Wednesday 20 October 2010

RIBA President’s Bronze Medal Nomination / best design portfolio at Oxford Brookes University / Mike Bell 3rd year










RIBA President’s Bronze Medal Nomination
Michael Bell (Unit E, Oxford Brookes University), The fantasy world of Montparnasse – Celebration of hybridized garden and office, 2009-2010


This project explores the symbiotic relationships of gardens and offices through the narrative of a mysterious exploration into the filmic spaces as experienced by a girl named Ophelia (inspired by the main character in Pan’s Labyrinth). Sited in the brutalistic Montparnasse Office Tower in Paris (commonly known as one of the ugliest office tower in Europe), Ophelia explores a hidden fantasy world of living willow trees concealed within the void spaces of the office tower. Ophelia’s exploration is driven by the prophecies from her dreams that foretold fragments of curious spaces depicting a world inhabited with spirited trees and wonderful architectural forms. She was lead on into a mystical journey to eventually discovering portals and entry points hidden within the office interior that allowed her to mediate into the fantasy world.

Digital Flora: Urban Agriculture Bridge / Viral Shah 3rd year






Digital Flora: Urban Agriculture Bridge / Viral Shah 3rd year
The project addresses  a contemporary interpretation of the ‘Inhabitable Bridge’. Providing spaces for urban agricultural growth, public and retail food market, organic food restaurant and cafe, viewing platforms, and most significantly, staggered docks for floating restaurants, below the structure, that will take people along the River Seine to see the sights of Paris.

Unit E PUBLICATION 2010



http://www.brookes.ac.uk/schools/be/media/Yearbook2010.pdf

Tuesday 19 October 2010

Leslie Jones Memorial Prize (RIBA) 2010 / Michelle Evans 3rd year







Leslie Jones Memorial Prize (RIBA) 2010 
Michelle Evans (Unit E, Oxford Brookes University), The ritualistic veins of a winery – Celebration of wine tasting, 2009-2010


The project attempts to investigate cross programming the wine making process with the visitor routes, a winery allows visitors to celebrate and indulge in the art of winemaking through all the different stages. The ritualistic circulation system blurs the boundaries between public and private, ascend and descend, external and internal, sin and sacrament. The roof is integrated with transparent pipes (the veins of the architectural body), servicing and pumping crushed grape juice from the core (interception heart) to various levels of the topographical building. The building makes use of the natural slope of the landscape through a gravity flow system within the winery to minimise energy use and the need for hydraulic systems.

Camille and Enri / The Digital Garden of Sins / James C J Simcock






Berman Guedes Stretton Architects Prize 2010 / For creative originality in Design / Anna Bear 2nd Year





Berman Guedes Stretton Architects Prize 2010 
For creative originality in Design
Anna Beer (Unit E, Oxford Brookes University), Pinnacle moment– Celebration of garden
The water garden attempts to experiment a spatial boundary between land and water. The organic symmetrical form commemorates the 8m water rise in the 1910 Paris floods. A meteorological research laboratory not only celebrates Paris’ rich academic history, but also regulates and displays the weather conditions, and warns of severe climatic changes.



Unit E in BLUEPRINT






Edmund's project from Unit E  was choosen as one of the best student projects in Britain by Blueprint magazine.

'An inhabitable bridge for performing arts. Seeking to blur the boundary between artist and voyeur anyone using the bridge was to become a part of its exhibition, the performance itself. Taking its cue from a brief of semi-living architecture the bridge became a series of separate organisms each in constant flux between introversion and extroversion imitating the life of plants, slowly gathering energy so as to present themselves to the world. ‘Organism’ has become one of the architectural trends recently. Among those looking at similar approach to organism, this semi-living architecture proposal suggests a new definition of ‘organic architecture. Mami Sayo'




Link: Blueprint

Fluid Dynamic Particle Fields: Dandelion Wishing Platform






Flexible Fragility / Cultural Arts Centre / Diana Ester Elia / 3rd year







Flexible Fragility / Cultural Arts Centre / Diana Ester Elia / 3rd year
The proposal responds to the brief and the site as a symbiotic fusion between architecture, landscape and infrastructure. The concept is that of structure which springs from the preserved facade, enhancing the connection of the past to the future, and envelops a cultural centre with a flexible performance hall, a cafe, and a viewing pod which rises from the complex allowing the visitors to enjoy in the inspirational views of the art district of Montmartre. The intent is a building ecology, where there is a strong correlation between the object and the environment with a reference to the metabolic structures of plants and humans. It is a translation of the fragility found in a delicate leaf and the study of the metabolic reactions such as the use of  daylight and wind . The building then becomes a semi- living structure which, in the same way as the leaf, is shaped by the context and the environmental factors of daylight and wind.