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ENGLISH
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EDITORIAL
COPPER ARCHITECTURE AND DIVERSITY This issue features the results of the 2015 European Copper in Architecture Awards. We want to take this opportunity to congratulate all those who have received awards or were shortlisted, and thank everyone who entered. One trend that our panel of architect judges picked up on from the Awards is the growing diversity of building types where copper plays a leading role – with a sports hall, office tower, ferry terminal buildings and individual homes, alongside prominent public buildings traditionally more associated with copper, all within the Shortlist. Several of the Awards projects (pages 4 – 11) have been covered in previous issues and you can explore them again via copperconcept.org. But one entry, an Alpine villa in Italy (pages 12 – 17) is considered in detail and reveals a robust design response to its stunning location. Apart from the Awards, architectural diversity continues with an uncompromising city-centre supermarket in the UK (pages 18 – 21) clad entirely in bronze and glass. Perhaps even more surprising is the transformation from engineering to architecture of a pumping station in northern Germany (pages 22 – 23) with pierced golden copper alloy cladding.
The public archive building typology presents particular challenges for designers and the Awards include a fine interpretation (page 11). It makes an interesting comparison with another example in Nuremberg, Germany (pages 24 – 27). Here, a carefully detailed and vertically structured copper box is separated by glazing from its sandstone base. This ‘copper on top’ approach has also been adopted for a cultural centre in Sweden (pages 28 – 31), where a golden copper alloy crown surmounts the simple white box below. New opportunities with perforated metals continue to fascinate designers and copper is no exception. Maximising freedom of expression, the façade of a spa in Zaragoza, Spain (pages 32 – 33) uses the technology to generate complex patterns and images, with a similar approach used internally for screens to rooflights. More perforated copper and another spa – this time part of a water-side development near Oslo (pages 34 – 35). Here, the pattern of perforations is repeated to generate a uniting theme throughout the complex. Our last project is probably the most unusual of all: a floating, copper-clad restaurant (pages 36 – 39) in Helsinki. There really are no limits to the architectural potential of copper. The Editorial Team
Register for Copper Architecture Forum – copperconcept.org
Editor in Chief: Robert Pintér
View magazine back issues – copperconcept.org
Editor: Chris Hodson RIBA
Contact the Editorial Team – editorialteam@copperconcept.org
Editorial team: Ari Lammikko, Chris Hodson, Graeme Bell, Herbert Mock, Hermann Kersting, Irina Dumitrescu, Robert Pinter
Upload your project to the website – copperconcept.org See the European Copper in Architecture Awards – copperconcept.org Copper Architecture Forum 39, November 2015 Copper Architecture Forum is part of the ”European Copper In Architecture Campaign”. It is published twice a year and has a circulation of 25.000 copies. The magazine is distributed to architects and building professionals throughout Europe – and beyond – in English, Czech, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Russian and Spanish languages.
E-mail: editorialteam@copperconcept.org Address: CAF, European Copper Institute, Avenue de Tervueren 168 b-10, B-1150 Brussels, Belgium Publisher: Nigel Cotton, ECI Layout and technical production: ECI Printing: Copy & Consulting Kft., Hungary Editorial panel: Birgit Schmitz, De Kazimierz Zakrzewski, Pl Marco Crespi, It Nicholas Hay, UK Nikolaos Vergopoulos, Gr Nuno Diaz, Es Olivier Tissot, Fr Pia Voutilainen, Se, No, Fi, Dk Robert Pintér, Hu, Cz, Svk, Ru Yolande Pianet, Benelux
birgit.schmitz@copperalliance.de kazimierz.zakrzewski@copperalliance.pl marco.crespi@copperalliance.it nick.hay@copperalliance.org.uk nick.vergopoulos@copperalliance.gr nuno.diaz@copperalliance.es olivier.tissot@copperalliance.fr pia.voutilainen@copperalliance.se robert.pinter@copperalliance.hu yolande.pianet@copperalliance.eu
Front Cover: Flood Prevention Pumping Station, Lingen, Germany (page 22) Photo: KME Back cover: Alps Villa, Lumezzane, Italy (page 12) Photo: Nicolò Galeazzi
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© Copper Architecture Forum 2015
CONTENTS
39
2 COPPER ARCHITECTURE AND DIVERSITY – editorial comment
4 – 11 REWARDING COPPER ARCHITECTURE – the 2015 European
Copper in Architecture Awards: the results and judges’ comments
12 – 17 CONTEXTUAL COPPER – a modern house in the mountains making
the most of its stunning location
18 – 21 REVITALIZING RETAIL ARCHITECTURE – bronze enhances the
architectural qualities of this city centre supermarket
22 – 23 INSPIRING ARCHITECTURAL ENGINEERING – an exemplary
alternative to utilitarian infrastructure buildings
24 – 27 CUBIC COPPER – a restrained material palette featuring copper
defines this new archive building
28 – 31 CULTURAL COPPER – golden copper alloy crowns the new civic
centre for culture in Landvetter, Sweden
32 – 33 THERAPEUTIC PERFORATIONS – this oriental spa façade
stretches copper perforation technology to the limit
34 – 35 THEMATIC PERFORATIONS – perforated panels of golden copper
alloy enhance a spa and residential development
36 – 39 COPPER AFLOAT – this copper-clad restaurant is the first floating
public building in Finland
© Copper Architecture Forum 2015
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AWARDS 2015
REWARDING
COPPER ARCHITECTURE by Chris Hodson
HIGH STANDARDS
An international team of architect judges has chosen the outright Winner and four Commendations for the 2015 European Copper in Architecture Awards, a celebration of the very best in contemporary architecture. But our website users also had their say with the Public Choice poll Winner.
The judges were impressed by the high standards demonstrated across the entries generally. But eventually they settled on shortlisted projects (described here by their architects).
The seventeenth iteration of these popular, biennial architectural awards recognises the growing influence of copper and its alloys on modern design. But it also exposes to a wider international audience inspirational projects, some of which might otherwise go unrecognised. This year, over 50 entries were received from 17 countries. This year’s judging panel consisted of four architects: Ulla Hell (PLASMA studio, Italy); Erik Nobel (NOBEL arkitekter, Denmark); Fernando Sá (Pitágoras Aquitectos, Portugal) and Keith Williams (keith williams architects, UK). All have been recipients of previous Copper in Architecture Awards and therefore understand the aims of the programme from the competitors’ viewpoint as well as that of the judges.
Chair of the Judges, Keith Williams commented: “Whilst there was a considerable degree of unanimity amongst the judges, there was also extensive debate. Neither the scale of project nor the quantity of copper used was regarded a factor, as is evidenced from the range of projects shortlisted. The judges were far more interested in the contribution that copper and its alloys can make to the creation of fine architecture. Arriving at the top 10 was far from easy and all those shortlisted have produced exceptional work. But the task of choosing an outright winner alongside four outstanding commendations proved even more demanding.”
PUBLIC CHOICE During the summer, registered copperconcept.org visitors voted on-line for their favourite shortlisted Awards entry. More information and images of all the 2015 entries and previous Awards can be viewed at:
copperconcept.org/awards
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WINNER
TROLLBEADS HOUSE, COPENHAGEN, DENMARK, DESIGNED BY BBP ARKITEKTER A 1960s office building has been transformed into a high security building, organised like a Venetian merchant house, with goods loaded at the ground floor, stock and offices above, and, at the highest level, a residence for the owner with a roof terrace. The challenge was to make a building that respects its curtain wall typology, while relating to the historic houses on either side. A new skin of glass and golden copper alloy covers the facade, the roof and a small courtyard at the back. On the outside a patterned, perforated golden copper alloy curtain is hung, incorporating motorized folding elements. Every morning half of the curtain opens, emulating the adjacent historic houses with repeating window reveals in a ‘massive’ wall. After working hours the curtain closes automatically, creating a burglar-proof vault. After dark, dim lighting reveals a modern glass house behind a veil of translucent golden copper alloy.
Photos: Jens Markus Lindhe
THE JUDGES’ VIEWS
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This transformable building is a unique and powerful response to its urban context – surprising, yet obvious. It effortlessly overcomes the constraints of an existing building frame without compromise and reflects the rhythm of the streets. The central concept is carried through undiluted and executed with care to an impressive level of detail.
[Featured in our 37/2014 issue, page 8] COPPERCONCEPT.ORG 5
Photo: Filip Dujardin
COMMENDED & PUBLIC CHOICE WINNER HOUSE VDV, DESTELBERGEN, BELGIUM, DESIGNED BY GRAUX & BAEYENS ARCHITECTEN
House VDV appears simultaneously familiar and strange. The basic volume, consisting of a ground floor and upper level within a pitched roof, alludes to familiar archetypes such as the rural farmhouse or barn. Yet, at the same time, the simplicity of the volume is broken up by large glass facades, establishing relationships with the surrounding trees and listed castle wall surrounding the plot.
THE JUDGES’ VIEWS
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The abstract, diagrammatic rationale behind this design is seductive and delivered with conviction as a pavilion within a walled garden. The conventional use of copper does not detract from its strong form and subversion of the traditional gabled house. Mandatory planning requirements for the plot made sure that the house was conceived as a pavilion. The solution is essentially a garden-house with no front or rear but, instead, two identical facades and a 360-degree experience of the entire plot. The untreated copper cladding will continuously change colour over the years, from bright in the beginning to brown and eventually green at the end. It gives the project a poetic impermanence, which is echoed in the reflection of the surrounding trees in the glass facades. [Featured in our 37/2014 issue, page 18]
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AWARDS 2015
COMMENDED FERRY TERMINAL BUILDINGS, STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN, DESIGNED BY MARGE ARKITEKTER The buildings serve travellers heading to the Stockholm archipelago and are located in one of the city’s most visited areas opposite the Royal Palace. There are three new buildings: two terminals and one building with a café, viewing steps, storage and a recycling station. The buildings are scaled down in relation to the surrounding architecture, maintaining open views of the Royal Palace. The design is based on an elementary form – the cone – framing different views over the water. The cones are combined in different ways to meet the demands of the different operations, resulting in buildings with no specific fronts or backs.
THE JUDGES’ VIEWS
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This powerful group of buildings along Stockholm’s waterfront is truly special and defies the mundane ferry terminal building typology. Deferential in scale to their historic neighbours, the buildings make no architectural concessions and instantly add to the city’s heritage. Each building is unique but together they create a cohesive expression for visitors. Exterior facades are covered with burnished brass alloy, accentuating the sculptural form of the buildings with a gradually evolving surface. Glazing by the waiting hall and the sales areas is drawn back to give rain shelter and to provide space for displays. Due to the construction of the buildings a precise expression has been created where guttering and drain pipes can be avoided. [Featured in our 36/2014 issue, page 20]
Photo: Johan Fowelin
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AWARDS 2015
COMMENDED
SPORTS HALL, ST MARTIN, AUSTRIA, DESIGNED BY DIETGER WISSOUNIG ARCHITEKTEN At the front of the elongated structure is the main entrance with a small forecourt. The three-storey building has been lowered four metres below street level in order to create a direct underground access to the adjacent school and to give the extensive hall with a total height of 11.8 metres an appropriate form in the locality.
THE JUDGES’ VIEWS
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A deceptively simple design cleverly incorporating below-ground space, this sports hall box is beautifully done, even though defined by its programme and flat site. Its detailed execution is exemplary, with uninterrupted glazing and a subtle use of perforated copper.
The building’s appearance is characterised by a façade made of folded, perforated copper plates covering the hall like a semi-transparent veil. The copper sheets are staggered by one folded element at each storey, which structures the front horizontally. The façade is interrupted by glazing on the upper floor at the northeast side and on the ground floor at the southeast side. The former ensures an even and glare-free incidence of daylight in addition to the numerous skylights, while the latter provides a view into the sports hall from the schoolyard. [Featured in our 38/2015 issue, page 24]
Photo: © paul ott photografiert
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Photo: Julien Lanoo
COMMENDED EURAVENIR TOWER, LILLE, FRANCE, DESIGNED BY LAN
The Euravenir Tower project occupies the last free parcel of Phase One of the Euralille Area. The plot’s strategic position, located at the intersection of different axes, demanded a sophisticated solution that acts as a hub, uniting the elements gravitating around it. By extending and crossing the axes within the plot, an initial extrusion generated a small tower. With completion of the Avenue Le Corbusier, this vertical element also becomes a corner building on the Place Valladolid signalling the city to approaching drivers.
THE JUDGES’ VIEWS
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This free-standing, crystalline copper tower is handsome in its own right with a simplicity of form, considered use of materials and crisp detailing. But it also plays a key urban design role in a very public situation, uniting and making sense of its surroundings.
This architecture has created a new urban space that combines private and public, vertical and horizontal. The facades become a series of windows that provide a 360-degree panorama of the city. Here, a lattice motif is formed by cut-outs in the facades. The copper is used as a kind of fixed edge along the opaque or semi-glazed stretches of the façade. It is also present in the form of perforated panels that help regulate the amount of light penetrating the building.
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SHORTLISTED
MUSEUM OF THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR OF 1870 AND THE ANNEXATION, FRANCE, DESIGNED BY BRUNO MADER ARCHITECTES Clad in patinated brass, the monolithic building marries a simple plan form with irregular rooflines. The roof folds along eastwest axes, creating a dialogue of slopes and fragmenting the volume, gashed with glazed openings to capture the north light. These illuminate a central double-height entrance hall space in such a way that it feels neither interior nor exterior. This focal point is a dramatic space, whose dark, irregular walls and lacerated roof symbolise war. The huge panels of patinated metal that form the hall’s walls are the same as those used on the facades, giving a powerful identity, coherence and sculptural character.
Photo: Alan Williams
GREAT JAMES STREET, LONDON, UK, DESIGNED BY EMRYS ARCHITECTS A bronze triangulated roof form now sits over landlocked space to the rear of two historic townhouses, creating a dramatic transition from the old to the new, its height and form designed to fit key points around the perimeter. The patina of the bronze on this contemporary folded roof, as well as courtyard facades and window surrounds, was selected to harmonise with the existing buildings. An asymmetric lofted ceiling sits under the new roof with recessed lighting accentuating the geometric planes. Use of roof lights and glazed access to courtyard areas has ensured that the building is flooded with light.
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AWARDS 2015
Photo: Christian Richters
KUNSTMUSEUM, AHRENSHOOP, GERMANY, DESIGNED BY STAAB ARCHITEKTEN The design concept represents reinterpretation of the local vernacular typology into a modern museum structure. Emerging from thatched-roof houses, a constellation of single-room buildings has been developed. By fusing the roof forms, a sculptural building volume is generated that unites these apparently freestanding structures into a single complex. For the external skin, bevelled brass sheets refer to the linear texture of reed thatching. The brass will quickly weather to give a darker surface reminiscent of thatched roofs. The desired surface irregularity was achieved using subtle variations in the profiles and the product develops an unexpectedly varied look. [Featured in our 35/2013 issue, page 34]
RHONE DEPARTMENT ARCHIVES, LYON, FRANCE, DESIGNED BY GAUTIER + CONQUET & ASSOCIES
Photo: Renaud Araud
This prominent civic building reconciles the need to protect the collection while welcoming the public, as part of the urban and cultural process. The technical challenge is to supply air with a highly stable level of humidity whilst maintaining low energy consumption. The project is conceived as a hierarchy of boxes of differing scales, one inside the other. The main cubic volumes are made up of precious materials: stone, a golden copper alloy and glass. The central section encloses the archives with copper alloy embossed panels while the top contains the offices, behind a ventilated double skin glass envelope, like a lid on a precious casket. [Featured in our 38/2015 issue, page 28]
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SHORTLISTED ALPS VILLA, LUMEZZANE, ITALY, DESIGNED BY CAMILLO BOTTICINI ARCHITETTO This final project shortlisted for the 2015 Awards is featured over the next 6 pages.
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CONTEXTUAL COPPER COPPERCONCEPT.ORG 13
Shortlisted for the 2015 Awards, this Alpine villa gives a strong contextual response to its exceptional location in Lumezzane, Italy. Here, architect Camillo Botticini provides an insight into its design. The house stands on a steep slope in a woodland clearing, 700 metres above sea level and next to a road connecting two valleys. The landscape is characterized by an open valley to the south and a frame of green mountains with peaks of dolomite rock to the north. The materials of the project create a relationship between the plot and the landscape. The house seems to bite into the mountain: it is deep-rooted to the north and “emancipated” to the south, through an overhang that turns the house to the valley.
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THREE BUILDING FORMS To the north, a courtyard patio opens towards the profile of the dolomite rock spires above. To the south, a massive splayed window mediates between the interior of the living areas and the landscape. The plan of the house is an irregular C-shape wrapping around the patio. The fourth side is defined by a green landscape area that generates three building forms with variable heights, increasing from northeast, where the volume disappears, inserting itself into the ground. The first body contains three bedrooms, two with windows facing the patio, while the third relates to a cut-out that opens the master bedroom and its bathroom to the west into the clearing. The central, second body – with a height between 3.50 and 4.50 metres – introduces the living room. This continues with the dining area, to the east with a double height, continuous space and, at its highest part, a loft study below which the kitchen opens onto the patio.
GROUND FLOOR PLAN 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
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Elevator shaft Kitchen Bathroom Living room Bedroom Patio
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MODULATED COPPER WALLS The house maintains its primary relationship with the landscape, uninterrupted by artificial elements, other than the suspended staircase that floats above the grass slope. The green meadows and trees frame the building’s external skin made of corrugated pre-oxidised copper and Accoya wood. Architect: Camillo Botticini Architetto Copper Installer: Domenico Belingheri - Colere (BG) Copper Product: TECU® Oxid Photos: Nicolò Galeazzi
The copper, timber and triple glazing of the windows provide a counterpoint that interacts with nature. The ventilated copper walls are modulated with a slight pleating, its non-reflective surface almost quivering in the light, while the timber of the great splay reflects southern light.
MORE ONLINE
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REVITALIZING
RETAIL ARCHITECTURE A thoroughly modern application of bronze cladding adds permanence and enhances the impressive architectural qualities of this city-centre supermarket as its designer Matt Brook, director of architects Broadway Malyan, explains. 18 COPPER ARCHITECTURE FORUM 39/2015
Photo: Edmund Sumner
This project seeks to demonstrate that the key to good supermarket design is the promotion of place – and integral to this is the importance of sensitive scaling, well-considered geometry and thoughtful materiality. Located on a key arterial route into the city centre of Chester, UK, the scheme comprises a new flagship Waitrose retail store together with a fully integrated public realm including a new pedestrian bridge across the canal.
The project is designed as a southern gateway to the city’s Central Business Quarter, which also includes another of our projects - a mixed-use scheme on the opposite side of the canal, incorporating Chester’s protected shot tower and former lead works. The shot tower, built in 1799, is probably the oldest such structure still standing in the world and, at around 51m, the tallest building in Chester. It was used for dropping molten lead through a copper sieve at the top of the tower so that the falling drops formed balls of lead shot for muskets used in the Napoleonic Wars.
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Photo: Graeme Cooper
CLARITY AND SIMPLICITY Within its historic urban setting, the clarity and elemental simplicity of the supermarket’s colonnade design provide an elegant, rhythmic module that unifies the building’s appearance, creating a strong civic presence. Active frontages along the principal facades engage with the surrounding area. This is particularly evident in the design of the retail units along Boughton Road, which animate the streetscape along a key route into the city centre. Central to the scheme’s public realm is a sloped walkway that runs parallel to the building’s west elevation and travelator hall. This allows the lower level car parking to be concealed, while providing level access to the new footbridge that links directly with the wider Chester Central master-plan.
The specific alignment of the supermarket and the adjoining walkway, moreover, essentially enhance views of the shot tower from Boughton Road, thus providing this historic structure with a new urban purpose as a way-finding device for the rail station and the Chester Business Quarter. From a tectonic standpoint, the Waitrose store is articulated as a steel frame construction with the first floor constructed from precast hollow-core concrete planks topped with a structural concrete screed. The colonnade and primary structural elements expressed on the exterior of the building are set out on a 7.9m structural grid and clad in sheet bronze, with the principal elevations being clad in either perforated bronze sheets or glazed with a curtain wall capped with perforated bronze fins. Both are set out vertically on a 1.128m grid sub-module of the primary structural grid.
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FIRST FLOOR PLAN 9 1 8 4
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1. Waitrose 2. Retail unit 1 3. Retail unit 2 4. Sloped public realm 5. Store car park 6. Footbridge 7. Consented planning scheme for Broadway Malyan designed Shot Tower 8. Future development phase 9. Steam Mill 10. Canal
STRONG NATURAL COLOUR Bronze was selected at an early design stage. We wanted to use a material for the expressed frame that would reference the area’s industrial heritage, particularly of metalworking. In addition, the strong, natural colour of the weathering bronze complements the surrounding historic brick and sandstone buildings. From the outset, the BREEAM ‘Excellent’ rated project was committed to reducing the energy demands of the building. The design and orientation of the travelator hall on the west elevation, for example, allow it to passively heat the store; while the use of perforated bronze fins, attached to the glazed curtain wall mullions, provides solar shading during the most intense sunlight, so reducing demand on the air conditioning system. Furthermore, the abundance of natural daylight to the main public entrance lobbies and travelator hall reduces the requirement for artificial lighting during the day.
Photo: Edmund Sumner Architect: Broadway Malyan Copper Installer: Varla Copper Product: Nordic Bronze
WEST ELEVATION 1. Waitrose - Main store / Sloped public realm 2. Car park entrance/exit 3. Retail unit 1 4. Foot bridge 5. Consented planning scheme for Broadway Malyan designed Shot Tower 5
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INSPIRING
ARCHITECTURAL
ENGINEERING by Chris Hodson Flood prevention pumping stations are a common sight in northern Germany, typified by massive concrete bases, culverts and other hydrological elements, with the pumping equipment housed in simple structures, generally constructed in brick. In the case of Lingen in Germany, a new pumping station uses four inclined Archimedes’ screws to lift up excess water from low-lying land into the River Ems above. As usual, the base is concrete – but here the pumps are housed in a distinctive, polygonal form clad in a golden copper alloy. Circular perforations of varying sizes in the metal panels are carefully arranged to emulate the flow of bubbling water being forced up the incline by the four screws before cascading into the river. Located close to housing on the eastern edge of the town, the pumping station is served by public walkways for residents to enjoy. The sculptural golden copper alloy structure celebrates the function it contains and offers an inspirational alternative to purely utilitarian structures normally associated with this typology.
Architect: Vickers Krieger Architekten, Architekt Arnd Vickers Copper Installer: Peters Stahlbau GmbH, Itterbeck, Germany Copper Product: TECU® Brass_Bond Photos: KME
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CUBIC COPPER As part of a restrained material palette, copper facades add a subtle richness to the deceptively simple forms of this archive building in Nuremberg, Germany, described by its architects gmp.
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The new building for the State Archive of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Bavaria is located on a former factory site in the very vicinity of the former archive. With 34 kilometres of shelving, the archive now has more than twice its previous storage space and, in addition, a restoration workshop and rooms for visitors. The archive houses many original documents – including letters by Martin Luther, documents by popes and emperors, and numerous historically important books and paintings – protected by a passive air conditioning system. The new building consists of two intersecting solid cubes floating above a transparent, recessed ground floor. The structure rises up from a basement plinth about a metre high along the road, which develops into a full storey height along the downward slope towards the south, and is topped with a large terrace enjoying views of the Wöhrder See lake. The composition defines a solitary, sculptural building with principal facades on all sides. It thereby confines the adjacent Zeissstrasse on the one side and the garden of the Theological Seminary on the other. Viewed from across the garden, the new archive building appears as a continuation and extension of the Theological Seminary. Visitors enter public areas of the archive via Veilhofstrasse. From there they can reach the lecture hall, which can also be used for exhibitions. This hall presents a welcoming public frontage to the corner of Veilhof-/Zeissstrasse. The reading room faces both east and west and is located on the quiet garden side. The offices are located above, on two levels surrounding the archive areas, and provide easy access for staff to the repository. The repository areas themselves occupy four floors above the ground floor, as well as the two lower ground floors. As the first lower ground floor extends out on the slope towards the south, access is available from Zeissstrasse to the workshop and service rooms.
Architects: von Gerkan, Marg and Partner (gmp) Copper Product: TECU® Classic Photos: Christian Gahl
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COPPER CLOSE-UP
RESTRAINED MATERIAL PALETTE The plinth of the reinforced steel structure is clad with reddish sandstone, forming a continuation of the existing sandstone wall and anchoring the building in its landscape context. The external walls of the archive are finished in a shiny copper facade with a subtle vertical structure. The natural metal surface will undergo continuing natural oxidisation and colour changes until it finally develops a velvety, dark brown appearance.
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GROUND FLOOR PLAN 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Lobby Passageway Convention room Reading room Terrace
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SOUTH ELEVATION
office
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CULTURAL COPPER A new cultural centre in the Swedish town of Landvetter is conceived as a simple white box with a golden copper alloy crown, as its designers Fredblad Arkitekter explain.
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The building program included spaces for cultural activities including music, dance and drama classes, a public library and an auditorium for 150 people. The location right in the centre of Landvetter makes the building an urban hub and a key element of the design was to create a public meeting place for the citizens. The interior of the building is gathered around a bright atrium with circular skylights, a wide stair with seating and pine plywood cladding for walls and ceiling.
A culture centre should draw attention to itself – be festive and daring in its appearance. But it must also fit in and become a natural part of its context. The building’s design draws from the duality between the lower two floors and the top floor’s recessed volume set behind a roof garden. The white rendered base of the building brightens the space around it. Then, for the top floor, we needed a colourful and reflective material that would emphasize the angled façade and roof.
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GOLDEN COPPER ALLOY Here, the building sparkles with a faceted surface of golden copper alloy that gives a hint of the building’s exciting interior activities. The choice of metal had symbolic as well as architectural and practical reasons. Copper and its alloys are high-end materials with a certain civic status and feel, offering a good contrast to the simpler materials used for the interior and also referencing musical instruments made of brass. Some interior detailing is in brass, connecting it with the exterior copper alloy. The result is a new meeting place for the inhabitants of Landvetter - a simple white box with a golden copper alloy crown gleaming in the evening sun’s last rays.
Architect: Fredblad Arkitekter Copper Installer: Hisingstads Bleck- och Plåtslageri AB Copper Product: Nordic RoyalTM Photos: Per Kårehed
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THERAPEUTIC PERFORATIONS
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Copper perforation technology is taken to the limit with this decorative façade – interrupted only by its moon gate entrance and secondary peephole – announcing a new oriental spa in Zaragoza, Spain. Its designers Magén Arquitectos tell us more.
The ground floor of a residential building has been converted to the Liang Xin Spa, a centre for oriental therapies based on traditional Chinese imperial techniques, whose philosophy is to combine mind, body and spirit to achieve optimal health and wellness. The design aims to create an urban oasis, conducive to relaxation and wellness. The property has two distinct areas. The first, parallel to the street facade, is rectangular with uniform height. The second area runs along an internal courtyard and has a gabled roof, lit by a series of skylights. The internal spaces are organized around three aisles – ‘Imperial Walk’ and ‘Empress Walk’, with a third under the skylights. On the street, the new Spa is celebrated by a complex graphic design generated with circular perforations of varying sizes in copper sheets, making up the unique façade. The same technique is used internally with perforated copper sheets screening skylights to give indirect lighting, enhancing the relaxing atmosphere.
Generating the graphic design using perforated copper sheets (405 mm wide) Images created by round perforations of varying diameters. Gradual dissolution of the images, using round perforations with varying diameters, decreasing as they move away from the main images.
Architect: Magén Arquitectos Copper Installer: Innovhogar Copper Product: TECU® Classic Photos: Pedro Pegenaute
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THEMATIC PERFORATIONS by Chris Hodson
This waterside development in the modern Tjuvholmen quarter is designed to maximise views over the Oslo fjord. Apartments are arranged in two blocks, one with a ground floor residents’ communal area and shops, the other with a spa and fitness centre at basement and ground levels.
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A blue-grey slate plinth sits beneath pristine white rendered apartment facades, relieved by crisply detailed horizontal copings, window cills and heads in a golden copper alloy. The same copper alloy is used for perforated screen panels, aligning with the fenestration and slightly raised off the walls. The distinctive pattern of perforations is simply repeated thematically on panels throughout the project, including a continuous screen to entrance glazing of the Spa block, contrasting with the dark slate facades.
Architect: schmidt hammer lassen architects Copper Product: Nordic RoyalTM Photos: Finn Ståle Felberg
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COPPER AFLOAT
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Architect Simo Freese discusses his design for an innovative, copper and glass, floating restaurant in a prominent Helsinki location.
In its waterfront setting, the ‘Sea Pavilion’ Meripaviljonki is widely visible around the Eläintarha Bay surrounded by parks. It is an eye-catching, modern addition to the Helsinki Workers’ House – a ruggedly beautiful, granite Art Nouveau building – adding to the historical cityscape of downtown Helsinki. The area is a cultural centre with theatres and a temporary concert venue during the Helsinki Festival. The restaurant caters for 200 sitting guests and the kitchen, although small, is fully equipped for fine dining, additionally relying on the related congress centre facilities of the Workers’ House when necessary.
Meripaviljonki is the first floating public building in Finland and technically innovative. The raft is connected to two giant tripod anchor piles by a rectangular, swinging arm and there is no detectable movement for visitors on board. The pontoon below the raft contains all the HVAC installations and a novel solution has been found for connecting these to land-side infrastructure below the entrance bridge, able to accommodate a 2.4m variation in sea level.
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VISITOR EXPERIENCE Contemporary architecture in locations such as this is critically viewed against the long Finnish tradition of waterfront buildings and presents special challenges with planning consents. Our design concept centres on the visitor experience. Curved space free from corners is fluid and intimate, while 270-degree views and full height glazing offer astonishing sea views in the heart of the city. The glazed facades incorporate external glass beams, intentionally contrasting with the adjacent, heavy Art Nouveau building while, at the same time, connecting them. The choice of copper, alongside glass, for the facades references the famous, neighbouring 1960s “Round House” and recognises the material’s sustainability credentials, long-life, minimal maintenance and beautiful patination. In fact, the copper is already oxidising naturally and darkening in the photos on these two pages. Copper also characterises the main entrance lobby and is used to form lettering for the restaurant’s illuminated sign.
Architect: Arkkitehtitoimisto Freese Oy Copper Installer: Europelti Oy Copper Product: Nordic Standard Photos: Esko Tuomisto
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ENTRANCE LOBBY, ‘WONEN AAN HET MAS’, ANTWERP, BELGIUM
Architect: Co Studio Copper Product: TECU® Brass Copper Installer and Photo: Heri Interieurbouw
The brass clad ceiling and floor of the entrance lobby to this apartment block provide flat, reflective surfaces that set the tone for the luxurious aspirations of the whole project.
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Apart from its popularity with architects as a thoroughly modern material for façades, roofs and other external elements, copper – and its alloys – forms part of the designer’s palette for interior items such as light fittings, door furniture, handrails and contact surfaces (where its anti-microbial characteristics are also important).
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But there is also a growing trend for wider, innovative uses in interior design as wall, ceiling and even floor coverings, as shown in these projects.
SEATING ZONE, CANALLA DISCO, PAMPLONA, SPAIN
Architect: Vaillo+Irigaray Architects Photos: Rubén Pérez Bescós
A zig-zag brass section, folded to form floor, seating, wall and ceiling surfaces, extrudes along the length of one wall of this nocturnal space. The perforated and embossed brass sparkles and reflects the disco lighting, contrasting with the black surfaces throughout the rest of the space.
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PRIVATE VILLA STAIRCASE, LAS BRISAS, MALLORCA, SPAIN This statement staircase comprises folded planes of copper clad plywood panels with patterns of voids cut out by water jet and a patination finish applied. Both the patterns and finish reflect a plant-filled copper ‘green gabion’ that stretches the entire width of the house separating living and service zones.
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Architect: Studio Mishin Architectural Bureau (with Arup) Copper Products: TECU® Classic/TECU® Bond Classic Photos: Studio Mishin
REDEVELOPMENT INTERVENTIONS, LEEGKERK CHURCH, THE NETHERLANDS
Architekt: awg architecten Copper Product: Nordic RoyalTM Photos: Harold Koopmans
The 13th-century Leegkerk Church–a national monument–has been transformed into a multifunctional community centre, enabled by a free-standing, contemporary cube of golden copper alloy, containing the new functions and hosting a balcony space. Matching golden cabinets in existing archways function as rotating room dividers.
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COPPER CONTROL Formed of brass, this modest structure picks up the cylindrical form of the spiral staircase within the base of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and creates a compact security booth. Cleverly designed, double-swing glazed doors, also in brass, enable optimum use of the confined space.
Architect: David Devaux & Architecture Nomade Design Copper Product: TECU® Brass Photos: Joan Bracco
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