Saturday, October 30, 2010

eVolo Magazine – 2010 Skyscraper Competition Winners



Established in 2006, the annual Skyscraper Competition recognizes outstanding ideas that redefine skyscraper design through the use of new technologies, materials, programs, aesthetics, and spatial organization. The award seeks to discover young talents whose ideas will change the way we understand architecture and its relationship with the natural and built environments.

The Jury of the 2010 edition was formed by leaders of the architecture and design fields including: Mario Cipresso, Kyu Ho Chun, Kenta Fukunishi, Elie Gamburg, Mitchell Joachim, JaeYoung Lee, Adelaïde Marchi, Nicola Marchi and Eric Vergne. The Jury selected 3 winners and 27 special mentions among 430 entries from 42 countries.

Globalization, sustainability, flexibility, adaptability, and the digital revolution, were some of the multi-layered elements taken into consideration.

Follow this link and click on each entry, then on each image for larger renderings.


First Place: Vertical Prison
Chow Khoon Toong, Ong Tien Yee, Beh Ssi Cze
Malaysia
Some studies reveal that post-release offenses are very high and that criminal’s imprisonment is just a temporal solution because they do not have the opportunity to rehabilitate in a desirable community.

This project examines the possibility of creating a vertical prison in the sky where inmates will have to work and live in a community that will contribute to the host city below. The prison will have agricultural fields, factories, and recyclable plants that will be operated by the offenders as a way to give back to the community. They will live “free” until they have completed their sentence and are prepared to rejoin their communities.

The vertical prison has its own transportation system which consists of different “pods” for officers, prisoners, firefighters, and other workers.




Rezza Rahdian, Erwin Setiawan, Ayu Diah Shanti, Leonardus Chrisnantyo
Indonesia




The city of Jakarta, Indonesia, was originally designed in the confluence of thirteen rivers which were used for transportation and agriculture. The largest of its rivers is The Ciliwung River, which has been extremely polluted during the last couple of decades, characterizes by hundreds of slums inhabited by thousands of people in marginal conditions.

The Ciliwung Recovery Program (CRP) is a project that aims to collect the garbage of the riverbank and purify its water through an ingenious system of mega-filters that operate in three different phases. The first one separates the different types of garbage and utilizes the organic one to fertilize its soil. The second phase purifies the water by removing dangerous chemicals and adding important minerals to it. The clean water is then fed to the river and to the nearby agricultural fields through a system of capillary tubes.  Finally in the third phase all the recyclable waste is processed.

One of the most important aspects of this proposal is the elimination of the slums along the river. The majority of the people will live and work at the CRP which could be understood as new city within Jakarta. The CRP project will be a 100 percent sustainable building that will produce energy through wind, solar, and hydroelectric systems.






Ryohei Koike, Jarod Poenisch
United States


The Nested Skyscraper adapts to climatic, urban, and programmatic conditions with the use of advanced materials and robotic construction. Its form and building method derive from the carbon sleeves and fiber-laced concrete performance. It is a composition of multiple layers of louvers which thicken and rotate according to solar and wind exposure.

The construction method consists of a series of robots that stretch a network of carbon sleeves that are sprayed with fiber-laced concrete to create a primary structure. A second set of robots wraps the structure with a steel mesh for lateral movements and increase or decrease its density according to structural and programmatic needs. The resulting structure of “nests” is a hybrid of compressive and tensile elements that frees the skyscraper typology from the rigid multiplication of floor plates.

This prototype was designed as a fashion boutique for Tokyo; a city of extreme climate, density, and earthquakes. It explores the use of advanced materials and robotic construction to re-imagine the skyscraper.


Thursday, October 28, 2010

What Is Compost?

From Green Solutions AS website:

Compost is the product resulting from the controlled biological decomposition of organic material; a stable, humus-like product resulting from the biological decomposition of organic matter under controlled conditions which has a positive effect on plant growth.

Composting refers to the biological degradation process of organic matter. It is a thermophilic process that relies on high temperatures to meet pathogen reduction standards. The waste product from the Bionova process – the compost – is the result of such a controlled biological decomposition of organic material at high temperature.

Compost is beneficial for more than its "fertilizing" capacity. It is highly regarded as a soil amendment because it confers many physical benefits to soil.
The benefits of compost include:

  • Higher humus content in the soil
  • Increases Earth's water storage capacity
  • Ensures good aeration of the soil
  • Provide nutrients and micronutrients to the soil
  • Increase the plants ability to absorb nutrients
  • Stabilize the soils pH and prevent acidification
  • Prevent plant diseases
  • Plant nutrients are returned to the earth’s natural cycle.

Monday, October 25, 2010

Sourcing Sustainable Fashion

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum events.


Thursday, October 28, 2010, 6:30 – 8pm
Cooper-Hewitt Museum, 2 East 91st Street New York, NY 10128
COST: $15 General admission; $10 CHNDM members, seniors, students


Sourcing Sustainable Fashion

The trend toward organic goods and ethical trade is spreading in the fashion world with a wealth of new initiatives to connect designers to sustainable resources and materials.

Hear from Summer Rayne Oakes, Co-founder/CEO of Source4Style – a B2B marketplace that allows designers – both fashion and interior – to search, compare and purchase more sustainable materials from around the world, and Tone Tobiasson, co-founder of NICE (Nordic Initiative Clean & Ethical), and nicefashion.org – a web tool for consumers, designers, and people involved in the textile business – as well as a forum where professionals can find resources and exchange information.

From NICE (Nordic Initiative Clean & Ethical) website

From Source4Style website




Thursday, October 14, 2010

Congratulations to Green Solutions AS

Green Solutions AS website.

Congratulations to Green Solutions AS, a new Norwegian company formed by the entrepreneurial duo Tone Bekkestad and Einar Mjelde.
Green Solutions AS is committed to communicate and to create sustainable technological solutions – working with companies who hold or develop technological solutions in the front edge – that in different ways can contribute to a sustainable society and reducing emissions of greenhouse gases.
Another important goal is to prove that environmentally-friendly solutions can be profitable.
Holtermann Design LLC wishes Tone and Einar prosperity and success with their new company – and more new, exciting projects soon to come.
We encourage and appreciate your help with spreading the word to friends and colleagues who might be interested in Green Solutions AS.