Архитектура

 Saving space. Big ideas for small buildings

Over the years, talented architects have occasionally indulged themselves with the challenge of designing small but perfectly formed buildings. Today, with reduced budgets, many architects have turned in a more focused way to creating works that may be diminutive in their dimensions, but are definitely big when it comes to trendsetting ideas. Whether in Japanese cities, where large sites are hard to come by, or at the frontier between art and architecture, small buildings present many advantages, and push their designers to do more with less.

A dollhouse for Calvin Klein in New York, a playhouse for children in Trondheim, pop-up stores for fashion stars, vacation cabins, and housing for victims of natural disasters are all part of the new rush to develop the great small architecture of the moment. The 2013 Pritzker Prize winner Toyo Ito is here, but so are emergent architects from Portugal, Chile, England, and New Zealand. Alvaro Siza and Kazuyo Sejima (SANAA) display their eye for tiny detail alongside artists Doug Aitken and Olafur Eliasson. From world-famous names to the freshest new talent, come discover architectural invention on a whole new, small scale. 

Bars are places where intercultural and multidisciplinary contexts are born, where styles, materials and activities fuse into one, where any given scenario can be staged from the harmony juxtaposed by our senses. These are places that put social mechanisms into motion: those based the need for individuals to communicate. They are places characteristic of any city on Earth, ones which represent the global reach of contemporary modern design, ones that aim to strike a balance where no single feature stands out over another.

Gardens are filled with structures: gazebos and pergolas, pools and children's playspaces, sheds, fences and arbors. These pose a unique challenge to planning a landscape that successfully navigates and envelopes the structures. Landscape design expert, Gordon Hayward, presents situations in which garden structures have successfully been incorporated into the overall plan. With clear, straightforward and insightful text this is fully illustrated with photographs and watercolors. It is a thoroughly inspirational and practical resource.

Big doesn’t always mean better. Small City Houses wants to prove that you don’t need many square meters to create wonderful spaces. The book is a collection of small homes that symbolize contemporary cultural coded values: compactness, efficiency and minimalism.

This book brings together a selection of ideas for urban dwellings which respond to the scarcity of construction space in a particularly way. From homes on miniscule and problematic plots of land to small planned urban refuges, the projects included here prove that the lack of square metres actually promotes creativity, equally in respect to that of the architects as of the occupants. In these homes, the finest details are taken care of, each and every corner systematically put to good use, helping to create a feeling of spaciousness and wellbeing.

These houses are built to make the best use of renewable resources and designed to guarantee environmental protection and the health of the community. Ecological housing has in fact ceased to be the choice of just a few radical ecologists to become one of the fastest developing interests in modern society.
Along with the people’s interest, that of the architects dedicated to designing this type of housing has also grown, with aesthetics and comfort no way incom­patible with the principles of sustainable development. Research into alternative materials and new ways to apply traditional prime materials have paved the way to create a whole new range of superb designs.

The emergence of a greater awareness of the environment, the application of new technical knowledge, and the use of traditional construction methods such as orientation towards the sun, are motivating a growing number of owners to have ecological houses built on a small scale.

These small eco-houses are the first step towards a culture of sustainable and responsible construction, based on the use of natural materials which save energy and contain environmental contamination, but also on the creation of small oases that offer a high quality of life.

There are numerous examples of how pleasant ecological houses can be from an architectural viewpoint, and the variety of ecological materials now available allows architects to select their own approach.

This books presents a selection of small eco-houses: considered architectural anomalies for some time, these houses have laid the foundation for tomorrow's construction. Lots of color photos.

In the world today, the homogeny of most services and the low-cost tag applied to nearly any entity ends up creating a self-defensive reaction in those still searching for something specific, the particular in the regular. It therefore means finding that distinctiveness which makes the experience felt in the hotels presented here fly far beyond a simple classification by number, area or volume. The largest hotel project presented in this volume reaches no higher than 104 guestrooms.

In the world today, the homogeny of most services and the low-cost tag applied to nearly any entity ends up creating a self-defensive reaction in those still searching for something specific, the particular in the regular. It therefore means finding that distinctiveness which makes the experience felt in the hotels presented here fly far beyond a simple classification by number, area or volume. The largest hotel project presented in this volume reaches no higher than 104 guestrooms.

Inspired solutions to a reality of housing today

 * Case studies plus photos and floor plans
* Expert commentary by the designing architects

 The architects featured in Small Houses have reinvented the small house, successfully creating the illusion of space where, in reality, there is very little. With their remarkable sleight-of hand, space and light are maximized, superfluous elements are minimized. These invaluable case studies, illustrated with full-color photographs and floor plans, are expertly explained by the architects who created them. For any architect or design professional working with the realities of small homes, this book is a treasure trove of ideas and information.

Due to their proportions - often related to the budget - minimal houses tend to use a basic, light structural system, generally based on wooden frames or thin metal sections, which also make the building easy to construct on isolated or inaccessible plots of land. These homes can hide ingenious elements inside, such as folding tables, hanging beds, translucent panels, and highly efficient storage areas. This collection of 25 projects includes practical, contemporary examples that demonstrate the countless architectural solutions available for houses with minimal space.

Simplifies living as its very best is what’s offered in these rural getaways. By applying first-rate modern design technology and advances to an age-old concept, the award-winning architects featured herein have reinvented the small country house. For their exemplary maximisation of space and light and masterful paring down, while also ensuring the utmost in comfort, these houses are invaluable case studies for any professional (or aspiring professional) in the fields of Architecture and Design. IIIustrated with full-colour glossy photographs and floor plans, each project is expect explained by the best authority available: the designing architects themselves.

If cabins make you think of lumberjacks…of Camp Grenada, circa 1974… of Deliverance…then you need a copy of Small Wood Cabins. Paul Bunyan would have been proud to call any of these twenty-five magnificent cabins home. Each cabin has been designed to maximize limited living space and create a warm, appealing place for living, relaxing, and entertaining. Full color photographs, ground plans and sketches, and in-depth technical commentaries by the architects themselves render these cabins truly inviting for design professionals everywhere.