The exhibition documents WAG’s winning scheme for the Workspace Group Urbantine Project®Tent competition, and the runners-up schemes

The exhibition is launching with a panel discussion at 7.45 pm on September 11th, which should be interesting. I will be contributing to the discussion with the other invited contributors listed below. The discussion will address issues around new craftsmanship, the analogue space of virtual communication, sensory environments and adaptive structures.

Panelists:

Lesley Gavin [BT futurologists]
Olivier Geoffroy [untothislast]
Jon Goodbun [winner of the Workspace Group Urbantine Project®Tent), WAG]
Usman Haque [Haque design and research]
Alvise Simondetti [Foresight & Innovation at Arup]

Chair: Christian Derix [nous, Aedas R&D]

Open Tables Ecology is a study in contemporary interaction theory, or Ubiquitous Computing.

Ubiquitous Computing is based upon using the particularities of real places and spaces to provide the basis for our interactions with digital media. It explores how everyday objects and familiar places can help us to interact with and create ‘local’ information in a global network. This is the opposite of the old concept of ‘cyberspace’, or indeed the current experience of being on line, which is always the same where ever you are…

We started this project by asking how can we create a physical space which facilitates the navigation, selection and creation of ideas. For us, this is in fact part of a bigger study, into creating a hybrid real space/web platform to facilitate the production of open source design (analogous to open source software).

The proposal is for an environment which will facilitate open source thinking, between individuals and groups working and playing in the installation space (and perhaps others working in other places, and online). We would like to really test this by hiring the space for a few hours each day to local companies to use for brainstorming workshops.

The installation is conceptually organised into digitally enhanced ‘tables’ and ‘walls’. In addition, there are hybrid objects: these are found and recycled everyday items, bought from architectural salvage yards and the like, which are physically and technologically manipulated and adjusted to create usable hybrid objects which channel and interface RSS feeds. These are categorised as ‘Wall-Objects’ and ‘Table-Objects’
The ‘tables’ are for working on individually and collectively, and the ‘walls’ are for displaying the work of the ‘tables’. For example, a workgroup at one of the tables or ‘table-objects’ start writing some ideas. The computer (actually a piece of RSS aggregator software) identifies keywords on the table (inputted on the table or by mobile), and starts to search RSS feeds for posts tagged with the keywords. As these feeds start to display or get projected onto the various table-objects, the workgroups can tag and cross reference them. This primary amended content then gets displayed on the walls and wall-objects, to be seen and responded to by the larger community.

Graphic material in images, source: http://www.visualcomplexity.com

Competition team:

WAG: Working Architecture Group are Jon Goodbun, Filip Visnjic and Cordula Weisser.
WAG is an eco-innovative design and research practice, whose interests range from urbanism and ecology to architectural furniture and computer aided manufacture. We believe that the architectural research that WAG has been involved in, produced through our teaching, writing and built practice, enables us to articulate, explore and develop the core aims and values of our clients, in interesting and powerful new ways. Our office is near Spitalfields Market, in East London, and our portfolio includes residential, retail, exhibition, bar and branding projects, for clients including BBC, YMCA, German Embassy and British Museum.

For Open Tables WAG are leading a cross-disciplinary design team, which includes students from Schumacher College ( Fabio Barone (software developer) and Amalie Lauer (engineer)), and interaction designer Alexander Kohlhofer (plasticshore.com).

WAG/Jon Goodbun general quote:

“Whenever I try to describe the ideas behind our work at WAG, or my broader consultancy and academic research, I tend to use words like holism, ecology, and cybernetics a lot. These ideas are able to capture and describe the notion that we live in a globally networked, modern world, but that this ‘space of flows’ is fundamentally interconnected to the ‘Spaceship Earth’ that we are travelling on. We rely upon the biosphere for vast inputs of Natural Capital every year into our production and consumption economies/ecologies, and we need to find conceptual and practical ways to conceive of ourselves as personally networked into these natural and technological ecologies, in a ‘local’ way. We need to build bridges between the local and the global. The fact that both ‘economy’ and ‘ecology’ share the same etymological root from Greek oikos ‘house’, suggests that they are both in fact inextricable from the very concept of architecture – both effectively meaning ‘the science of the house’, or ‘the science of managing the home’. “

Alexander Kohlhofer (plasticshore.com) blurb:

As a designer Alexander Kohlhofer embodies strong artistic sensibilities with a passion for and expertise in contemporary technologies. He has worked on projects with the British Council, the Tate Gallery, the Imperial War Museum, the Arts Council, Amnesty International and the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (Nesta) and many others.

He has presented at international venues, conducted workshops abroad and has lived and worked in the US, UK, Germany and Austria. Until last year he was creative director of Bafta Award winners Soda Creative, world renowned for Soda Constructor. He is also a founding member and director of Munich based Schoene Neue Kinder in Germany.

His fascination for social software is expressed in his current start ups: the award winning online multiplayer-strategy game Weewar (http://weewar.com) and the agile team ware No Kahuna (http://nokahuna.com).

You can learn more about Alexander Kohlhofer at http://plasticshore.com

Submission Sheets:

Atelier 6 2007/08:
Tutors: Jon Goodbun, Filip Visnjic, Cordula Weisser

This year the WAG studio has continued the work of previous cohorts, exploring the intersection of demographic, technological and environmental change. We consciously attempted to envisage new sustainable social forms by exploring the possibilities opened up by rethinking, from the bottom up and top down, architectural design method in the light of planetary limits.

We started the year looking at a single dwelling unit, and finished with a series of master-planning exercises for Hackney Central, which explored food production, energy management, cohousing and urban transport. In both cases we developed with the students a new kind of drawing – The Ecology Diagram – which aims to capture the material and energy forces and flows acting upon the site – whether environmental, economic, social, or technological. By working with Ecology Diagrams students were able to design processes as much as products, and imagine new social scenarios as solutions to new problems. WAG will be presenting the research of Atelier 6, as part of a wider study, to Hackney Council and local community groups over the summer.

You can see more examples of students’ work here.

To find out more about Architecture at University of Greenwich please visit DigitalStudio. 

The design is aimed at meeting a growing niche demand in the housing market. The proposal is an opt-in community for individuals and families who want to take the next step in sustainable modern living. The Social Ecology is organised through the collective ownership and management of a community freehold, with private leaseholds for dwellings. There are shared car pools, rather than private car ownership, and instead of roads, a network of cycle routes and footpaths cross the site. There is an ecology of green spaces – from public to private. There are a range of dwelling types, clustered into groups of twenty units, organised around a linear public park, a permaculture based community school, a market hall and democratic billboard mediaspace. Each co-housing cluster overlooks shared garden, organic food growing and playground spaces. The individual dwelling units are organised around private courtyard gardens, which are treated as an external living rooms.

More information:

Press: For more information and press release material please contact info[at]wag-architecture.co.uk

Technorati Tags: architecture, design, ecology, life, health, innovation, technology, homes, domestic, morphology, sustainability, living

Jury’s report:
The project explored social structures and an approach to tenure rather than architecture or built form. Housing is grouped in small courts with shared community gardens and clustered communal resources. The jury welcomed this holistic consideration and positive vision for medium density housing in the 21st century.

The Milton Keynes Social Ecology by WAG is an urban cohousing permaculture project, aimed at meeting a growing niche demand in the housing market. The proposal is an opt-in community for individuals and families who want to take the next step in sustainable modern living. The Social Ecology is organised through the collective ownership and management of a community freehold, with private leaseholds for dwellings. There are shared car pools, rather than private car ownership, and instead of roads, a network of cycle routes and footpaths cross the site. There is an ecology of green spaces – from public to private. The dwellings are clustered into groups of twenty units, organised around a linear public park, permaculture based community school, market hall and democratic billboard mediaspace. Each co-housing cluster overlooks shared garden, organic food growing and playground spaces. The individual dwelling units are organised around private courtyard gardens, which are treated as an external living rooms.

Click images to enlarge

About Europan:
Europan is a biennial competition for young architects and urban design professionals, under 40 years of age, to design innovative housing schemes for sites across Europe.

WAG: Architects

Project Description: Ideas competition for development of a derelict but listed island resort and bridge/pier for UrbanSplash.

Estimated contract sum: N/A

Our latest competition submission for this exciting new project. Unfortunately, WAG was not shortlisted to procure project further. To see other entries/winner please visit RIBA competitions office.

Click to Enlarge (Full Screen)
Site Analysis:
Weston-Super-Mare operates efficiently during the holiday season, but has a lot of spare capacity for the rest of the year. Part of the brief we set ourselves is to develop a business model for Birnbeck Island that can use this spare capacity as an opportunity.

Strategy:
Create a destination that supports and attracts the existing tourist market during the summer season, providing cafes, restaurants art, live music etc. For the rest of the year, the island operates as a new university and business think tank venue, specialising in ecology, new media art, IT – partnering with local hotels to use spare capacity as student accommodation..

Tactics:
1. Renovate the pier and the listed buildings on the island to provide cafe and restaurant facilities, fully online etc
2. Remove concrete pillars and platform, and build a new, state of the art, semi submerged auditorium – acting as a music venue in season and a lecture theatre etc for the rest of the year
3. Insert a new crane/funfair like structure, which can unfold to provide lighting, AV, umbrella etc functions as required
4. Create a field of wave/wind powered lights, across the local bay

Philosophy:
The geographer and cultural theorist Manuel Castells has argued that our contemporary condition can be described as a “bipolar opposition between the net and the self”, and he has suggested that if we are to take control of our futures, and the futures of our cities, then we need to build what he calls “bridges” between what he calls “the space of flows” (ie global information and capital networks) and the “space of places” (ie the real, local world and its ecologies). He argues that places that do not robustly plug themselves into the global space of flows risk economic and social stagnation. Our approach bridges these spaces, by working with ecological models that combine and synergise natural and social ecosystems.

Sustainability:
In developing this proposal we have applied best practice thinking regarding sustainability, which is defined as working to the triple bottom line: People, Planet and Profit. We have developed a business model that turns problems with the local economy into opportunities, generating new business, culture and training.
The light field is a self powering system. We have maintained all of the important existing fabric, and have only introduced new structure where it can provide most value (all detailed specification will be according to Cradle2Cradle principles). We believe that there are opportunities for site micro energy generation – probably solar water heating and wind power… but to be determined….

Networks:
Birnbeck Island Bridge Ecology is an IT hub… kitted out with the latest AV, on-line and media interface gear
Media of all kinds are organised across the island according to Democratic Billboard principles: partnerships are formed with local councils, business and indeed multinational corporations. Space and time usage of the media infrastructure is allocated as:
20 % Art
20% BIBE
10% Local news/information
30% Local advertising
20% Global advertising

Battersea Liquidwood Station

Photo Voltaic powered fans at the base of each chimney draw air into the new heart of the building. Here CO2 and sunlight is used to feed a mix of specially selected (and possibly GM) micro organisms and algae in tanks, producing an organic sludge: Liquidwood. This sludge is pumped around London, and when combined on-site with a specially designed enzyme, solidifies to produce Sludgecrete, a revolutionary new building material as strong and plastic as concrete, with the environmental credentials of wood. Whereas conventional concrete has a high carbon footprint, Sludgecrete actually takes carbon out of the atmosphere and ties it up in buildings.

The proposal is an example of the the ability and need for architects to imagine, specify and demand sustainable near future materials and technologies. This project started as a speculative ideas proposal. However discussions with some research biologists suggest that the project is indeed viable, and so we now consider it a live research project. We are looking for biologists and materials scientists to partner us for future research funding bids… interested individuals should contact jon@wag-architecture.co.uk

Intellectual Property rights associated with the names ‘Liquidwood’ and ‘Sludgecrete’ remain with WAG Architecture Ltd.

NB An exclusive article containing images of Battersea Liquidwood Station will be appearing soon on Dark Roasted Blend

Location: Sheffield
Year: 2007
WAG: Architects
Project description: Competition Entry

A predominantly timber extension, this proposal weaves new media technology into a patterned wood panel facade – creating a distinctive new aesthetic combining luxury and function, appropriate to this Festival Centre brief. The roof gardens, themselves both pleasurable and functional (recycling greywater), when seen from the station and square spouting above the wooden weaves, suggest a basket of flowers – a gift to all who arrive in the city.

Our primary spatial move was to separate the volume of the new auditorium from the existing building creating an intense space between the two buildings, which we call the Show-Station. At ground level this space provides a public route through the centre, off of which are located a cafe terrace the box office and mediatheque. We have cut into the existing Showroom structure, creating stepped back terraces, which host a small ‘forest’, and allow light into the space, bouncing off strategically placed reflective surfaces. Above two bridges connect the new terraces in the old structure to the new building. One of these bridges is the main public access to the cinema. The other connects the new Workstation studios set into the roof gardens of the two buildings. We imagine the Show-Station space to be alive with media, used and curated by the Showroom and Workstation practices to showcase their work.

The woven timber facade wraps around the building. Along the long facade this breaks down into adjustable sun screens, shading the S-SE facing workstation windows in the existing building, which must suffer from over heating. Incorporated into this are visual media screens, used for advertising (both for Workstation based companies, and external revenue generators) and communications.

We propose to re-landscape the grass square in front of the building. The landscaping creates mounds to sit on, and a large screen at the end, which reflects sun back into the square, and can be used for public festival projections from the cinema.

SUSTAINABLE STRATEGIES
Our sustainable strategy has 6 main components:

SUN
Dealing with the sun on this site presents some challenges, and has structured much of the design. The site, and the public square in front, are potentially in the shade cast by the building for a lot of the time. Our proposal pulls away from the existing building, and bounces sunlight back down into the foyer. Furthermore, the screen at the opposite end of the square similarly bounces sunlight back into the square.
The new facade plays with the sun in a number of ways. We have placed adjustable sun screens (and media screens) across the south facing windows, allowing them to be shaded in the summer.
Meanwhile, the pattern of the facade generally would be fine tuned to work plastically with the sun. Each protruding facet contains a small PV cell sufficient to charge a bettery to power an LED light. At night this field of LEDs illuminates up out of the woven facade, as if light through the planet by the sun.

WIND FARM
A vertical helix wind farm installation on roof of existing building – harvesting updrafts created by building, and at higher level the wind passing along the valley. The helices are painted to produce animated op art effects.
GROUND SOURCE GEO-THERMAL HEATING
Below the ground in the re-landscaped square a ground source heat pump system is installed, to supply the Showroom and Workstation

UNDERGROUND AIR COOLING
Cooling for the foyer and office spaces is augmented by air passing through concrete tubes under the Show-Station space
WATER
Rainwater is harvested from the roofs, whilst greywater is sequentially cleaned by plants on the roof, before being recycled within the building.

BIO-DIVERSITY
The gardens on the roof of the buildings will work together with lawns in the square to add a significant new base for wildlife in the heart of the city.

We were charged with thinking about power needs in two distinct scenarios: the expansion of the leisure spaces and activities of the home into the garden, and the bulk delivery of power to buildings, developments and events which are ‘autonomous’, or not connected to the electric and gas networks.

It was my role to constantly remind them of their companies stated goal, which is to lead the world in the transition to an economy which is beyond petroleum..

I did not get to see much of Lisbon, but there is a great suspension bridge there…