Commercial Archives | Page 4 of 13

Daylight Ducts for High-Rise Offices

In Asia, most office tower designs have highly glazed façades. Yet, the building occupants hardly get to enjoy the views outside, because the over-sized windows are exposed to excessive tropical daylight and glare, so that the occupants have no choice but to engage manual blinds on a near-permanent basis. However, once the blinds are down, […]

Cocoa Craftsman Factory: The building as a chocolate melting machine

While the process of repurposing means making use of what is already built or designed—although oftentimes cosmetic or structural—to give a new lease of life to a project, it is not common to leverage a flaw and turn it into an ecological benefit. TAPPING FREE HEAT The crux of this transformation lies in the ingenuity […]

The art of putting together idle objects in Tekuni Dua

How many worn-out objects—antiques, odds and ends of broken items—are sitting idle in one’s storeroom, neither used nor thrown away? What if they could be assembled in new and artful ways? This is the mission behind Tekuni Dua, a three-storey rentable apartment in Kuta, Bali, where roughly 90 per cent of the finishes use recycled […]

A showcase of creative frugality: Hippo Farm Bioclimatic Dormitories

Located about 30 kilometres away from Ho Chi Minh City, Hippo Farm’s dormitories are an expansion of a three-hectare permaculture farm geared towards children and families. It is akin to a summer camp where the visitors can enjoy activities such as horse riding, farming and gardening, learning first-hand about Nature and sustainable practices. According to […]

Joined at the ‘wing’: Smoothly merging a box and an A-frame

The Wing, a two-storey private residence and rentable villa, is located among neighbouring paddy fields in Bali. In the tropical climate, there is abundant sunlight that can be used to light up the interior spaces. At the same time, the sun’s heat cannot excessively permeate into the rooms. This is why the local vernacular architecture […]

Pari Klegung: ‘Slow architecture’ in a natural setting

Pari Klegung is a community eatery in a verdant village, located in the same complex as architect Eko Prawoto’s home. This makes it a passion project that reflects Eko’s advocacy for reorienting humans as part of Nature—not the other way around. “I wanted the buildings to match their natural surroundings and avoid creating social gaps, […]

A ‘maze’ of public gardens enliven the rooftop of Idea Factory

In line with our ongoing student competition FuturArc Prize (FAP) 2022: Reinterpretation, we are highlighting projects that follow the theme. Click here to learn more about the FAP brief; submit your entries by 25 February 2022! Shenzen Special Economic Zone—often dubbed the Silicon Valley of China—is best known for its technology and manufacturing industries. Its […]

The retro charm of energy-efficient Max House, New Delhi

Reducing carbon emissions in buildings necessitate a two-pronged approach: through its construction as well as operation. From the design stage, architects could play an important role by specifying materials with low embedded carbon and implementing passive design to reduce the cooling/heating load. A good building would be able to operate comfortably with low energy—thus lowering […]

A ‘public house’ at the heart of a recycling town

In line with our ongoing student competition FuturArc Prize (FAP) 2022: Reinterpretation, we are highlighting projects that follow the theme. Click here to learn more about the FAP brief; submit your entries by 25 February 2022! The project’s lead architect, Hiroshi Nakamura, says: “As the word ‘pub’ comes from ‘public house’, we decided to bring […]

Good bones: Navakitel Design Hotel emphasises its existing structure

In line with our ongoing student competition FuturArc Prize (FAP) 2022: Reinterpretation, we are highlighting projects that follow the theme. Click here to learn more about the FAP brief; submit your entries by 25 February 2022! The hotel’s original building was a two-storey apartment with a reinforced concrete structure. In order to transform the function […]

Creative reinterpretations of historic colonial-era buildings

Many cities in Asia have a number of colonial-era buildings that remain standing till today. Often, these buildings were conceived as public institution, built with good ‘bones’ to support their lives for decades—if not centuries—to come. Yet, many of these buildings have stood empty and unused. This could be due to their functions falling out […]

Strung together: a hybrid retail emerges from an unused structure

In line with our ongoing student competition FuturArc Prize (FAP) 2022: Reinterpretation, we are highlighting previously published projects that follow the theme. Click here to learn more about the brief and to submit your entries for FAP! The existing building was initially constructed to be part of the Pudong landscape, but it had fallen into […]

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