Vivid Sydney 2011

Vivid Sydney has drawn its curtain for 2011.

It has been a wonderful 2 weeks of festivity, turning the iconic buildings - Sydney Opera House and Customs House - into canvases for international artistic collaboration.  The play of light and effect on architectural perception is truly wonderful.

Here are some photographs of Opera House... we live in such a beautiful city.

excitement along the walk leading up to Sydney Opera House

(Additional information June 15 2011)

Here is a realtime video of Custom House light show..... it is truly amazing!

Many thanks to our friend Matthew Ho for filming and editing the entire show, and generously allows us to embed in our blog.

Customs House, Vivid Sydney 2011 from Matthew Ho on Vimeo.

Meter for meter

Here are some photos we have of Uchi Lounge construction...it was so cool we had to especially call in our photographer to take some professional shots before the project is finished.

Uchi Lounge has a long and skinny floor plate, very narrow access.
The restaurant area on ground floor, where we are working on at the moment, is 11m long and 4m wide but with an unusually high ceiling of 3.5m.
So here we have 2x 11m long steel beams penetrating the entire volume, supported off the end walls at either side of the 11m without extra support inbetween, exerting tremendous sense of existence within the peculiarly proportioned space.

Anyone curious about how the steel beams got into the restaurant in one piece through a very narrow door way?

Photo (c) Katherine Lu

The entry door way is to the left on the furthermost corner (spot the green exit sign?); the bright square in the centre of the photo is a bay window with fixed glass fronting the street. Photo (c) Katherine Lu

M House - DONE!!!!!

We are proud to announce...... M HOUSE IS COMPLETED!! (*scream with excitement*)

M House has successfully obtained 確認済証 ("kakuninsumi shou" = Occupational Certificate in Australia) on May 27th, and construction team has cleared out of the house completely.
Construction was officially launched October 23rd 2010, the entire construction period was 7 months despite the heavy snow and earthquake.
It feels a little sentimental, especially with a project which has been around for such a long time (it is as old as our practice!) to see it finally becomes an individual identity; I guess this feeling will be even stronger when the M family moves into their new home!

Here we have some photos taken by our multi-talented builder, Otsuki san.... they are so good that we can probably save on professional photography?!

our familiar shot.  Question: "where was Otsuki san standing when he took this photo?"

view from inside the entry box ("genkan") to the outside through main entry door

the deck viewed from outside entry door

view from the street (compare this with the last photo)

view of the deck at night

view from street

good bye! old M House!

Wardrobes!

Admittedly I have been too carried away with site(s) in Sydney lately and have slacked off updating on M House....these photos are from Yoshi's last visit (beginning of  May)....oops!

M House is raised off the natural ground level by 1m, and with an entry door of a rather modest dimension.
In order to move in the wardrobes which are prefabricated in factory, this is what has happened.....

delivery truck has arrived outside M House

...careful.....

wow...this is a big one.....

.....more careful......

man... this is HUGE!

Come everyone!
(later on the joiners put a large piece of timber to span between the truck and the house over the fence......and "walked the plank" with furniture pieces)

all sitting silently in the bedroom

just installed.  looking very pretty (my nerdy love for plywood is showing..)

...open this way.....

...or open this way....!

Can 100% sure be sure enough?

After we have built the part mock-up of Uchi Lounge and tested in office, in order to be more sure and lighting effect, we built a full scale lightbox with cardboard to test the effect on site after majority of the wall painting was completed.

Our mock-up was one section of the actual lightbox, approximately 1.1m (L) x 1.4m (W) x 0.3m (D)....it was transported by cab from office in parts and assembled on site... does that sound like some DIY off-site prefabrication?!

Ben working away on the mock-up in the meeting room..... where is the meeting table?

on site we emerged from the dark....

Who designed this cool shop?

Sneakerology (photo: Katherine Lu)

ok...WE did...!

This is Sneakerology in the new Westfield Shopping Centre, Sydney.
We completed the design and documentation of it, and its sister store Streetology adjacent to it, end of 2009.   The two stores completed construction and opened end of 2010.

Yesterday we went in for a photoshoot.... I was feeling so proud....
I will talk about them in more details in a later post!

photoshoot in Streetology; our photographer Katherine looking through the finder

photoshoot in Streetology; there I was looking rather nervous.

Studio SPEC published in Malaysia!

Our project, Studio SPEC, is published in Space Magazine, Malaysia!

I am not sure if Space Magazine is selling here in Sydney (we have received our copy from the publisher in mail today), but if you happen to spot Issue 2011 #2, check out p114 - 117!

Embodiment of Light

Today we did a small experiment on the lighting effects for Uchi Lounge.

We made a 1:1 sectional model of the lightbox we are designing, organised large scale sample from fabric supplier, borrowed light source from electrician (don't we love our team!), and tested the effect of light if the light source is at different distance and direction from the fabric.

The difference is subtle at this scale but will be magnified once built.... can you tell the difference?

light source at the furtherest point in the lightbox from the fabric

light source at half the distance in the lightbox from the fabric

We did similar experiments for the Water Moon lightbox; but it was to test out the clarity of shadow projection from within the lightbox.
We had to go for the compact fluorescent rather than the linear fluorescent as the result (the linear fluorescent produces very diffused light and was not projecting much of any recognisable shadows...).
There was also a rather sensitive relationship with the interrelated distance between light source, bottle, and fabric......well, we had a lot of fun and are happy with the result!

Initial concept stage, when testing with paper lampshade material

During construction, testing with actual fabric sample on site

Freshly installed...the day before Water Moon opened for business

Professionally photographed (c) Katherine Lu

Water Moon has been widely recognised:
> Restaurant & Bar Design Awards UK - International Lighting Design Category - Shortlisted (refer HERE)
> Intergrain Timber Vision Awards 2010 - Commercial Interior Category - Winner (refer HERE)
> IDEA Awards 2010 - Best Hospitality Design - Shortlisted (refer HERE)

Nostalgia nostalgia

It is always a challenge, to work on something that is already very nice in a non-descriptive way... Here we have one.

We were approached by Uchi Lounge in Sydney to work on the interior renovation, so we went for dinner to observe how things are.
It is tucked away in the lane way for people who are looking for somewhere to temporarily hide out from the noise of the world.  The inside space is architecturally unadorned, but the atmosphere is organic and relaxing, somewhere really comfortable and safe, with a sense of nostalgia...I guess that is why it is where local celebrities chose to hang out.
The owner of Uchi Lounge is an artist who produced most of the artworks in the space.  Oh and have I mentioned the food? ...man... so good....

Now we are faced with the challenge to create something sensitive and just as "comfortable".....Well, guess we will know soon enough as we are going into construction next week!

Here are some photos of the existing condition..

the street facade

entry stairwell

the unusually large, long bar

looking back out to the street

Let there be light

Today the triangular glass infill is installed ...finally.....
M house is suddenly filled with such gentle glow, and the roof structure sits silently in its fine repetition.

2011 April 28 - approaching completion

2010 November 11 - study model

2011 March 22 - sealed triangular infill with plywood during construction