a+u Architecture and Urbanism 22:11_626

This issue features 33 teahouses from the classical era of Sen no Rikyu and Enshu Kobori to the modern period. The sukiya-style architecture and sencha spaces that were influenced by the tea ceremony are addressed by focusing on the relationship between nature and teahouses. With its selection of photographs and detail drawings, this issue is an easily understandable introduction to the culture and architecture of the tea ceremony. Guest editor, Kunio Kirisako (Tea house researcher, Vice Principal of Kyoto Architectural College) The commonly held view is that Luis Barragán’s buildings project a colorful, light-filled, cheerful image distinctive to Mexico, but when I actually visited them, the spaces were unexpectedly dark. In that subdued light, the pink, yellow, and orange colors shone faintly. When I saw that, I was reminded of the story…

a+u’s November issue features the most recent wave of construction in Berlin. Thirty-two years have passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall – a period longer than the life of the wall itself – and the city has entered a new phase of normalization, with the genre, styles, and values of architecture being decidedly different from those of the post-Reunification euphoria. While major initiatives such as the restoration of Museum Island have brought glory back to the many monuments of historic Berlin, this current period of so-called normalization has benefited from Berlin’s “putatively abnormal, vacated, fragmented, and duplicative condition,” as outlined by Florian Hertweck. Berlin became a cultural capital that attracted young, risktaking creatives, with opportunities for cross-disciplinary experimentations and collaborations. Self-determined building groups sought to provide well-designed and…

Picard, Danny Rigter, Joanna Rozbroj, Stefanos Roimpas, Jad Semaan, Lukasz Skalec, Sandra Sinka, Thomas Shadbolt, Magdalena Stanescu, Mike Yin, Marcus Parviainen, Slavis Poczebutas, Alexandru Vilcu, Frederike Werner, Mateusz Wojcieszek Project team: Ed. Züblin AG (main contractor), Dobler Metallbau GmbH (façade contractor), SMV Bauprojektsteuerung Ingenieurgesellschaft mbH (project management), Emproc GmbH (cost management), ZWP Ingenieur-AG (mep engineering), Emmer Pfenninger Partner AG (façade engineering), Inside Outside (landscape and curtain design), Arup (structural engineering), Lerch & Bates (elevators), Transsolar Energietechnik GmbH (energy and comfort), knp.Bauphysik GmbH (building physics), Kahle Acoustics (acoustics), GuD Geotechnik und Dynamik Consult GmbH (geotechnics), les éclaireurs (lighting), Büro Uebele (orientation system), Unifor and Lensvelt (furniture) Site area: 9,260 m2 Gross floor area: 57,828 m2 (above ground), 14,731 m2 (below ground) The German publisher Axel Springer has launched a move from print to digital media.…

Floating University is a self-organized space in Berlin where practitioners from a wide range of backgrounds meet to collaborate, co-create, and imaginatively work toward the future. Set on a gray urban infrastructure, it has a rainwater collection basin that serves the former Tempelhof airfield nearby, and although it was designed in the early 1930s, it remains a fully functioning public infrastructure that holds and diverts rainwater into the city’s canal system. It is also surrounded by a gartenkolonie – an allotment or community garden – and is therefore almost invisible to passersby. In the past years, a diverse range of animals, plants, and algae have taken root in the basin and given birth to a unique landscape: a human-made environment reclaimed by nature where polluted water coexists with the relatively new…

Terrassenhaus, located in the Wedding district, Mitte, Berlin, created a new typology: a ziggurat-shaped studio and gallery building with spacious, semipublic terraces, in an act of giving a piece of “property” back to Berliners. Situated next to a typical 1900s dwelling, a climbing hall, and suburban railway tracks, the building combines various uses and is particularly adaptable to new ones, preparing it for possible changes in the zoning plan: currently, the area has no binding land-use plan, and a regulation from 1958 permits only the construction of commercial buildings. Yet at the same time, a grandfather clause ensures that the area will remain essentially a residential zone. This special status allowed for a new building to be constructed that currently serves as a commercial building but could become a residential…

Thomas Kupke, Sebastian von Oppen, Torsten Richter, Elke Saleina, Thomas Schöpf, Eberhard Veit, Anja Wiedemann Project team: Wenzel+Wenzel Freie Architekten (site supervision); Christine Kappei (quantity surveying); IGB Ingenieurgruppe Bauen (structural engineering); INNIUS DÖ GmbH, Inros Lackner AG (services engineering); Müller-BBM GmbH (building physics); matí AG, Conceptlicht GmbH (lighting); Duncan McCauley GmbH und Co. KG (exhibition planning); Polyform (signage); Levin Monsigny Landschaftsarchitekten (landscape); Arge Brandschutz NEG (fire consultant) Site area: 6,000 m2 Gross floor area: 10,900 m2 Project estimate: 133,000,000 USD (134,000,000 EUR) As a continuation of Friedrich August Stüler’s forum architecture, James-Simon-Galerie serves as the new entrance building for Museum Island, completing the ensemble between Kupfergraben Canal and Neues Museum (pp. 42–51). Together with Archaeological Promenade, it forms the backbone of the master plan that was developed in 1999 and adopted as the basis for…