Another new start!

Before Meudon has completely finished, we have to make a start on another site last week.

It was a 4am start, in order to minimise any disturbance to neighbours.  

We were starting on building the mezzanine structure to the soon-to-be restaurant first.
Because almost all the intertenancy walls are not structural, the mezzanine is cantilevered on all sides from concrete columns with some help of couple of new steel columns.  As the result the steel members are rather oversized, very heavy to transport indeed.

By end of Day 1, we had most of the mezzanine bones up - hooray~~!

 quietly......

 shhhhhhhh.......

surveying the mezzanine height...

end of Day 1 - someone said it looks like a movie set; I guess it does!!

 one of the complicated steel junctions at top of the stair

Day 51 - Cheerfulness

Jumping over quite a few hurdles here we have arrived at Day 51 of Meudon site.
There is a silent cheerfulness in the air now that construction dusts have all settled at last, light and air freely circulate in the spacious apartment, finally the space is taking the shape of what we have originally imagined.

This is probably one of those exciting moments of all things - almost there but not quite, full of anticipation and hope.. of course this excitement is only to be surpassed by the even-more-exciting project completion!

 

 

 

 

Sydney Architecture Festival - "Behind the Lens" Exhibition

Sydney Architecture Festival is on!

On the weekend it was Sydney Open, with 50+ Sydney's best loved buildings opening their doors for people.  During these 2 weeks there are numerous architectural talks, exhibitions, activities for anyone and everyone interested in architecture.

I went to see the "Behind the Lens" photographic exhibition.  Our work Sneakerology was included in the exhibition by photographer Katherine Lu. Beautiful photography works of Opera House, Apple Store, Sydney architecture / cityscape and more are also on exhibition by 5 of the Sydney architectural photographers.

"Behind the Lens" is on at The Rocks Pop Up until NOV 10, don't miss out!

The Rocks Pop Up

 

Sneakerology spotted!

 

Doshisha "You Are Here"

The more the site develops, the more it is becoming maze-like....
Lets have a little orientation session so we know what we are looking at.

Here is an elevation of Doshisha Chapel Complex:

The red dot is where we stand...

....in the photo 

A little bit more oriented or did I manage to confuse you more?

Well, I just realised that we can actually stand on top of the buildings now! 

Few more months to go...  頑張りましょう!!

Good as new!

Interesting that Sneakerology is still constantly requested by press after the years!

It is published this time by Index Book from Barcelona, Spain as one of the "...projects that represent the forefront of retail design".

I sometimes wonder what defines Architecture.
At this moment, for me, it is about "timelessness".

Maybe Sneakerology is on its way to becoming Architecture...

 

 

 

 

 

High up above

Doshisha Chapel has a ceiling height of 8m.

The ceiling is consisted of a cross-hatch screen of different sized timber battens.  This screen conceals services behind, assists with acoustic reverberation time, and allows access for maintenance.

Here is the mock-up panel of the ceiling screen in our Kyoto site office.

In this earlier post you can see our "homemade" mockup....

 

 

 

Subtle (but important) differences

Testing grouts between hollow concrete blocks in Kyoto Doshisha site.

There are: 

- different textures: smooth or rough

- different depth of indentation: 0mm, 3mm, 5mm

- different shades of grey (aarrgghh...)

Any preference?

 

 

 

 

Day 18 - let there be light

The site in Sydney is now 1/3 way through construction program.
Lots of unpredictable happened (which is predictable for a building of this age) but we managed to keep on track with the very tight program.
So this is where we are at....

from the front door - there is so much light after enlarging the openings 

the wall on the right of corridor is the original finish; the wall on the left has been stripped of the ornaments during construction but all timber architraves will be reinstated to maintain the heritage intactness of the corridor

connecting the 2 central room is the main operation ...to allow light and breeze to circulate within the apartment

this opening was blocked off for more than 30 years... we have now reinstated it

running electrical cables under the floor has been a difficult task because the floor joists are at different directions and are laid in individual rooms (so the space under the floor is interrupted at the walls by masonry plinths)

new central room by connecting 2 rooms.  Original plan was lacking hierarchy in space, almost like an assemblage of scattered rooms.  We try to introduce a "heart" into the planning where the rooms / spaces can "come off" from

the top of this window was covered for over 30 years.  It is nice to see how it is reinstated and is bringing so much light into the space 

at the sunroom, slanting window sills have been replaced by straight sills.  Aluminium windows will be replaced with sashless windows to provide uninterrupted view to the Bay....

Poured!!

Concrete is poured, we have moved up one storey with Doshisha Chapel!

 This is half of the site...