Interview Leopold Banchini

Interview TEd'A arquitectes

JULIAN SCHUBERT

Interview Tyler Sharp

Special edition: building for the community

interview Studio RAAAF

focus on worship and contemplation

interview Odile Decq

Archidea 61

Archidea 60

Archidea 59

Archidea 58

Archidea 57

Archidea 56

Archidea 55

No architectural genre has changed more radically than that of the office and the workplace. Organizations have become less hierarchical. Creativity and a rapid, effective response to market developments both call for a flexible, horizontal organization. People are more aware than ever that workplace design contributes to the quality of the work done and the functioning of the organization.

Archidea 55 is a special edition about "office spaces" and features interviews with Verda Alexander & Primo Orpilla, Piuarch and Clive Wilkinson.

ArchIdea 54

This edition offers an interview with architect Andrés Jaque from the Office for Political Innovation. According to Andrés Jaque, architects cannot define society but they can create conditions capable of readjusting people’s attitudes towards one other. That is why his office tries to open up the conventional closed box and to suggest alternative ways of using a space.

ArchIdea 53

Josémaria de Churtichaga: “I always start with an idea of the atmosphere or experiential conditions that I want to achieve. The exterior is secondary to me. It is basically a consequence of the interior. In the interior, you are almost in total control. Designing the exterior is restricted by the kind of ‘organism’ you defined in the interior.”

Archidea 52

Edition 52 offers an interview with architect Lukasz Zagala from the Polish Medusa Group. This studio is involved in architecture, urban planning and industrial design projects. Looking at their inventive, but low-key and rough-textured, output it is hard to imagine that the founding architects, Lukasz Zagala and Przemo Lukasik, previously worked for French star architects like Jean Nouvel. The ambition of Medusa Group is to make a good space out of nothing; their motto is primum non nocere, first of all do no harm.

For the articles on the pages 12-15 we have focussed on office buildings. The former fixation on the office exterior has now shifted to the interior. General office concepts that were formerly regarded as efficient, such as open plan or corridors with cellular offices, no longer meet current needs. An increasingly important consideration is the part that the interior plays in cultivating employee loyalty. The office interior is evolving into a pleasant environment with a wide spatial differentiation for various functions. The interior is less and less like an office, and more and more like a city.

Archidea 51

As in other parts of the world, modernity has spread across Asia in an unstoppable flood. The
pace of change, and the form in which it manifests itself, has differed from one region to
another. But no country has escaped all the radical processes of modernization such as
mushrooming cities, advances in technology and an increasingly globalized economy. It has
been a challenge for architects to decide what stance to take towards the modern paradigm. A
specific question has been whether architecture should aim to be international in style, should
hark back to regional archetypes in reaction to the loss of identity, or should aspire to a blend of
Occidental and Oriental traits.

Interview with Bjarke Ingels: “Why should a building be judged purely on the grounds of utility? Shouldn’t it also behave like a good citizen? If every building were designed to cater only for a specific purpose, the result would be a terrible city. I think that when you design a building you have to ask yourself how many dreams you can fulfill.”

INTERVIEW with MECANOO “Different people bring different kinds of expertise into the designing process. We, the architects, are the ones who know about space – or are supposed to – and about designing it. But we are not experts in how teachers want to teach, nor are we are experts in the kind of space in which the users feel at ease. So it can help a lot when you talk to teachers and students or children.”

Interview Emre Arolat

“In architecture we should learn from the land, from the place.” Unlike the hardcore modernists, architect Emre Arolat believes in context, in differentiation and in not having the same order everywhere. “I feel very uncomfortable when people say they recognize my designs. I force myself to make something different every time, something that depends on the context.”

INTERVIEW - Marcio Kogan
The architectural approach of one of the leading architects of Brazil, Marcio Kogan, shows some intriguing contradictions. He pushes the design of a house to the limit, but at the same time he advocates simple solutions that are sustainable.

Interview with Julien De Smedt is not afraid to produce architecture that creates a visual spectacle. Extravagance and spectacle are not however the essence of his architecture. “The shape of some of our projects was motivated by a wish not to obstruct the view of the building behind it....

Interview with Charles Renfro The architect Charles Renfro, of Diller Scofidio + Renfro, likes to turn everything on its head a bit. According to him, a trick, a pleasure of a discomfort wakes people up. "Those moments of discomfort are the ones that bring...
Focus on interiors Urban nature as public space. The problem of eroding urban space has dominated the architectural discourse since the seventies. The projects CCTV and TTCV buildings, Madrid Rio and High Line all show an example of giving public space...

Interview with Ofis Architects The young architectural office has been attracting attention from the international architectural press with some original, playful, beautiful and conceptually interesting designs…

FOCUS ON ARCHITECTURE TOURISM No category of architecture is more playful or more exuberant than architecture dedicated to tourism. Anything is possible, it seems, as long as it attracts attention and provides a spectacle that yanks…

Interview with Retail Edition Studio Concrete in Amsterdam spurns the conventional boundaries between architecture, interior design and graphic design and takes...
FUKSAS There was a long period when architects took little interest in retail design. The Italian architect Massimiliano Fuksas was one of the very...

Interview with Steven Holl Ideas drive the designs of architect Steven Holl. In many cases his ideas spring from musical concepts. You move through a sequence of...
FOCUS ON INTERIORS The experience of space goes further than the tactile sense and involves sound, smell and light. Light is most crucial medium because of...

Interview with Holzer Kobler Architecture must communicate, and it is the community that is the recipient of this communication. That is how Barbara Holzer and Tristan...
TEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE Temporary architecture is growing increasingly popular. Wherever people gather for relatively short periods, you often see temporary...

Interviews with Jean Mah, Richard Ahle & Stefan Egelhof and David Page
The interior of several health care projects involving the use of floors and furniture surfacing from Forbo Flooring as form of insiration. The projects are located in various parts of the world and show the many possibilities provided by Forbo’s products.

Interview with SIR NICHOLAS GRIMSHAW Sir Nicholas Grimshaw believes strongly in the satisfaction of looking at joints and details. By doing different projects and becoming...
INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS No other type of building receives such merciless treatment. Architect Liesbeth van der Pol, Ton Verhoeven and Patrick Berger & Jacques...

Interviews with FXFowle Architects, Ken yeang and Mario cucinella
“Creating better environments” begins with caring for the environment. In this section Forbo Flooring Systems presents unique projects and initiatives that help improve our day to day working and living environments.

Interview with Fernando Romero One of Mexican architect Fernando Romero’s challenges is to connect what’s global with local circumstances. He wants to...
Contemporary houses with regional identity The architecture of the Australian Vineyard Residence designed by John Wardle goes beyond the local architectural style and the house...

Interview with Qingyun Ma According to the Chinese architect Qingyun Ma, his projects are public devices rather than architecture: they are not about architectural...
Old and new The exterior of the Nobel Peace Centre in Oslo (Norway) was left untouched, whereas the interior was changed drastically