Extend
Here is an aerial view of Libeskind’s extension to the main house to form the Nussbaum Museum in Osnabruck. There is great daring to be found in the idea of adjacencies where adjacencies might not be thought to really make sense, thereby creating spaces between buildings which traditionally might have been thought best to keep free as axial views.
Imagine this theory at work in the compacted city environment.
Here is one of the Darton Towers in Manchester, re-clad and internally re-arranged by Urban Splash to provide modern apartments to occupy the volume previously designated as unloved flats. The basic structure remains the same, the future proofing has as much to do with image as function .
Organise space and working
Here in Dublin, O’Donnell and Tuomey work through a careful series of interventions to make a group of buildings operate as one.
External spaces become internal and windows become balconies, this could be offices or homes arts or theatre it is genuinely new use for old.
Latham’s proposal for Nottingham University Postgraduate centre follow a similar process of interventions and change to bring new life to a listed building.
Remove waste circulation
As here at the Bishop’s Stortford Arts Centre (right), a lost space between buildings can be utilized to provide all vertical circulation and connection of levels necessary to bring a resolution of access between uses or departments. In this case, Lathams introduced top light and lifts to achieve a new future for a building group
And here the architect Karl-Joseph Schattner has provided the university at Eichstatt with a new reading room by enclosing an old courtyard and allowing new work to form the third side.
The Future?
For all the economic, social, cultural or environmental constraints on architecture, the design and building of iconic new structures is not going to stop. If nothing else, the human race’s seemingly endless appetite for bigger, faster, taller, sleeker or simply newer will ensure it continues to be a powerful force in our built environment.
It seems clear, however, that particularly in the developed Western economies there is a range of factors, from economy to environment and beyond, which points to changing demands and changing needs. For all that architects are not the be-all and end-all of the development process, we do have a role to play in helping our clients to square what might seem to be in insurmountable circle – how to meet the demands for new space, new facilities and even a new aesthetic without turning every time to new build.
We as architects must move beyond the new. We must not only embrace adaptive re-use ourselves, but also and be able to show our clients that to help them embrace adaptive re-use, and to show that far from being a second-best option imposed by economic or environmental restrictions, it can unlock powerful new benefits.
We must all look at our buildings and our spaces with fresh eyes. When we see an open and unused floorplate like the one pictured right, we must wonder not just what was it once was, but consider what might it become: your home, your place of work, your new local cinema - or perhaps all three?
