A Place in Space
The Problem of the Suburb (the space between things)
Looking skyward is rarely an uplifting experience in the Lower Mainland. Yet when looking up at the timber roof structure in Surrey's new town centre, it is difficult not to feel a sense of awe. One could say that our minds do not read space, they read volume.
Or put another way, we cannot 'create' space - we can only hope to intelligently frame it.
The edges of Nolli's 1748 map of Rome reveals the importance of this principle when it comes to making memorable urban spaces on the outskirts of a developing city.
The proliferation of the object in 20th Century suburban planning has led to a lack of regard for the implied volumes we call streets. Architectural objects in isolation cannot 'solve the suburb'.
The Problem of the Tower (the space inside things)
All buildings, however, must be objects in some sense of the term. And, like all objects, they are humanized through association and use. But we cannot use a building as we would a pen - instead we inhabit its sheltered volumes.
The identity of a condominium tower is almost exclusively that of an object, rather than a space which invites appropriation. The disparity between the volume it occupies and the pigeon-hole spaces inside it, further dehumanizes the tower.
How can these principles be applied to Semiahmoo? The brief calls for a typology which is object-based, and for a plaza in a suburb with acres of empty, characterless space.
A Place in Space
In this proposal, the sidewalk is diverted through an internal, full-height, cruciform void within the tower, giving pedestrians the opportunity to read the tower not just as an object but as a space, or more importantly, as a place. Each apartment features two double-height 'external' spaces - one opening to the exterior, the other opening to the sheltered internal void and the diverted street below. The void thus becomes appropriated by both the street and the apartments above it.
The existing sectional change across the site, in tandem with existing pedestrian movements, informs the design of the plaza. The lower level of the site's eastern edge is taken as the datum for the plaza, its sunken nature declaring it a volume apart from the empty streets nearby. Effects of compression and release from the internal street to the plaza, along with the overlooking street above, announce it as a theatrical space.
Stats: 112 apartments
(From competitor's text)
7 scanned / 5 viewable
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