to the audience, at a lecture I recently attended by one Mr. John Hardy, founder of the Green School in Bali.
The premise of this school was one that I found really seductive. Every aspect of it from the curriculum to the infrastructure is thought through from the viewpoint of sustainability. From growing their own food to employing local knowledge and traditional techniques in the construction, the school is focused on minimizing its impact on the surroundings.
What I thought raised this up to another level is that the ideas were so well-executed, and the school actually comes out looking gorgeous. The spaces are innovative and inspiring, and look very much at home on their site… It looks like an awesome place to study and a school I would have loved to attend.
I already enjoyed going to school as a kid, but what an adventure it would be…
Taking this path to school everyday…
Having lessons like this every single day…
He mentioned that this landscape is a luxury, but this still seemed like an understating of the facts to me. I’m staring at the massive concrete block that now houses my former alma mater and trying to imagine how we might have all turned out if we had grown up in a school like this. I don’t wonder that people move their families there just so their kids can attend this school. It’s just a pity that such an experience is still largely limited to those wealthy and privileged enough to buy a slot in these niche market schools.
Filed under: books | Tags: architecture, lisa heschong, thermal delight in architecture
I needed to balance all my rather dry research readings (Hullo Olgyay) with some rather more poetic readings. This one offers an interesting perspective on the issue of thermal comfort , something that every living creature has to contend with.
Rather than follow the notion that the ideal situation is to achieve a constant and stable ‘optimum’ temperature within buildings, Heschong’s book suggests that the thermal quality of buildings has been too often neglected as a sensual delight, and deserves attention and thought to its provision rather than a blanket solution (attention that is commonly given to the rather more glamorous quality of light).
In this compact volume, she documents many traditional thermal experiences (Japanese Onsen, Persian gardens etc.) and offers a case for sensitive passive design with a greater consciousness of nature. This is very much related to my other readings, but at the same time much more of a pleasure to read.
Filed under: books, nostalgia | Tags: a place of my own, architecture, michael pollan
A very interesting book recording the travails of an amateur builder out to create build a writing house for himself. I thought the most interesting part of it was reading about a layman’s (for lack of a better term.. civilian? hahaha) view of the building process and about architecture.
It’s been a while since the book was first published in 1997 and IMO the field of architecture has shifted away a little from what he describes. Not so much of the abstraction and (sometimes empty) theories and words anymore. So it was interesting to read about his views on (what is now considered architectural history?) that too.
Pollan has described in detail his perspective through the entire process of making the building from conception to finishing, which I rarely find documented, and therefore found very interesting.
In a way, this reminded me of working on the Istana pavilion. What looks simple on paper is infinitely more complicated once it comes to 3 dimensions and taking into account things like the limits of your own strength and skill level.
All in all, a nice diversion from report writing 
