London.MixUseDevelopments 2.

BRUNSWICK CENTER vs NEO BANKSIDE

The students focused their exploration around two iconic residential projects that incorporate commercial-retail on ground floor:

1/ The Brunswick Centre by Patrick Hodgkinson
2/ NEO Bankside by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners

The first being a grade II listed building from the 1970s whilst the latter is a contemporary development recently completed.

The students drew how these buildings articulate the same program in different ways and consequently define the performance of the building. This exercise helped them discover how these building-design react to similar challenges of circulation, scale, materiality whilst relating differently to their adjacent urbanity contributing to create specific urban environments.

To do this, the studio divided itself in two study groups so that each students of the each team could explore respectively one of the specific topic listed below. The elements explored dealt with tangible and intangible attributes so that the unseen essence could be unveiled.

1-Circulation and Flow
2-Infrastructure and Network
3-Activity and Time
4-Scale and Rhythm
5-Edge and Boundaries
6-Solid and Void
7- Pattern

These topics were explored through drawing and model making; the challenge was to abstract the real building to highlight the qualities of the chosen topic to study.