PORTFOLIO OF PENG CHEN
Bachelor of Architecture
Department of Architecture and Built Environment, University of Nottingham chenuuupeng@gmail.com
The architecture is more than the creation of built forms; it induces the dialogue between people, space and time. I believe architecture is a medium that bridges the tangible physical realities of materiality and structure and intangible qualities of culture, memory and experience. The role of architect is to balance the need for sustainability and resolving social issues with the timeless pursuit of beauty and innovation. My works in the portfolio seek to explore this balance and create connection between people and local communities.
Reuse of the abandoned cityspace and exploration of the public relationship Pasta Community Centre
and Food-Orientated
Ireland Mine Retreat
Transformation of Irish industrial archeology masterpieces into a meditation destination
Milan Social Housing
A Manifesto on Minorities' Social Integration
Huairen Pet Market
A Flexible and Adpative Modular System of Pet Market
Timber Plant Stand An extendable plant stand using traditional timber interlocking techniques
Nottingham Cultural Centre
Reuse of the abandoned cityspace and exploration of the public relationship
Station St., Nottingham, United Kingdom
Year 2 Individual Work, 1,500 sqm
Instructor: Farida Makki
Nottingham is a city with rich cultural background, historical buildings (i.e. Wollaton Hall, City of Cave, ) and folk icons (i.e. Robin Hood) becomes tourist attractions and shapes the Nottingham's cultural identities. The architectures scattered around the cities are manifestations or storytellers of Nottingham history and create a spontaneous journey between the city centre region and the Trent District, where the Nottingham Train Station as well as our site are located. The Nottingham cultural centre, as either a starting point or an end point of the journey, gathering visitors and celebrating the diverse culture of Nottingham.
The project draws attention to the classical building facade and spatial typology inspired by some of the important buildings among Nottingham city. These buildings not only make reminiscent of the classical architectural elements of 'Portico', 'Square', 'Arch', 'Gallery' and 'Courtyard', but also raise the awareness of the public relationship between the building and the cityscape.
The project is located beside an elevated tramline, under which there are multiple abandoned archways. The presence of arches endow the site with strong public nature, that spontaneously associates the site with the public-private duality and transitional relationship. So the exploration of this public-private relationship based on classical elements would become the main design approach to capture the essence of the exsiting site conditions.
Palazzo Comunale, Piacenza, 1281 Piazza San Marco, Venice, 9th century Piazza del Popolo, Faenza, 1394-1875
Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, II, Milan, 1865-1877
Rotonda Foschini, Ferrara, 1773-1797
The arch gate of the building serves as the main entrance and a statement of the public nature of the cultural centre by itself, from which the architecture is connected wth the cityscape of Nottingham
The public square is coverd with concrete roof that tapers as it extends from the arch gate to portico of the building. The light beams illuminate the sunken stepped square where visitors gather and enjoy activities.
SQUARE
PORTICO
GALLERY
COURTYARD
Pasta Community Centre
Sustainable Urban Greenhouse and Food-Orientated Building Programs
Vandries St., Ten Street District, Liverpool, United Kingdom Year 3 Individual Work, 3,000 sqm Instructor: Farida Makki
This project mainly addresses the severe situation of food insecurity in Liverpool city caused by COVID-19 and BREXIT. The Ten Street Area with limited number of stable food source would become a test ground of urban food research and production. The potential of the food-orientated architecture would be explored to solve food insecurity issue and reconnect architecture, food and community.
The pasta has been chosen as the protagonist in this food-oientated building for its important role in daily source of nutrition. The legume-baed pasta becomes the substitute for conventional wheat-based pasta due to its advantages in health and sustainability aspects, which help establishing a greener food production system.
The building itself is a narrative of a closed- loop of food(pasta) lifecycle and the multiple programme are designed based on the pasta production from legume cultivation, to processing, cooking/dinning/marketing and finally, the biogas production to achieve a sustainable pasta production process.
The public nature of the building would be reinforced by the community-based activities happened inside the building, which can be a catalyst to rejunvanate Ten Street Area into a diverse and lively district.
This project addresses the negative impacts of COVID-19 and BREXIT on food insecurity problem in United Kingdom and Liverpool city.
Both Covid-19 and BREXIT have caused disruption in resources transcation and higher production cost in the food and agriculture sectors. The shortage of food supply and food price inflation in UK caused spreading phenomena of panic buying and increasing delivery of food parcels from food banks.
The Liverpool city has bad performance in its food sector in terms of food supply, food waste, food inequality and carbon emission. These issues become much more severe in the peripheral areas such as Ten Street Area which is a character zone located to the North of the city centre.
The Ten Street Area has low Health Food Access Score comparing to city centre, indicating the unconvenience of local residents to access healthy food. Although there are several small restaurants/ cafe on the Ten Street, most of them are small and old, providing insufficient nutrition for the daily food intake. For this reason, a stable and accessible source of food to feed the community in this area is really urgent, and this give a rationale and suitable context from which my project can arise.
Feeding the Community
32%
140,000 tonnes 368,000 tonnes most food-deprived city in UK with less than two supermarkets in deprived districts
3rd of annual food loss and waste in the city of Liverpool of annual
of people experience food and nutritional insecurity in Liverpool city
In face of the current food insecurity issue in Liverpool city and the lack of stable food source in Ten Street area, the project proposes to produce legume-based pasta as the carbonhydrate substitute for wheat-based pasta. This type of pasta has multiple benefits in both sustainability and health aspects, it has increasing demand over pasta years in UK which indicates opportunity in replacing conventional pasta as staple food
- Chickpea
more fibre than wheatbased pasta, which reducing risks of diabetes
more protein than wheatbased pasta, beneficial after exercise less of carbon emission per 1kg of legume-based pasta
- Black bean - Red lentils
- Mung bean
- Edamame
- Garden pea
freshwater eutrophication of legume-based pasta
- Black-eyed pea ....
The Ten Street District is featured by its grid of ten parallel streets that runs east to west and the building typology distribution is characterized by heavy industrial services and warehouses with limited number of food shop and public space for gathering. In order to rejuvenate and transform the Ten Street into a more vibrant district, my design approach aims at creating a community-based public space full of various activities and food resources.
My site is located on the Vandries Street and there are two main reasons why this location has been chosen.
Two faces of blank red brick facade of the adjacent building are facing to my site. It certainly provides oppotunity for vertical farming of legume plants instead of leaving it as blank wall
My project produces legume-based pasta with high carbonhydrate and protein, it is suitable to locate the project near the MMA Academy so it can become a canteen in which people can take highly nutritional food after exercise. 1 2
The project would be a foodorientated building aims at producing enough pasta for the Ten Street neighborhood while the pasta production and cooking experience would be celebrated
Comparing to current UK food production system, my project would be environmental friendly and sustainable in its programs associated with pasta production.
The project seeks to make connection with the MMA Academy that people can come to the building for nutritional intake. This strong bond creates a sense of community
Chickpea elbows Edamame spaghetti Red lentil spaghetti
Food-Orientated Architecture
The building is designed based on four main programs associated with pasta to exhibit nature of food-orientated architecture. The spatial arrangement attempts at creating a fluent legume-based pasta pasta production process.The architectural design concepts shown on the right of the panel are conceived to reinforce the idea of 'food-orientation' and can be demonstrated from the section diagram
Tectonic section
Ireland Mine Retreat
Transformation of Irish industrial archeology masterpieces into a retreat and meditation destination
Allihies, County Cork, Ireland
Individual Work, 1,000 sqm Instructor: Finn Lam
Allihies is a village associated with mine history and situated among the hills where the ruins of ancient copper mines stand. The architectures towering over Allihies mines have became a symbolic guardian of the town and the vast natural landscape.
The natural scenaries can be considered as more valuable resources than copper metal of this land. The project proposes an architectural solution to transform the ruins into a retreat and meditation destination for hikers and visitors who desire to escape from the urban environment. The design aims at creating immersive and solitary experiences with the beauty of this timeless natural paradise in Ireland.
The design approach is developed based on the original plan and orientation of the ruined building, so the project is more like an extension of the ruin towards the Altlantic Sea.
The retreat consists of multiple public functions including viewing platform, meeting space, bathhouse, etc... and private dwelling units with respective meditation cabin. These programme are located along the slope of the Allihies to capture the panoramic view of the natural landscape.
The site is located at the top of the Allihies, with an iconic stone ruin towering over the hill. This leftover building has a unique plan and section incorporated with the slope of the hill.
The grid system of the ruin is taken as reference to develop the plan of the retreat. So the project can be seen as an extension of the original ruin of copper mine with a series of block arranged along the hill.
The terrain line of the Allihies also helps sculpting the massing of the retreat, orientating the block at 45 degree angle.
The copper material is vastly used for fenestration, handrail, roofing in the project to remind visitors the long mining history of this land
View of the outdoor platform
View of the terrace View upon the outdoor stairacse
Distant view of the retreat
View of the bathhouse
Indoor
Interior of living units
Axonometruc View of Retreat Unit
Milan Social Housing
A Manifesto on Minorities' Social Integration
Milan, Italy
Individual Work , 1,000 sqm
Instructor: Arnold Yu
Milan is the economic capital of Italy with high proportion of immigrants of its total population. This project draws attention to social minorities of refugee and low-income immigrants who suffered from lack of basic physilogical needs including shelter and food.
Traditional social housing in Milan only focus on minimum physical requirement, providing low-standard apartment to immigrants and refugee. However, this project not only put attention on solve the basic survival needs of immigrants lived in Milan, but also attempts to their self-identity and sense of belongings to the community.
According to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, the needs of immigrants can be summarized into three categores -- 'Identity', 'Quality' and 'Community'. These three requirements become the design driver of ths soial housing project in Milan. A personlised modular living units, together with public functional units, create a comprehensive and friendly housing cluster with sense of community in the periphery of Milan.
Immigrants and Social Housing Estate
Milan is home to a large number of immigrants - approximately 20% of the population. There are 129,000 refugees and low-income group of people among these immigrants, who experience issues of survival and social segregation. They find themselves difficult to blend with local residents and struggle to have shelter, food and jobs. This project targets to find a new solution of social housing that not only solve the essential physiological needs of this group of population minorities, but also help them find social identity and belongings.
The site is located at Lambro Meridionale, which is a region with a vast area of old social housing estate. This large estates of social housing in Milan occurred in the period of intensive industrialisation and associated urbanisation from the late 1940s to the mid-1970s. Like other social housing estate, this scheme occurred in the periphery of the city (i.e. to the southern part of Milan), which cause social geography change.
Today housing estates are more heterogeneous in terms of the social and ethnic groups who live there. The estates is distant from city centre, thus have limited access to any sort of centrality, symbolic values, public and cultural services, resulting in ethnice segregation. Apart from that, the majority of the apartment/ buildings also shows signs of physical deterioration, affecting the quality of life.
Maslow's Hierarchy Of Needs
The project uses Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs to identify current issues faced by the low-income immigrants and refugees lived in Milan. The conventional social
projects located in this area put more attentions to solve the basic physiological needs. However, this project attempts to satisfy immigrant's higher level of needs including dignity and sense of belongings.
The conventional social housing buildings are results of mass-production, which produce apartment look like prison without sense of identity. The project seeks to find personalised solution that reflect identity of individuals.
The lack of shelters, jobs, food of lowincome immigrants and refugee negatively affect the quality of their lifes. The project should seek improvement in life quality of all different apects
As
and
Grattosoglio, tower apartments designed by BBPR.
Grattosoglio, tower apartments designed by BBPR.
First Floor
Massing
Shifting and Variation
Staircase core
The residents uses the sharing kitchen and dinning space for their daily meals
The residents enjoy the friendly nad calming atomsphere created by the combination of various materiality and natural landscape
The balcony/corridor space that connecting the first floor of residential units Residents have chats at public realm
Residents walking the dog
Huairen Pet Market
A Flexible and Adpative Modular System of Pet Market
Huairen city, Shanxi Province, China
Group Work , 500 sqm
Instructor: Finn Lam
Duty: Diagram production, Plan production, Construction
This project aims at creating an adaptive and versatile pet market in the form of a light-weight steel modular structure, which is designed based on cybernetic theory that prioritizes spatial dyamics, user behaviors and adaptability, to revitalize the abandoned space underneath the bridge.
According to cyernetics and site condition, the design starts with taking the spatial elements of columns and boundaries of the bridge as the controlling point, based on which a grid system is developed. This grid system gives clues on how to demarcating the space into different modules according to various people's behaviors and activities. The programme primarily consists of sales and leisure as well as circulation.
These three-dimensional modules have feasibilities in installation and allocation, thus during different time such as weekday, holiday or weekend can have different modes of functions. During weekday and holiday, the structures become playground for residents and children while during weenkend it is transformed into pet marketing space.
The site is located under an elevated bridge in Huairen City, Shanxi Province, adjacent to the Dog Market Square. It is mainly engaged in pet business and has a market during weekends. The current condition of the market is quite chaotic and unfriendly to the visitors and consumers. The goal of the project is to transform the original pet market into a place in which a better and more diverse shopping and leisure experiences are provided.
The light-weight steel structure is designed based on cyberetic theory that addresses spatial adaptability and flexitibility. From survey and interviews of local residents, the behaviors and activities become the design generators and factors to determine the evolution and development of the design. The site starts with a grid system to determine the primary horizontal and logitudinal pathways. The steel modules or lattices for sales function are allocated to demarcate the spatial arrangement of the space. The sale of the pet consists of four forms: 'column', 'lattice',
Site: Huairen City, Shanxi Province
Concept Generation Based on Cedric Price Design Theory
'tricycle', 'on ground'.
Huairen Pet Market
Tricycle On Ground
Column Lattice
Project
Facade
The edge of the ground pattern was designated with the tape and the pattern was painted on the ground, waiting for dry after painting process.
The materials were transported to the site and the localisation of each steel foundation was carried out through alignment of strings.
The joints of the foundation, lateral and longitudinal steel bars are assembled together to form the frame structures.
Overview of the project underneath the bridge
The central walkway with timber floor tile
The polycarbonate facade is printed with pet information and graphics
Playground
Playgroud for children during weekday
The facade of polycarbonate and canvas under sunlight
The facade consists of canvas, polycarbonate boards and meshes, before installation, screen printing techniques are used to print different texts and patterns on them.
Timber Plant Stand
An extendable plant stand using traditional timber interlocking techniques
/ Year 3 Integrated Design Project Instructor: Margaret Mulcahy
This project originated from one of the module called Integrated Design of Architecture, is associated with the final year project and aims at making an 'artefact' to improve certain aspect of the building.
Since my final year project put much attention in gardening activities, so the first idea came up to my mind is a sustainable timber plant stand that is easily installed and demounted.
From research, the traditional Japanese joinery of Cidori employed in Kengo Kuma's architectures have inspired to focus on timber interlocking techniques. This makes me reminiscent of Chinese timber techniques of Sunmou Joint and Kong Ming Lock.
In this project, the structural logic of Sunmou Joint and Kong Ming Lock would be analysed and evaluated to determine which joint is more suitable to be used for the modular plant stand unit. A final 1:1 artefact would be produced as the final outcome of the project.
