HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER BY ZAHA HADID

A major new venue and landmark structure, the Haydar Aliyev Cultural Centre will play a pivotal role in the redevelopment of Baku.

Defining a new neighborhood designated for residential, offices, hotel and commercial centre; facing out onto a new outdoor piazza.

This most fluid of buildings emerges through the folding of the surrounding landscape’s natural topography which extends to ‘wrap’ the different functions housed within – each one represented by the folds in the centre’s continuous surface.

“Emerging from the surrounding landscape, this most fluid of structures provides a major new venue, landmark and source of regeneration for the city of Baku.

Admitting visitors to a library, museum and conference centre through folds in its continuous outer skin, the interior spaces flooded with natural light via a glass façade.” Zaha Hadid says.

This fluidity connects diverse cultural spaces while also providing each with its own identity and privacy.

The museum faces out into the landscape – participating in the urban fabric of the city developing around the site, its glass façade subtly interrupted by the sculptural interplay between outer skin and ground.

Natural light ‘floods’ the interior via a glass façade. The library faces north, effectively controlling admitted light, while reading and archive floors are stacked and wrapped within the folds of the outer envelope.

The floors fall to each other with ramps connecting them, allowing continuous circulation.

Library and museum are further connected by a ramp that leads through the ground floor of the Library to the first floor of the Museum, while a bridge ‘flies’ across the library foyer connecting to the conference centre.

The conference centre accommodates three auditoriums of different sizes, all with direct access to the external plaza through a main entrance located within the void created by ‘stretching’ the volume’s outer skin.

Surrounding landscape rises to merge with the building, forming radiated earth mounds, while the building itself blends with its surrounds to form the new plaza – a forum for public engagement.

 

 

Location: Baku, Azerbaijan

Architect: Zaha Hadid Architects

Area: 101,801m²

Building: 57,519m²

Site: 111,292m²

Footprint: 15,514m²

Year: 2007 –2012

Client: The Republic of Azerbaijan

GALAXY SOHO BY ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS

 

Zaha Hadid Architects have recently completed the Galaxy SOHO office and retail building in the historical centre of Beijing, China. Zaha Hadid joined Soho China's Zhang Xin and Pan Shiyi, with 15,000 guests from China and around the world, to celebrate the completion of Galaxy Soho, Beijing.

 

"Working on Galaxy for Soho China was very exciting. The design responds to the varied contextual relationships and dynamic conditions of Beijing. We have created a variety of public spaces that directly engage with the city; reinterpreting the traditional urban fabric and contemporary living patterns into a seamless urban landscape inspired by nature," explains Hadid. "The natural rhythms and flows of the city, of the environment and of the people have been integrated within the design to define its formal composition."

 

 

Five continuous, flowing volumes coalesce to create an internal world of continuous open spaces within Galaxy Soho – a new office, retail entertainment complex devoid of corners or abrupt transitions – a re-inventing of the classical Chinese courtyard which generates an immersive, enveloping experience at the heart of Beijing.

These volumes generate what ZHA deems "a panoramic architecture", without corners or abrupt transitions breaking the fluidity of its formal composition. "The great interior courts of the project are a reflection of traditional Chinese architecture where courtyards create an internal world of continuous open spaces," the architects point out.

"Here, the architecture is no longer composed of rigid blocks, but instead comprised of volumes which generate a deep sense of immersion and envelopment. As users enter deeper into the building, they discover intimate spaces that follow the same coherent formal logic of continuous curvelinearity."

Galaxy Soho constitutes a new office, retail and entertainment complex for the heart of this great Chinese city – matching its grand scale. The complex comprises five continuous flowing volumes, set apart yet fused or linked by a sequence of stretched bridges.

Each volume adapts outwards, generating a panoramic architecture devoid of corners or abrupt transitions. Galaxy Soho reinvents the great interior courts of Chinese antiquity to create an internal world of continuous open spaces. Here, architecture no longer incorporates rigid blocks, but instead comprises volumes which coalesce to achieve continuous mutual adaptation and fluid movement between buildings.

Shifting plateaus impact upon each other to generate a deep sense of immersion and envelopment, allowing visitors to discover intimate spaces as they move deeper in the building. The structure’s three lower levels contain retail and entertainment facilities, those above provide works spaces for innovative businesses of many kinds, while top levels are dedicated to bars, restaurants and cafes – many with views along the city’s great avenues.

 

 

The lower three levels of the building house public facilities for retail and entertainment. The levels immediately above provide work spaces for clusters of innovative businesses, while the top of the building houses bars, restaurants and cafés, while simultaneously offering views along one of the city's avenues. "These different functions are interconnected through intimate interiors that are always linked with the city, helping to establish Galaxy SOHO as a major urban landmark for Beijing," state the architects.

 

 

With its inclusive, organic design incorporating innovative public spaces, all available units in Galaxy Soho were sold in 2011. Zaha Hadid Architects continue to develop the Wangjing (Beijing) and Sky (Shanghai) projects for Soho China.

 

Location: Beijing, China

Architect: Zaha Hadid Architects

Design: Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher

Project Director: Satoshi Ohashi

Project Architect: Yoshi Uchiyama

Execution Team: Stephan Wurster, Michael Hill, Samer Chamoun, Eugene Leung, Rita Lee, Lillie Liu, Rolando Rodriguez-Leal, Wen Tao, Tom Wuenschmann, Seung-ho Yeo, Shuojiong Zhang, Michael Grau, Shu Hashimoto, Shao-Wei Huang, Chikara Inamura, Lydia Kim, Yasuko Kobayashi, Wang Lin, Yereem Park, Kelly Lee

Gross Floor Area: 332,857m²

PORT HOUSE BY ZAHA HADID

The Official Ceremony has been held to start the construction work on Port House, the new headquarters for Antwerp Port Authority on the Kattendijk dock. The new Antwerp Port Authority headquarters will house approximately 500 staff (currently working in separate buildings) in a single new location that comprises a former fire station and the new extension.

The design team from Zaha Hadid Architects proposed a very dynamic architecture that strikes up a dialogue with the Oosterweel road link, with the Lange Wapper bridge forming a backdrop to the New Port House. With its unique design, its facade architecture and its height of 46 metres, the new Port Authority will be an iconic building, visible from many different directions.

The concept is a free interpretation of a beam-shaped volume raised above the existing fire brigade building and supported on three sculptured concrete pillars housing the stairs and lifts. Two of the pillars are situated on the covered inner courtyard of the firehouse, while the third is located beside an external support point and consists of a panoramic lift shaft.

The new volume is oriented North-South parallel to the Kattendijk dock. The head of the building on the South side is a frame that looks towards the city and clearly marks the start of the port area. The outside walls are made up of glass triangles, some transparent and some reflecting. These do not all lie in the same plane but are rotated slightly with respect to one another, creating an attractive reflecting play of incoming light in a reference to Antwerp’s diamond industry.

The present firehouse will be kept free of building all around, so that the four outside walls will be fully respected. As for the arrangement of the inside spaces, consultations will be held with Flanders Real Estate Heritage and the Monuments department of the City of Antwerp to determine whether open-plan offices (as laid down in the schedule of requirements) are possible, either partly of throughout.

The inner courtyard will be roofed over at the height of the second story so as to create an air-conditioned inside space. This central entrance hall will be considered as a semi-public space, with various enquiry desks (Personnel department, Harbourmaster’s Office, Planning Permission & Environment Permit office and Port Dues payment desk) integrated in the inside wall portals.

A sculptural, sloping roof unites an underground lobby with the covered inner court. Access to the underground car park is an important aspect of the overall concept, with the loading & unloading bays and the refuse handling facilities also located here. The car park has space for 300 or so cars and consists of a single underground level.

The design of the square can be arranged so that daylight is allowed to enter. The above-ground layout forms part of a design project that is being carried out in consultation with the city departments responsible, with the main imperative being to “preserve the visual quality of the outside spaces in the Het Eilandje area.

 

Location: Antwerp, Belgium

Architect: Zaha Hadid architects

Area: 12.800 mq. (groos) – 16.400 mq. (site)

Client: Antwerp Port Authority

Year: 2008 (project)

JOCKEY CLUB INNOVATION TOWER BY ZAHA HADID

Zaha Hadid’s first permanent building in Hong Kong is due to complete this year and it has just been announced that the banded tower at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University will be used as the base for Hong Kong’s first Desigh Institute for Social Innovation. The fluid character of the Innovation Tower is generated through an intrinsic composition of its landscape, floor platesand louvers, that dissolves the classic typology of the tower and the podium into an iconic seamless piece.

These fluid internal and external courtyards create new public spaces of an intimate scale which complement the large open exhibition forums and outdoor recreational facilities to promote a diversity of civic spaces. The University has been aided in this venture by The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust who donated HK$249m to the cause.

PolyU President Professor Timothy W. Tong explains: “This is the largest single donation ever received by the University since its establishment in 1937. We are truly grateful for the Jockey Club for their generous support to this project as well as many other initiatives undertaken by PolyU over the years.” After the building project was approved back in 2009, PolyU were required to fund a quarter of the necessary construction costs.

The Jockey Club Design Institute for Social Innovation will support students in the study of social issues arising in Hong Kong and the Pearl River Delta Region, addressed through the themes of Service Design, Sustainable Environment, Holistic Health, and Adolescent and Family Development.

The building will become a blended space for academia and business as well as the development of research and product design for the betterment of local residents. Mr. T. Brian Stevenson, Chairman of The Hong Kong Jockey Club, stated: “We believe that the Institute will provide a springboard of community education and training; foster student learning and help nurture a new generation of design professionals who are not only innovative but also socially conscious.”

UrbanismThe Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HK PolyU) is an urban endeavour by virtue of addition and growth over the last 40 years. The rich patchwork of various faculties, communities and facilities are strung together by a community of visually coherent yet different buildings. From a process of outward expansion, the HK PolyU is now looking inwards to develop itself by making creative use of its remaining void on the North side of the campus.

The Innovation Tower aims to use these voids to create an accessible urban space which will transform how the Hong Kong Poly University is perceived and the way it will be used. The building unashamedly aims to stimulate and project a vision of possibilities for its future, as well as reflect the history of the HK PolyU by encapsulating in its architecture the process of change.

The new Innovation Tower on podium level is established as an open public foyer that channels deep into the building through a column-free, open showcase forum. The long integrated path from Suen Chi Sun Memorial Square guides the visitor to the main entrance and from here, a generous and welcoming space openly leads its visitors access to supporting public facilities, shop, cafeteria and museum.

The podium level is a route that ramps and stretches through towards the open ground with relocated recreational outdoor facilities. From the entry foyer, a long escalator penetrates deep upwards through four levels of openly glazed workspaces.

These routes aims to promote new opportunities of interaction between the diverse types of users through its spaces through every level. Voids bring in natural daylight, fresh air and the sense of continuity of space. In this way, the programmes of the tower, which comprise of learning clusters and central facilities, are allowed to create coordinated repertoires and dialogue between respective volumes.

Location: Hong Kong, China

Architect: Zaha Hadid Arcjitects

Design Principal: Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher

Project Director:Woody K.T.Yao

Project Team:Simon Yu; Competition team: Hinki Kwong, Melodie Leung, Long Jiang, Zhenjiang Guo, Yang Jingwen, Miron Mutyaba, Pavlos Xanthopoulus, Margarita Yordanova Valova

Landscape: Team 73 Hong Kong Ltd

Consultants: AGC Design, LtdAD+RG

Client: Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Area: 15000 mq.