Shifting from a literal Utopian scheme as laid out by St. Augustine,
Urban Monastary reframes the traditional monastery, specifically

Certosa Di Pavia, within the context of a contemporary urban site.
The historic notion of the wall as a boundary is inverted into a
void, programatically dividing, joining, and operating as a threshold
between three opposites: living and worship, silence and daily
contact, and spiritual and secular.

The unique site condition redefines the notion of the wall as one
which links spaces both vertically and horizontally, departing
from the otherwise traditional hierarchy of horizontal spaces and
creating a convergence point for monks and visitors within
the cloister. The voided wall is contextualized as an armature
between the lake and street, an extension of the urban block, and
addresses the park on the West-side with a series of visual manipulations.
The ghost of its predecessor is retained as one moves throughout
the wall corridor, engaging in a constant dialogue between the
visitor and monk, expansion and compression. Its dialogue is
furthered with the balance between lightness and transparency
through the intricate steel details as well as heaviness and opacity
with the massive concrete walls.

Its unique predicament from its “un-ideal” urban site suggests the
role of an Urban Monastery as not one which aims for complete
seclusion but one which equally engages with the city as a refuge
for all people. Gathering people together for a higher purpose,
Urban Monastery aims to be the quintessential civic building. It is
an intellectual center, a refuge for both monks and city dwellers, giving
the immaterial a secure home on earth.

Framed on issues of recent leisure developments, the Winery Hotel investigates the geometry of the wine barrel as a generator for new model types and aggregations of social form otherwise not found in traditional hotel typologies. Capitalizing on its visual and performance based processes, the logic of the wine barrel is used to develop a specific ornamental strategy, branding itself as a communication tool while pursuing an operational approach to its production.

The differentiation of the model is appropriated into a series of variable geometric and organizational relations subject to rhythmic and scalar variation to introduce an upward gradient from intricate order to dynamic chaos. These structures inform of program, building envelope, infrastructural strategies, circulation, and structural systems, followed by a set of tools to inherit greater control.

The simple system produces a myriad of different courtyard types which can accommodate different functions based on its geometry and scale, ranging from large meeting spaces to a parasol for shade. These tools further inform of the building’s many assets, including levels of privacy due to cluster density and facade porosity, physical proximity of courtyards, and density of circulation spaces. They are further manipulated by local parameters such as topographic measurements, where openings of the shell are mod lated depending on structural requirements, views, and sun exposure.

A double-headed goat appears out of the misty dense forest. The by-products of scientific experiments find their place in Hyper-Benidorm - on itself, also an experiment. By exacerbating the differential on population and inhabitation densities (already at record-level in current Benidorm), a series of fantastic environments are able to happen. Due to global warming, Hyper-Benidorm is now an arid place of summer year-round. Giant solar panels and wind turbines expand over the desert and sea to power the desalination plant which provides enough water for the agricultural central-pivot irrigation systems, the extensive golf courses, the never-ending pools and water works, and, of course, the misty dense forest. A constant flux of elderly retired people - also a by-product of our contemporary societies - gathers here for purely hedonistic purposes. In a similar way, families and young adults come looking for its hyper-active, beyond-expected fantastic situations. Although Hyper-Benidorm only exists at the level of the project, its instances are already happening.

Pace-sketch

In the Green Dragon Cafe, 2007

Photos by Han Wang and Ethan Moses

by Mariela Alvarez, Day Jimenez, Yevgeniya Kononenko, Asdren Matoshi

by Jeffrey M. Chusid

Fall Creek Suspension Bridge, Ithaca, NY
by Aaron Sherbany