Glass Zine

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LAMINATED COLOUR GLASS

21 Cake Headquarters

by People’s Architecture Office, Beijing

The design for the headquarters of 21 Cake, a popular gourmet cake franchise, relies on the interaction of the three primary colors: red, yellow and blue.

Selected walls of the office, namely those along circulation areas, are made of laminated colored glass. These glass panels are ‘layered’ to create a full spectrum of changing colors.

As one walks through the spaces of the office, changing vantage points in combination with natural and artificial light and reflections produce dramatic effects. A double height central atrium topped with a skylight brings in light through the layers of color along the staircase and glass bridge on the second floor. Conference tables and mobile work tables are designed and produced by our sister company PIDO. Designed by People’s Architecture Office

Optical Glass House

by NAP Architects, Hiroshima, Japan

This house is sited among tall buildings in downtown Hiroshima, overlooking a street with many passing cars and trams. To obtain privacy and tranquility in these surroundings, a garden and optical glass façade is placed on the street side of the house. The garden is visible from all rooms, and the serene soundless scenery of the passing cars and trams imparts richness to life in the house. Sunlight from the east, refracting through the glass, creates beautiful light patterns.

Rain striking the water-basin skylight manifests water patterns on the entrance floor. Filtered light through the garden trees flickers on the living room floor, and a super lightweight curtain of sputter-coated metal dances in the wind. Although located downtown in a city, the house enables residents to enjoy the changing light and city moods, as the day passes, and live in awareness of the changing seasons.

A façade of some 6,000 pure-glass blocks (50mm x 235mm x 50mm) was employed. The pure-glass blocks, with their large mass-per-unit area, effectively shut out sound and enable the creation of an open, clearly articulated garden that admits the city scenery.

To realize such a façade, glass casting was employed to produce glass of extremely high transparency from borosilicate, the raw material for optical glass.

The casting process was exceedingly difficult, for it required both slow cooling to remove residual stress from within the glass, and high dimensional accuracy.

Even then, however, the glass retained micro-level surface asperities, but this effect was actively welcomed, for it would produce unexpected optical illusions in the interior space.

So large was the 8.6m x 8.6m façade, it could not stand independently if constructed by laying rows of glass blocks a mere 50mm deep. Therefore the glass blocks were punctured with holes and strung on 75 stainless steel bolts suspended from the beam above the façade. Such a structure would be vulnerable to lateral stress, however, so along with the glass blocks, stainless steel flat bars were also strung on (40mm x 4mm) at 10 centimeter intervals.

The flat bar is seated within the 50mm-thick glass block to render it invisible, and thus a uniform 6mm sealing joint between the glass blocks was achieved.

The result—a transparent façade when seen from either the garden or the street. The façade appears like a waterfall flowing downward, scattering light and filling the air with freshness.

The glass block façade weighs around 13 tons.

The supporting beam, if constructed of concrete, would therefore be of massive size. Employing steel frame reinforced concrete, the steel beam was pretensioned and given an upward camber. Then, after giving it the load of the façade, concrete was cast around the beam and, in this way, minimized its size.

‘C42’ Citroen showroom

by Manuelle Gautrand Architecture, Paris

The new Citroën showroom is at number 42 Champs Elysées; Citroën have owned the site since André Citroën set up shop there in the 1920s. His original showroom was beautiful, the interior was extremely theatrical, and the glass rectangle façade beautifully proportioned, very minimalist and contemporary.

On street level, the glass façade is minimalist and demonstrates a certain rigour with its flatness and use of large rectangles, but the introduction of the chevron signals the start of some much more original design, with lozenge shapes, triangles and chevrons.

The higher up the building one looks, the more threedimensional it becomes with the introduction of prisms that will bring new depths to the design.

Finally, the top section of the new building is like a great glass sculpture, recalling origami in its complexity. The chevron remains present yet discreet, becoming less defined and more suggested in the overall form, and almost subliminal, in this exciting project, midway between a building and a fine art sculpture.

The use of red, was originally conceived– the brand’s signature colour, in the glass panels but it was decided it would be too bright from the outside. There were some concerns about the building not harmonising with its neighbours on the Champs Elysées, so a filter has been created that on first sight, masks the red colour from the exterior.

This totally original filter, which is cleverly constructed inside the finished glass, also minimises the heat of the sun passing through, and will also create a diaphanous pearly white atmosphere inside the building. The red colour can still be seen from the inside of the building, reflecting the brand’s signature colours.

The main role of the building is as a place to show cars, and the designers wanted to express this primary aim in the form of the space itself. The shape of the building itself is inspired by the shape of a car, it’s not an object with a front, a roof and a rear, but something moulded with curves and fluidity, that links the front, roof and rear with a continuity that is like the form of a car itself, creating unity between the place and the product, and makes a rich and complex interior.

To display the cars themselves, attached to a central mast are eight circular platforms each of which takes a car. The platforms are six metres in diameter, and each one turns to show off the car on all sides and has a mirrored base to reflect the car below. Around the display, the public is led by a series of staircases and walkways that spiral past the cars.

The designers wanted to create something like a museum or a cultural building, a space which would encourage people to spend time there. There is a panoramic lift to take people to the top of the building, and they are able to enjoy an exceptional view of both Paris and the sky.

THIS TOTALLY ORIGINAL FILTER, WHICH IS CLEVERLY CONSTRUCTED INSIDE THE FINISHED GLASS, ALSO MINIMISES THE HEAT OF THE SUN PASSING THROUGH, AND WILL ALSO CREATE A DIAPHANOUS PEARLY WHITE ATMOSPHERE INSIDE THE BUILDING.

The Life of Forms Glass art of Dale Chihuly

Born in 1941 in Tacoma, Washington, Dale Chihuly was introduced to glass while studying interior design at the University of Washington. After graduating in 1965, Chihuly enrolled in the first glass program in the country, at the University of Wisconsin. He continued his studies at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), where he later established the glass program and taught for more than a decade.

In 1968, after receiving a Fulbright Fellowship, he went to work at the Venini glass factory in Venice. There he observed the team approach to blowing glass, which is critical to the way he works today. In 1971, Chihuly cofounded Pilchuck Glass School in Washington State. With this international glass center, Chihuly has led the avant-garde in the development of glass as a fine art.

His work is included in more than 200 hundred museum collections worldwide. He has been the recipient of many awards, including twelve honorary doctorates and two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Chihuly has created more than a dozen well-known series of works, among them Cylinders and Baskets in the 1970s; Seaforms, Macchia, Venetians, and Persians in the 1980s; Niijima Floats and Chandeliers in the 1990s; and Fiori in the 2000s. He is also celebrated for large architectural installations. In 1986, he was honored with a solo exhibition, Dale Chihuly objets de verre, at the MusĂŠe des Arts DĂŠcoratifs, Palais du Louvre, in Paris. In 1995, he began Chihuly Over Venice, for which he created sculptures at glass factories in Finland, Ireland, and Mexico, then installed them over the canals and piazzas of Venice.

He rarely uses tools and molds relying more on gravity and centrifugal force to create his glasswork

In 1999, Chihuly started an ambitious exhibition, Chihuly in the Light of Jerusalem; more than 1 million visitors attended the Tower of David Museum to view his installations. In 2001, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London curated the exhibition Chihuly at the V&A. Chihuly’s lifelong fascination for glasshouses has grown into a series of exhibitions within botanical settings. His Garden Cycle began in 2001 at the Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago.

Chihuly exhibited at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, near London, in 2005. Other major exhibition venues include the de Young Museum in San Francisco, in 2008; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 2011; and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, in 2013. Chihuly Garden and Glass, a long-term exhibition, opened at Seattle Center in 2012.

The artist is consumed with organic forms and surprises that take shape in the glass. He rarely uses tools and molds relying more on gravity and centrifugal force to create his glasswork- the more organic and unusual, the better. His work is based on the “happy accident” yielding even stranger, more embraceable biology.

For one his exhibits at the V&A, he also broke with tradition, using molds and then later seeing where physics would take the resulting form. These creations are modern sculptures amidst the arms and armor in the medieval art section of the museum. Both Chihuly’s work and medieval art are colorful and exhuberant. He views his work as a collection that is ongoing. He enjoys playing with natural light and water. As the forms are placed, Chihuly likes the viewer to wonder if the work is manmade or is it natural? He doesn’t want it to be overly designed with predictible placement but rather looking like it grew there naturally. When it comes to production, he stresses experimentation and teamwork.

The Waterfall Bar

by Tokujin Yoshioka

The waterfall was created by a group of men for a public display space in the heart of Tokyo in 2006. The architecture was designed by Tadao Ando and the “waterfall” optical glass bar was designed by Tokujin Yoshioka and installation was performed by Olafur Eliasson. Together, this group of men created what appears to be a bar made from water.

Using an optical glass block, the same material used in larger observatory telescopes and that is worked entirely by hand.

By nature, and because of the way it is shaped, the glass has a rippled surface that accentuates the impression of seeing a liquid that has frozen over, rather than an actual solid. When approaching the table, a feeling of instability takes hold of the visitor, who has the sensation of having to sit down in a void, or better on a wobbly, liquid substance that seems as if it could flow away like the water of a Waterfall.

About the water table: The world‘s largest optical glass table.

The block of special glass. which is used on the space shuttle, is made from a 4.5-meter giant optical glass block. Its strong appearance reminds of the water running down the surface of a sheer cliff. This optical glass work was completed following the “Water Block” and the ‘Chair that disappears in the rain,” which were designed in 2002.

G The brief was to desigN a dwelling for the “city of glass�

House

Glass H Glass House Laminata

by Kruunenberg Van der Erve architects

The realisation of the glass house Laminat took almost six years. It started with a design contest initiated by the CWL Koopwoningen organisation. The brief was to desigin a dwelling for the “city of glass” Leerdam.

Kruunenberg Van der Erve architects took this brief very literally and designed a dwelling in which glass is removed from it’s traditional role as a transparant division between the inside and outside, and becomes the main constructive material.

The basis of the final construction consists out of 13000 glass plates (floatglass). This building volume was the divided in a broad and narrow section that were consequently hollowed out. The narrow part is a hallway to the sleeping quarters in the broad section of the building. The living quarters, kitchen and patio are situated between the two hollow parts.

Although glass as a constructive building material is not very common yet, this project proves the possibilities of glass beyond it’s traditional role.

21st Century Museum by the architect office SANAA

The 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa is a museum of contemporary art located in Kanazawa, Ishikawa, Japan. It was designed by Japanese architects Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa of the architect office SANAA in 2004. In October 2005, one year after its opening the Museum marked 1,570,000 visitors.

The building The Museum is located in the center of Kanazawa, near Kenroku-en garden and the Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art. The building has a circular form, with a diameter of 112.5 metres. This shape aims to keep the appearance of the overall building volume low, to mitigate the scale of the project and allows access from multiple points of entry. The transparency of the building further manifests the wish to avoid the museum being perceived as a large, introverted mass. The building includes community gathering spaces, such as a library, lecture hall, and children’s workshop, located on the periphery, and museum spaces in the middle. The exhibition areas comprise numerous galleries with multiple options for division, expansion, or concentration. The galleries are of various proportions and light conditions ”“ from bright daylight through glass ceilings to spaces with no natural light source, their height ranging from 4 to 12 metres. The circulation spaces are designed to make them usable as additional exhibition areas. Four fully glazed internal courtyards, each unique in character, provide ample daylight to the center of the building and a fluent border between community spaces and museum.

The transparency of the building further manifests the wish to avoid the museum being perceived as a large, introverted mass.

Transparent Toilet Eleven glass sides for this toilet whose walls are partly made of liquid cristal glass. Under electric tension, the glass is transparent and the toilet shows its clean and functional inside/interior: the user feels safe and sound. Out of tension, they become opaque: the place is now occupied and the users intimacy guaranteed. An innovative concept to deal with insecurity problems whilst playing with transparency.

Shruti Bajaj PG Semester 2 Retail & Exhibition Design