Guerilla Architecture

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Our ninja Ivan Hernandez Quintela of Ludens [our first 'Ninja of the Month'] contacted AMNP last week about new projects he’s worked on since the NotM feature – specifically, “The Box” @ MUAC. In addition to his own work, Ivan shared work done by student who participated in a “Guerilla Architecture” course which he taught at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City.

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Ivan’s students were asked to produce temporary shelters that would meet the needs of one of several ‘homeless profiles’ that the class recognized, and then construct and test the design. Both designs featured here attempt to “make evident that the homeless are not inactive people, but actually are extremely mobile, nomad by nature” – creating solutions that take into account this mobile nature of many of the homeless.

The idea was that the homeless citizen would wear the kimono during the day and would remove it during the night to create his temporary shelter.

A garment that could be worn by day, and then reassembled into a tent structure – the first design uses lines to attach to nearby objects in order to create a shelter from wearable materials, rather than using poles or other rigid, harder to carry methods. The homeless citizen then wears her shelter on her person, saving the energy and space needed to transport something larger/heavier.

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Next we have a design that combines this idea of mobility and need for shelter with the additional need – in some cases – for storage.

The students generated a vehicle, which was activated in a very similar manner as a wheel chair, so it required quite an athletic user, where two huge truck wheels were recuperated from a dump site and assembled in such a manner that in the middle is the navigating chair, and each wheel is used either as a resting spot or as a can container.

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::all images, info, and quotes courtesy of Ivan Hernandez Quintela::

Posted: June 30th, 2009
at 4:22pm


Categories: Ninjas of the Month, architecture, featured ninjas, housing, student

Comments: No comments


Quote of the Day

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[Image: Iterations: Kunst-Haas, May 24th 2009]

I’ve been kind of ‘on record’ as being deeply unhappy, and deeply uncomfortable about that kind of situation ['starchitect' title]… because I think every name describes a content, and the content of ’star architect’ – compared to the content of ‘architect’ – is limited. Nobody thinks the star has good intentions. A star walks over you – a star is indifferent to what people think. My hope is that also, through the current complexity, that the title will exit discreetly and disappear.

~ Rem Koolhaas in CNN interview, which can be seen here.

Posted: June 29th, 2009
at 3:26pm


Categories: architecture, quote of the day, starchitects

Comments: No comments


MNP Goes LEED Double Diamond

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The MNP fam has decided that it was finally time we ‘officially’ went ‘green’ – even tho ninjas have obviously always lived in perfect harmony with their environment. With that in mind, AMNP was kind enough to grace the USGBC and GBCI with our membership – and my becoming a LEED AP. For us it was little more than an early morning diversion and a few hundred bucks lost – but now these LEED organizations can claim an association with the shogunate, which will surely improve public perception of both groups. You’re welcome, USGBC and GBCI – no big thing, really.

With this in mind, we’ve decided to go for a LEED rating here at MNP. For AMNP specifically, this means that I will be recycling 100% of future content from other blogs and websites within a 500 mile radius. I’ll also be creating a graphic for the top of the page advising visitors that the site is best viewed with your monitor off, to save electricity.

I’ve also presented plans to the rest of myninjaplease to take the network to LEED Double Diamond status – which is lightyears ahead of Platinum, for those that didn’t know – by constructing the new dojo in a paralel dimension that has no impact on our own, accessed from an urban brownfield site we’ll be converting to a public park.

Posted: June 29th, 2009
at 11:52am


Categories: MNP, architecture, green arch

Comments: No comments


Ninjas on the ‘Net

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It’s Monday! Which of course means that many of you are back at work, staring blankly at your computer screens and trying to shake off the weekend. That said, with the current state of things, many of you are probably barely aware of what day it is – staring at the 2 new job postings that went up this week and wondering just how many other people are going to be applying for them, too [I'm there also]. But hey, that’s why we have the internet – to distract us from ‘the Mondays’ and from dreary job searches [contrary to popular belief, the web is for more than porn and Youtube videos, apparently - who knew?]. So zone out and enjoy some linkage, which will hopefully occupy you through lunch.

As always, if you come across an article you think I should post a link to, or a project AMNP should feature, drop me an email at architecture@myninjaplease.com.

- Guggenheim original color suggestions from FLW, plus early designs [NY Times]

- Slideshow of Guggenheim drawings / proposals [NY Times]

- an interview with John from Archidose [I Dream of Architecture]

- is Dharavi a slum? pt 1 + 2 [Where]
- here’s how a firm should run their network/internet, like it was the 21st century [Architect Magazine]

- track stimulus money and plan accordingly [Architect Magazine]

- green buildings: lovely, except for the acoustics? [Scientific American]

- a post related to the one above on green acoustics, from ‘07 [CityofSound]

- NYC, 1966, and John Lindsay’s vision for the city [triplecanopy]

- horrifying coloring books [Mockitecture]

- BIM promotes sustainability [construction.com]

- will Beantown get a fleet of shared/rentable bicycles, like zip-car with pedals? [MA High Tech Business News]

- as always, don’t sleep on the myninjaplease.com main site

That wraps up this week’s Ninjas on the ‘Net. On your way out, remember to visit all our ninjas in the sidebar – support AMNP fam!

Posted: June 29th, 2009
at 11:39am


Categories: Ninjas on the 'net

Comments: No comments


Koolhaas on CNN [seriously]

::Video Sundays, or VS, is a weekly feature here on AMNP. For more architecture-related videos, click on any Sunday in the sidebar calendar – or on the ‘videos’ category in the ‘archjutsu’ section. And don’t hesitate to submit suggestions for video features to architecture[at]myninjaplease[dot]com::

Posted: June 28th, 2009
at 6:19am


Categories: architecture, starchitects, videos

Comments: 3 comments


URBIA: For Small Apts in Big Cities

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OBRA Architects was kind enough to share images of their URBIA Furniture System for Small Apts in Big Cities project, completed in 2007 and winner of a 2008 ID Annual Design Review Award.

Our Furniture Expansion System for Small Apartments in Big Cities, is designed for such lifestyles of minimal materiality—even if it is lopsided since these types tend to accumulate large book or shoe collections, vices that one day suddenly surprise with unexpected demands for additional room.

The project, designed for people OBRA deems ‘urban nomads’, is meant to address the needs of urbanites with small apartments who “fancy perpetual pedestrian investigations and as little time spent at home as
possible”. OBRA proposes that their system serves the function of providing simple space definition, storage, and the ability to travel with these nomadic city dwellers as they move over time.

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The system is made up of hollow wood panels and cabinets – constructed offsite with CNC milled 1/2″ ash plywood -  which are a maximum of 2×8 feet to ensure that the system can be transported through standard doorways, hallways, and elevator cabs. The system can be assembled vertically or horizontally – giving the ability to create partitions in a space, and/or create loft floors in space with adequate height – and has the potential for “endless reconfiguration” due to its modular nature.

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In today’s urban housing market mostly universally characterized by unimaginative and ill-conceived spaces dressed-up as luxurious by the inclusion of a few expensive materials, URBIA proposes a luxury of conception implicit in the harmony of its modular coordination. The proposed system is open-ended in nature, allowing for site modifications and the addition of custom elements that can give specificity to the whole, but it also provides, unlike traditional sheet-rock based interior construction, a built-in rhythm of articulation based on a Fibonacci series that makes proportional mistakes difficult and beauty almost automatic.

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A very interesting concept, it reminds me a lot of the work of Dan Hisel, AMNP featured Ninja of the Month – in particular, his ‘Z-Box’ projects [1 & 2]. The idea to transform rented or temporary living space with a modular, portable, reconfigurable, inhabitable furniture system is incredible – and I especially like the uniform material, which allows personal possessions and furniture to accentuate the spaces. It would be particularly interesting if you didn’t have to pack up your posessions when you moved – if the system was really potable storage, that was arranged into an inhabitable system. Get a new place? Just close up the cabinets and shelves still filled with your stuff [maybe bubble-wrap fragile objects, but thats it] and be on your way. Not sure that that is feasible, really – but it’d be pretty dope.

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[Image: wire-frame drawing of assembly system]

::See more photos – and the ones featured here, but in larger format – here, at AMNP’s Flickr page::

::all images, info + quoted text courtesy of OBRA Architects::

Posted: June 26th, 2009
at 12:55pm


Categories: architecture, furniture, housing, interiors

Comments: No comments


Death of a Ninja: Michael Jackson

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Michael Jackson, ‘The King of Pop’
August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009

I just wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the passing of a cultural icon, Michael Jackson.

I obviously can’t speak to the controversy that surrounded so much of his life in recent memory – nor can I turn a blind eye, because he’s passed, to the possibility that the allegations may be true. His image and legacy will forever be tarnished by events of the last decade or so, but dwelling on uncertain facts at this point seems disrespectful. Everyone ‘believes’ something about what happened, yet most ‘know’ nothing – I think its important to consider the difference between the two now that the man is gone.

The controversy is over – we are now faced with deciding how we chose to remember this incredible artist, a legend in his own lifetime.

For the immediate future [at least], I’d like to stick with what I know to be true: Michael Jackson changed global music and pop culture, forever – and I love his music. He was an incredible talent, and will be missed.

Rest in peace, sir.

Posted: June 26th, 2009
at 10:25am


Categories: MNP

Comments: 2 comments


BIG: Tallinn’s New City Hall

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The Bjarke Ingels Group has won an international competition to design Tallinn’s [Estonia] new city hall on a 35,000 square meter plot near the Linnahall building. The new design presents a cluster of volumes, housing different administrative offices and interconnecting to form atrium and/or courtyard spaces that would seem to connect to more public plazas surrounding the structure.

Bjarke Ingels, BIG, Partner-in-Charge:

There is a saying that success has many fathers. That is especially true when designing such a crucial public building and public space as a town hall. The design needs to be shaped by input from neighbours  and users, citizens and politicians. Paradoxically we architects often find ourselves isolated from this crucial dialogue at the moment of conception, due to the anonymity of the architectural competition. Since this was a 2 stage competition, we already had our first feedback from the jury – causing us to dramatically rearrange our design to fit the citizens’ needs. As a result we have envisioned a very elastic structure – capable of adapting to unexpected demands. We see it as the first conversation in a design dialogue we look forward to continue.

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The design emphasizes openness, and connections with the surrounding city. Located within the tower/spire shown, the city council looks out onto the city and outdoor public spaces – while at the same time, those outside can get a glimpse at the inner workings or the city’s government. To give those inside, and out, a better/more interesting view, the ceiling of the tower is to be tiled with a reflective surface – creating a kind of ‘periscope’ effect. This gives the city council a reflection of the city overhead – maybe a constant reminder of who/what they’re working for – and possibly gives the average citizen the ability to look in on meetings as they’re taking place, as if looking over the shoulders of their representatives.

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The periscope is a form of democratic tower, where even the average Tallinn citizen on the street gets to enjoy the overview from the top. From a distance the silhouette of the town hall tower enters the family of Tallinn’s historical spires including those of the Niguliste Museum-Concert Hall, Toomkirik, Kaarli Kirik, Pühavaimu Kirik, St. Olav Church and the current town hall.

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::images + quoted text courtesy of the Bjarke Ingels Group::

Posted: June 25th, 2009
at 10:42am


Categories: architecture, competitions

Comments: 4 comments


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