There are 20 homes vying for RIBA‘s House of the Year 2023 award, including a glass pavilion by Niall McLaughlin Architects and a timber-clad cottage extension by Studio Weave.

A converted pub by Erbar Mattes and the transformation of a former garage by Satish Jassal Architects are also both on the list.

RIBA House of the Year is awarded by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) annually to the “best example of a one-off house designed by an architect in the UK”.

It was established in 2013 in replacement of the Manser Medal, which was set up in 2001.

Several of the homes longlisted for this year’s award were also recently named winners of the RIBA National Awards for 2023.

These include a mass-timber home by Ao-ft, a castle-like dwelling in Scotland by Denizen Works and Niall McLaughlin Architects’ glasshouse-informed pavilion on the Isle of Wight.

An arts and crafts-style home by Rural Office and a clifftop house by Maich Swift Architects were also longlisted after receiving RIBA National Awards, alongside a pavilion with an oversailing roof by Hamish Herford and Nicholas Lyons and Ann Nisbet Studio‘s transformation of a stone ruin.

Jury chair Dido Milne said this year’s shortlist “showcases architects expressing their creativity within a wide variety of settings”.

Milne, who is a director at CSK Architects, is joined on the jury by Coppin Dockray Architects co-founder Bev Dockray, Al-Jawad Pile director Jessam Al-Jawad and The Modern House co-founder Albert Hill.

This year, the panel has placed a special focus on identifying projects where architects focused on their environmental impact, according to Milne.

“At this critical point in time in terms of ‘climate break down’ we were really looking to see how deep a dive the architects had taken into issues around environmental sustainability,” explained Milne.

“What we are building with, the provenance of materials and the impact on biodiversity are starting to really influence designs.”

Unlike the last seven years, the shortlist will be revealed exclusively by RIBA on 26 October rather than via the Grand Designs: House of the Year programme on Channel 4. The date of the winner announcement is yet to be revealed.

Previous winners include an “ordinary yet quirky” home in Dorset and a residence that references the hop-drying towers of the Kent countryside.

Scroll down to see the full longlist for 2023:

› Middle Avenue by Rural Office
› Rhossili House by Maich Swift Architects
› Riverview by Mole Architects
› Saltmarsh by Niall McLaughlin Architects
› Southwark Brick House by Satish Jassal Architects
› Spruce House by Ao-ft
› Threefold House by Knox Bhavan Architects

› Godwit House by MawsonKerr Architects
› Green House by Hayhurst and Co
› Hidden House by Hall + Bednarcyzk Architects
› House in Hove by Farshid Moussavi Architecture
› Hundred Acre Woodby Denizen Works
› Island House by Miya Ushida Architects
› Made of Sand by Studio Weave

› Blackbird by Hamish Herford and Nicholas Lyons
› Blockmakers Arms by Erbar Mattes
› Cove Ridge by Coffey Architects
› Cowshed by David Kohn Architects
› Cuddymoss by Ann Nisbet Studio
› Forest Road SNUG home by Ecomotive for HomeMade

The main photo of Saltmash House is by Nick Kane.

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British architecture studio Dowen Farmer Architects has released plans for Portal Road, a multistorey ghost-kitchen tower block in west London that would shuttle food to a public food hall like the “Ministry of Magic”.

The studio has filed plans for the building, which would be built in North Acton, London, and replace an unrealised scheme originally proposed by Scott Brownrigg in 2018.

This consisted of a two-tower development that would contain mixed-use rental kitchens and 376 homes.

Dowen Farmer Architects‘ proposal for the site, called Portal Road, would measure 28,000 square metres and consist of 12 storeys, 10 of which would be dedicated to 260 rentable ghost kitchens for use by local shops and restaurants.

Renders show the building with a large cubic form clad in metal mesh.

The ground floor of the structure has been designed as a two-storey podium that would be lined with glass and feature exposed structural beams that zigzag around the exterior.

The ground floor of the building would contain a vast public food hall housing 50 to 100 cafes, street vendors and restaurants that would aim to draw people to the site and create a sense of community.

At various points in the building’s elevations, large, three-storey-tall openings punctuate its facade, which would host a series of terraces across each of its floors.

Visitors to the Portal Road market space are expected to be able to order food from the resident kitchens across the 10 storeys of the building via an app. The food would then be shuttled to the food hall via “smart food lifts.”

“The food halls generate a sense of excitement with over 50 to 100 different food outlets with food ordered via apps and shuttled down to the market space via smart food lifts, akin to something from the Ministry of Magic,” said the studio.

“We anticipate this emerging sector will create ‘microwaves’ across the city in the coming years and are energised to be a part of the positive change,” continued Dowen Farmer Architects.

Dowen Farmer Architects explained that it looked to Sikh communities when designing the public space – specifically the way in which sharing food is a central point around relationships and community.

“This new industrial typology enables the reintegration of making space back into the heart of the city, providing employment in suburban locations of outer London,” it said.

“We are excited about an architecture that can start to question this status quo and plug into the renaissance of craft, industry, and making which are slowly returning to cities.”

A stepped public space will wrap around the exterior of the building and lead visitors to the food hall.

Elsewhere in London, Carmody Groarke recently announced its plans to add a children’s pavilion and extend a Grade II-listed cottage as part of a transformation at Dulwich Picture Gallery.

Earlier this year, London’s answer to the Las Vegas MSG Sphere, which was set to be designed by Populous, was placed on hold by Michael Gove.

The renders are by Blackpoint.

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The University of California has commenced an application process for studios to design student housing for its campus, in what appears to be a move away from its controversial Munger Hall dormitory announced in 2021.

The University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) is accepting applications for a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) – a screening process to find suitable candidates – for the design of its UCSB Student Housing Infill and Redevelopment Project.

This would deliver “at least” 3,500 beds for undergraduate students to the UCSB campus, 3,000 of which would be located in new residential community housing.

The remaining 500 beds would be part of an East Campus Infill and Redevelopment effort that would “add additional beds within an existing community of UCSB residence hall,” the university said.

According to the RFQ, which was signed by campus architect Julie Hendricks, the projected construction budget for phases 1 and 2 of the student housing project is $600 million to $750 million.

Campus to continue to work on “planning and consultation process for Munger Hall”

The RFQ appears to suggest that UCSB is moving away from its plans to build Munger Hall, a mostly windowless dorm that would house up to 4,500 students.

However, UCSB spokeswoman Kiki Reyes told local newspaper The Tribune that the campus will “continue to work on the planning and consultation process for Munger Hall with members of our campus community, donors and stakeholders,” implying that the project could still be going ahead.

“The university is also actively moving forward simultaneously with plans to develop [the new housing],” Reyes added.

The controversial Munger Hall would measure 1.68 million square feet (156,000 square metres) and have fourteen entrances and exits. Its design means that 94 per cent of students living in it would reportedly be in windowless rooms, which would instead feature virtual windows simulating sunlight.

The building was conceived by billionaire Charles Munger, who donated $200 million to the project, which has an overall budget of about $1.5 billion.

Munger Hall review found “significant health and safety risks”

Last year, a review panel for the project was formed at the request of the Santa Barbara Division of the Academic Senate’s Executive Council. The panel included “faculty experts, other experts and stakeholder representatives” and released a report on Munger Hall on 1 November.

This stated that “research and analysis weighed by this Panel reveal significant health and safety risks that are predictable enough, probable enough, and consequential enough that it would be unwise for UCSB to proceed without significant modifications to the design”.

Among the panel’s concerns were “the effect of small, windowless bedrooms on mental and physical health” and “the effect of high population density on student well-being and local infrastructure”, as well as the “safety and evacuation during emergencies”.

The panel suggested five design modifications that would address its major concerns, including adding operable windows to as many bedrooms as possible and increasing the size of each single bedroom.

Munger Hall attracted criticism from the beginning of the project, with architect Dennis McFadden stepping down from a University of California committee in protest over its design.

In November 2021, more than 12,000 people had signed a petition against the construction of the building, which Munger said was informed by architect Le Corbusier and would “last as long as the pyramids”.

The main image is courtesy of University of California Santa Barbara.

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New York studio SHoP Architects has completed the black and bronze facade of the supertall skyscraper Brooklyn Tower, the tallest building in the borough.

At 93 storeys and 1,066 feet (325 metres) tall, the supertall skyscraper topped out in March 2023, but the intricate cladding of its exterior was only recently completed.

The skyscraper features blackened stainless panels running from the top of the tower towards the bottom, where it meets the preserved, historic Dimes Savings Bank, which has been integrated into the tower’s podium.

Running the length of the tower are bronze and copper pilasters that give definition to the black facade, which at certain points comes to edges, creating a staggered appearance. The building has quickly become one of, if not the most, visible structures on the Brooklyn skyline.

Last year, SHoP principal Greg Pasquarelli told Dezeen in an exclusive interview that the structure, because of its special zoning, “would be kind of like the Empire State Building of Brooklyn.”

“We wanted to make sure that no matter what grid you were on, looking at it from wherever you were in Brooklyn, you felt like you were looking at the front,” he continued.

The residential skyscraper, which has more than 500 residences as well as retail at its base, has a wider base than many other supertalls because of the winds in Brooklyn.

The larger base means that the tower tapers, drawing attention to the smaller peaks of the tower as it narrows towards the tops. The base is clad in white marble, reflecting the art deco bank, and darkens as it rises.

The tower also has a number of “wind floors” throughout its length that allow heavy gusts to pass throughout without rocking the massive structure. According to New York magazine Curbed, one of the taller wind floors has been outfitted with a basketball court, the highest in the world.

The tower’s distinct form and colour have led some in the city to compare the building to the architecture of Sauron’s Dark Fortress, a tower in Peter Jackson’s filmatisation of the Lord of the Rings novels.

Inside, the art deco design of the Dimes Saving Bank has been carried through many of the public spaces, including the lobby design by Krista Ninivaggi.

The tower features multiple entrances, one directly from the street and another through the renovated bank, which has become a retail and pedestrian space.

Local interior firm Gachot Studios carried out the design of most of the residences.

SHoP Architects is also responsible for the nearby Barclays Center, a stadium clad with thousands of steel panels.

It has designed a number of other buildings throughout the city, including 111 W 57th Street on Billionaires Row in Manhattan, the world’s skinniest supertall skyscraper.

The photography is by Max Touhey.

Project credits:

Developer: JDS Development Group
Builder: JDS Construction Group
Architect: SHoP Architects
Residential interior design: Gachot Studios
Amenities interior design: Krista Ninivaggi of Woods Bagot
Landscape design: HMWhite
Structural engineer: WSP
Mechanical, electrical, plumbing engineer: JB&B
Curtain wall consultant: MW Skins
Civil engineer: AKRF
Geotechnical engineer: Mueser Rutledge
Wind engineer: RWDI

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Scientists from Texas A&M University and Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico have observed metal cracking and fusing back together, in a discovery that could pave the way for self-healing machines, vehicles and bridges.

Published in science journal Nature, the research shows that metal can self-repair microscopic cracks that form when the material is repeatedly put under stress.

This is achieved in a process known as cold welding, which means no heat or electricity is required.

The breakthrough could have major implications for engineering, the report argues, as 90 per cent of mechanical failures are a result of fatigue in metal components, which occurs when repetitive stress causes cracks to form.

By taking advantage of the self-healing process and tweaking the microstructure of metals accordingly, the scientists predict it might be possible to prevent fatigue cracking.

“We would like to understand how metal microstructure affects healing,” said Michael J Demkowicz, professor at Texas A&M and co-lead author of the study.

“Armed with that knowledge, we can envision tailoring microstructure to take advantage of self-healing in technological applications, for example, to create materials that are more resistant to fatigue damage,” he told Dezeen.

Self-healing possible with cold welding

Scientists have been investigating the potential of self-healing materials for some time.

Most breakthroughs have been in the development of plastics – on projects like a self-healing “e-skin” developed by University of Colorado Boulder scientists – although a recent MIT study also found it to be possible in concrete.

Before now, the property had not been observed in metals without heating them first.

The study shows it can be achieved at room temperature under vacuum conditions, in a process known as cold welding, which is primarily utilised in electronics and spacecraft technology.

This occurs when two bare pieces of metal become so close that their atoms are attracted to each other, causing their surfaces to fuse. It is only possible if the metals are completely clean.

Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories made the discovery during tests to see how cracks form in 40-nanometre-thick pieces of platinum.

They observed a crack fusing back together, leaving no trace and eventually reopening in a different location.

“This was absolutely stunning to watch first-hand,” Sandia scientist Brad Boyce told Wiley Analytical Science magazine.

“What we have confirmed is that metals have their own intrinsic, natural ability to heal themselves, at least in the case of fatigue damage at the nanoscale,” said Boyce, who is also co-lead author of the study.

Ten years before research can be put into practice

The findings prove a thesis first proposed by Demkowicz back in 2013, when he was working as a professor at MIT, based on the results of computer simulations produced with then-graduate student Guoqiang Xu.

At the time, the pair had no way of proving their theory. Now Sandia’s research has shown that self-healing is possible in copper as well as platinum and the researchers believe it can also occur in other metals.

The report states that the discovery “challenges the most fundamental theories on how engineers design and evaluate fatigue life in structural materials”.

However, Demkowicz claims it will be at least a decade before the insights can be used in practical application.

The next steps will be to explore whether metal can self-heal when exposed to air, not just in a vacuum, and whether the process is possible for metal alloys such as steel.

“The most important near-term consequences are for fundamental theories of fatigue in metals,” he told Dezeen. “These will have to be revised to take crack healing into account.”

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This week on Dezeen, architecture writer Matt Shaw reflected on what went wrong with Heatherwick Studio’s Vessel, two years after the 16-storey viewpoint in New York’s Hudson Yards was closed.

In an opinion piece for Dezeen, Shaw argued that the structure failed in its function as a public space because Heatherwick Studio and the developers failed to consult the local community in the design process.

“The Vessel shows us how bad the vampiric ultra-wealthy and their for-profit developers are at making public space and public art,” he wrote. “There must be a feedback loop between the top-down and the bottom-up.”

Another architecture project that proved controversial this week was the planned rugby stadium in the English city of Bath, for which the Bath Rugby club recently submitted the final development brief.

British studio Apollodorus Architecture argued that the proposed rectangular design was “at odds with Bath’s animated roofscape” and developed alternative plans for an oval design reminiscent of the Colosseum.

“The Romans invented the ellipse or oval for spectacles, so the choice seems apt given the city’s Romano-British origins,” said the studio’s director Mark Wilson Jones.

In China, architecture studio Zaha Hadid Architects announced plans for a 210-metre-tall skyscraper in Xi’an with a “cascade” of planted interior terraces modelled on mountainside waterfalls.

The mixed-use Daxia Tower will feature glazed keyhole-shaped openings on each of its elevations, so the terraces will offer views across the city.

This week, we also interviewed French designer Philippe Starck about his shift towards a more “asexual” design language, which he argues will become the norm in the face of an impending loneliness epidemic.

“The market of asexuality will be so revolutionary because everything we have produced in the world is driven by sexuality,” he told Dezeen. “What will be human production without sexuality? That is very, very interesting.”

Elsewhere in the world of design, the distinctive floral patterns of British manufacturer Morris & Co were transposed from textiles and wallpapers onto the kits of east London football club Walthamstow FC.

The revamped kits were created in collaboration with the Walthamstow-based William Morris Gallery and local art collective Wood Street Walls.

Our AItopia series continued with a roundup of 10 artificial intelligence apps that architects and designers need to know, including a floorplan generator and an “AI interior designer”.

At the same time, YuJune Park and Caspar Lam of digital design consultancy Synoptic Office argued in an opinion piece that any AI design will always require a human touch if it hopes to appeal to humans and all their senses.

Popular projects this week included a home in Taiwan that is hidden behind a perforated “brick veil”, an Ontario hotel that was rescued from ruin and a glasshouse-informed steel pavilion on the Isle of Wight.

Our latest lookbooks featured clever wine storage, bedrooms with space-efficient desks and interiors that draw on the principles of wabi-sabi.

This week on Dezeen

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Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have developed a low-cost energy storage system that could be integrated into roads and building foundations to facilitate the renewable energy transition.

The research team has created a supercapacitor – a device that works like a rechargeable battery – using cement, water and carbon black, a fine black powder primarily formed of pure carbon.

The breakthrough could pave the way for energy storage to be embedded into concrete, creating the potential for roads and buildings that charge electric devices.

Unlike batteries, which rely on materials in limited supply such as lithium, the technology could be produced cheaply using materials that are readily available, according to the researchers.

They describe cement and carbon black as “two of humanity’s most ubiquitous materials”.

“You have the most-used manmade material in the world, cement, combined with carbon black, which is a well-known historical material – the Dead Sea Scrolls were written with it,” said MIT professor Admir Masic.

The research team included Masic and fellow MIT professors Franz-Josef Ulm and Yang-Shao Horn, with postdoctoral researchers Nicolas Chanut, Damian Stefaniuk and Yunguang Zhu at MIT and James Weaver at Harvard’s Wyss Institute.

“Huge need for big energy storage”

They believe the technology could accelerate a global shift to renewable energy.

Solar, wind and tidal power are all produced at variable times, which often don’t correspond with peak electricity demand.  Large-scale energy storage is necessary to take advantage of these sources but is too expensive to realise using traditional batteries.

“There is a huge need for big energy storage,” said Ulm. “That’s where our technology is extremely promising because cement is ubiquitous.”

The team proved the concept works by creating a set of button-sized supercapacitors, equivalent to one-volt batteries, which were used to power an LED light.

They are now developing a 45-cubic-metre version to show the technology can be scaled up.

Calculations suggest a supercapacitor of this size could store around 10 kilowatt-hours of energy, which would be enough to meet the daily electricity usage of a typical household.

This means that a supercapacitor could potentially be incorporated into the concrete foundation of a house for little to no additional cost.

“You can go from one-millimetre-thick electrodes to one-metre-thick electrodes, and by doing so basically you can scale the energy storage capacity from lighting an LED for a few seconds to powering a whole house,” Ulm said.

The researchers suggest that embedding the technology into a concrete road could make it possible to charge electric cars while they are travelling across it, using similar technology to that used in wireless phone chargers.

Battery-powered versions of this system are already being trialled across Europe.

Carbon black key to “fascinating” composite

Supercapacitors work by storing electrical energy between two electrically conductive plates. They are able to deliver charge much more rapidly than batteries but most do not offer as much energy storage.

The amount of energy they are able to store depends on the total surface area of the two plates, which are separated by a thin insulation layer.

The version developed here has an extremely high internal surface area, which greatly improves its effectiveness. This is due to the chemical makeup of the material formed when carbon black is introduced to a concrete mixture and left to cure.

“The material is fascinating,” said Masic. “The carbon black is self-assembling into a connected conductive wire.”

According to Masic, the amount of carbon black needed is very small – as little as three per cent.

The more is added, the greater the storage capacity of the supercapacitor. But this also reduces the structural strength of the concrete, which could be a problem in load-bearing applications.

The “sweet spot” is believed to be around 10 per cent.

The composite material could also be utilised within a heating system, the team suggested. Full details of their findings are due to be published in an upcoming edition of science journal PNAS.

Other attempts at creating large-scale, low-cost energy storage systems include Polar Night Energy’s “sand battery”, which is already servicing around 10,000 people in the Finnish town of Kankaanpää.

The top image is courtesy of Shutterstock.

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Human rights organisation Equidem has alleged that female workers producing official merchandise for the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup are being exploited.

According to a report published by global human and labour rights group Equidem, women who work in the factories in Bangladesh that create official apparel for FIFA tournaments are being overworked and underpaid.

While the FIFA garments include official merchandise that is available for fans to buy, they does not include the football kits worn by players themselves, which are not manufactured by FIFA.

Supervisors alleged to “verbally abuse” workers

In a blog post explaining its findings, the organisation said that a range of one-on-one interviews were conducted with garment workers who reportedly told Equidem they are suffering what the organisation characterises as “rampant exploitation” at the hands of their employers.

Equidem has alleged that the women labourers earn 12 per cent of the national living wage, are forced into working significant overtime and are frequently verbally abused.

“We have a daily target to reach,” read one of a number of anonymous testimonies from factory workers published by the human rights organisation.

“The supervisor fixes our daily target. I make 60-80 pieces per hour. I can only go to the restroom after finishing my hourly target. When a lot of work piles up, they don’t let us go anywhere. They verbally abuse us. I work for 10-12 hours a day at my sewing machine.”

“Today, my supervisor told me to give 80 pieces per hour, but it was quite difficult to make 80 pieces. I made 60 pieces per hour. He shouted at me several times.”

Women denied paid maternity leave

Equidem also alleges that these women workers are illegally denied paid maternity leave and worksite childcare. In Bangladesh, working mothers are entitled to four months of paid maternity leave by law.

Various women also reported being told that they would lose their jobs if they became pregnant within the first two years of employment, according to the human rights organisation.

Workers are also being threatened with pay cuts and often work overtime, the report states.

“Our research found that workers’ shifts last for a minimum of nine hours a day, six days a week, but they often work overtime, with threats of their pay being cut if targets were not met,” said Equidem.

“FIFA has already failed workers in spaces predominantly taken up by men, and women are, as ever, left even further behind,” added the organisation.

FIFA has the “resource to address this at the systemic level”

The allegations come after FIFA pledged to found a human rights subcommittee following last year’s men’s World Cup.

“After the Men’s World Cup this past year in Qatar, FIFA pledged to set up a human rights subcommittee that would assess the legacy of the 2022 tournament, although there has been no further update as to the status of that assessment, nor its learnings,” Equidem CEO Mustafa Qadri said.

“Equidem urges FIFA to extend its expressed commitment to improving working conditions to women workers in their apparel supply chains,” Qadri continued.

“The FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 brings with it many positive improvements for its players, and it is crucial that FIFA extends that progress to addressing the harms its women workers experience. FIFA has the power, money, and resource to address this at the systemic level, and we will keep monitoring their global supply chains until it does.”

Equidem said it will continue to speak to staff to monitor the Women’s World Cup.

“These findings have been shared with FIFA, and while a comment has been requested from FIFA and companies in its garment supply chain, Equidem continues to monitor the Women’s World Cup by liaising with staff on the ground,” the organisation said.

Dezeen has contacted FIFA for comment but did not receive a response before publishing.

The allegations follow the controversies surrounding last year’s men’s World Cup tournament, which was held in Qatar.

Human rights group Amnesty International accused Qatar of exploitative labour conditions for migrant workers who built the tournament’s stadiums, while sports brand Hummel designed a football kit for Denmark’s men’s team as a “protest against Qatar and its human rights record”.

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Upon first look over the minute details of One Drawing Challenge Student Winner Victoria Wong‘s award-winning triptych appears to revel in the medium itself. A drawing that harnesses the powers of digital processes, it certainly requires close looking to grasp the changing perspectives, intertwining scenes and layers of time that are compounded in each of the three scenes. One would be forgiven for assuming that the University of Michigan student set out to explore the aesthetic possibilities of digital sketching, 3D modeling and the various uses of other graphic software.

Yet, while Victoria demonstrates mastery of these techniques, they only tell one part of the story behind the drawing. At a fundamental level, before the composition and execution of these ideas, Victoria set out to explore the boundaries between designing, modeling and post-production. In this way, she approaches her subject matter, the site of Hiroshima, through a kaleidoscopic lens that incorporates Japanese aesthetic theory, contemporary music, and photographing imperfections in daily life. In this sense, the end goal was actually to overcome the hurdles of focusing on the technicalities of the design itself to instead foreground the emotive dimensions of a place, unlocking creative possibilities.

“Suggested by Lebbeus Woods, architecture is essentially an internalization of society yet an externalization of ourselves,” Victoria explained. “Through investigating the decay and death of artifacts and events, Into the Void illustrates the new collisions of regrowth and reshaping our relationship with different agencies.”

Architizer’s Architecture Editor invited Victoria to expand on conceptualization of her winning triptych. In the conversation that follows, the designer, who will be starting at Perkins&Will‘s Dallas studio this May, offers insights into her creative process and the underlying themes of her thesis project.

Hannah Feniak: Congratulations on your success with the One Drawing Challenge! What sparked your interest in entering the competition and what does this accolade mean to you?

Victoria Wong: Thank you, Hannah and your team, for hosting and curating! Also, congratulations to all the winners. I came across the One Drawing Challenge several years ago and appreciated Architizer showcasing a wide variety of entries so the public can appreciate those drawings. The simplicity of one image accompanied by storytelling has also been compelling. Regarding this accolade, it’s an honor to conclude my time as a student by sharing my thesis with the architecture community.

POSSIBILITIES.

Photo Study: The starting point of Victoria’s winning entry was idea curation. To this end, she sought to understand her subject matter through taking photos and analyzing music. 

HF: What were the primary challenges of conceiving your work, from forming the idea to the physical process of creation? 

VW: The triptych serves as the final scenes of my thesis, “Into the Void: Fragment Time, Space, Memory, and Decay in Hiroshima.” It was about a six-month study of various Japanese aesthetic theories of imperfections, including life and death, decay and rebirth, shadow and lights, etc. Since the topic is very conceptual, I took a non-traditional route to build my understanding of the matter by photographing the imperfections in daily observance and analyzing contemporary music after the first round of research. 

The major challenge was translating multiple layers of Hiroshima’s research and new information into the final scenes while acknowledging the historical, cultural and natural aspects of the site. There is a delicate balance in respecting the gravity of the past while proposing a parallel timescape that accepts and appreciates imperfections and the scarring. Another challenge was to showcase the idea through an appropriate medium; in this case, the stages are oversaturated yet harmonizing to counter argue our understanding and concept of “void.” 

The final production was relatively short once I decided what to highlight and how to narrate my thesis. All elements in the triptych were modeled digitally, thus requiring very little post-production work. I specifically enjoyed the production process of this triptych; it was an experiment in challenging how much the post-production process can be minimized. The boundary between designing, modeling and post-production is blurred. The strategy of ‘manipulating’ the illustrations fulfilled my curiosity in examining if the creation of an image can be as interesting as the design and the story behind it. 

Photo Study: A zoomed-in showing one of the panoramic views that was described in the text that Victoria was working with.  

HF: Could you describe why you gravitated towards these specific illustration techniques? 

VW: I usually gravitate towards two types of illustrations: imaginative and informative. The creative illustration reveals how the space feels instead of the technicality of the design, i.e. the mood palette, while the informative illustration showcases relationships in all scales, from connectivities of agencies to architectural detailing to a building’s contextual relationship with its site or cityscape on a larger scale. This triptych lays between the two categories. It is a relatively new way of seeing illustrations for myself, but it seemed fitting for this theme. 

For example, the middle panel conveys the “void in culture” by depicting an afternoon at Yagenbori, previously known as one of the largest red-light districts in Japan. It is currently at its sunset stage and losing its identity as the cradle of Geisha. To capture its story and depict the diversity of the area, I chose to collapse multiple perspectives and timescapes into a one-point perspective allowing time and space to condense into one scene where layers of imagination coexist. The duo-perspective illustrates different timelines in the scene. When the panel is viewed ‘top-down,’ it tells the story of the current days; when it is viewed ‘forward,’ it illustrates the past events. Other floating devices and elements demonstrate futuristic connections bridging the two. The timeline, scale, and space are distorted in ways where elements from different eras are reorganized and coexist in the same world. 

Mini Prints of Testing Images

HF: Your piece explores Japanese aesthetic theories through the city of Hiroshima’s past, presents and future. Do you have other drawings that are as conceptual as this? In terms of format, have you explored the narrative potential of the triptych format in the past?

VW: This is my first time creating a triptych, but I have always gravitated towards illustrations with a sense of humor and leaving room for imagination. The project started with a trio of panoramic collages using historic photos from WWII to re-visualize the same three Hiroshima sites shown in the triptych. They depict a parallel timeline in which human and non-human agencies got to reclaim the ruins and transform them into their habitat instead of reconstructing how the sites were before they were annihilated. In terms of format, I am currently researching a couple of other sites that follow the same trail of investigation and presentation format besides Hiroshima. They both have their challenges – historically, environmentally, culturally, and politically– and I’m excited to see where this way of investigation will affect our views towards scarring that are shared between generations and to inform architects of alternative possibilities.

HF: How did the process and workflow of creating your drawing compare to traditional architectural drafting?

VW: While technology certainly helps people visualize and communicate ideas, I’m attracted to the simplicity of pen and paper when thinking through ideas. During covid, when our mobility was primarily restricted, I started exploring digital sketching. The medium is different, but the general technique remains unchanged. While my ideas begin with analog and digital sketching, 3D modeling and other graphic software are productions and experimental tools that elevate my understanding of design. On the one hand, I enjoy how forgiving digital platforms are, yet making mistakes is the best part of experimenting. 

Detail of the final product: 1/3 of the triptych. 

HF: What one tip would you give other students looking to win next year’s One Drawing Challenge?

VW: Go wild and explore your imagination. There is no right or wrong answer to creating an excellent image as long as the message is conveyed. I’m excited to see how people depict their logic and systematically translate it into a visually pleasing drawing. Have fun, and enjoy the process! 

Thank you, Hannah and your team, for hosting and curating! Also, congratulations to all the winners. I came across the One Drawing Challenge several years ago and appreciated Architizer showcasing a wide variety of entries so the public can appreciate those drawings. The simplicity of one image accompanied by storytelling has also been compelling. Regarding this accolade, it’s an honor to conclude my time as a student by sharing my thesis with the architecture community.

Interested in seeing more work by Victoria Wong? Peruse her portfolio and connect:

> https://www.linkedin.com/in/vwongwt/ 
> https://www.instagram.com/vw.archive/ 

Judging is now underway for the Architizer Vision Awards. Do you want first access to the Winner’s Announcement, information about our Architecture Film Fest, special print publication and more? Sign up to receive key program updates >  

The post This Epic Architectural Triptych Depicts the Complexities of Hiroshima’s Past, Present and Future appeared first on Journal.

Judging is now underway for the Architizer Vision Awards. Do you want first access to the Winner’s Announcement, information about our Architecture Film Fest, special print publication and more? Sign up to receive key program updates >  

Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities is officially more than 50 years old; yet, its enduring appeal is attested to by the special place reserved on most architect’s bookshelves for the Italian fables. For young architecture students and experienced practitioners alike, the book remains a source of inspiration and a constant reminder of the infinite possible experiences inherent to any place. This year’s One Drawing Challenge Non-Student Winner, Thomas Schaller, is one of those architects.

While at first glance, the city in his painting appears to be reflecting on a body of water, longer gazing reveals that the buildings grow both up and down. As the fine artist explains, “This drawing tells the story of Octavia, a city suspended above the Earth by a spider’s web of cables and wires. Interpretations are limitless, but in my interpretation, the inhabitants of Octavia depict the central truth about humanity – connections are profound – but tenuous, just as is our grasp on life itself.” The razor’s edge distinction between precarity and strength is at the core of the urban experience.

Expertly oscillating between the precision of fine lines, seen in details like the bridge and cables, and the more atmospheric and reflective qualities of diffused pigments, the image is mind-bending: not only in terms of subject matter but also in terms of technique. Schaller’s use of his medium, therefore, amplifies the thematic subject matter at the heart of the image.

To learn more about his conceptual and creative processes, Architizer’s Architecture Editor, Hannah Feniak, was delighted to chat with Thomas, who delved into topics such as the relationship between architecture and fine art, and the inspiration for his winning entry. Keep scrolling to see process sketches by the award-winning architectural artist!

Hannah Feniak: Congratulations on your success with the One Drawing Challenge! What sparked your interest in entering the competition, and what does this accolade mean to you?

Thomas Schaller: First, I want to say a very big “Thank You” to everyone at Architizer who designed and hosted this competition and exhibition. It is a great honor for me to even be included. I appreciate all your hard work. And I am in awe of the incredible work entered. Congratulations to all.

From the time I could see, drawing has been fundamental to who I am. As a child, I drew to try to make sense of the worlds I saw both around me and within my imagination. To this day, I am never without a sketchbook and a pocket full of sketch pencils in order to keep a kind of “visual diary” of the ideas in my head as well as to record my impressions of the world we all inhabit. And so, I am thrilled that this competition even exists.

It is my belief that drawing is the most effective and direct connection between the visual image and the human need to record, express, and create. While I rely on traditional pencil and paper, I have no opposition whatsoever to any means, method, or technological tool anyone uses to draw. But for the human mind to open the windows upon the landscapes of perception, creativity, and imagination, drawing is the most effective, enjoyable and expressive way to do so.

HF: What were the primary challenges of conceiving your work, from forming the idea to the creation process?

TS: Like many, I worship the iconic work, Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino. It was written in the early 1970s but its themes of exploration, the clash of the real and the imagined, the built and the unbuilt, the plausible and the impossible, dreams, memories and the human condition are simply timeless. The book’s protagonist — an adventurous interpretation of Marco Polo — travels a dreamscape of a world visiting cities built of memory and dreams and offers endless insights into the nature of cities and the very fabric of human life here on Earth.

One of the cities visited is Octavia, described in the book as suspended high above the Earth between two rocky mountain peaks by a tenuous spider’s web of cables and wires. Countless metaphors and analogies can be drawn. One of course is the dependence of any city on a healthy infrastructure of roads, bridges and lines of communication, etc. But another more broad theme is the “infrastructure” of humanity itself. Our very real need to congregate, to form groups for safety, sanity and survival was, for me, the takeaway and the theme of my drawing.

Especially after coming through two years of pandemic, the themes of human interaction and the need for interconnectivity were at the forefront of my mind as I designed this work. We can take our society’s survival for granted, but if we fail to care for and nurture one another, as well as the very planet upon which all societies depend, we can learn just how frail and fragile our infrastructure may truly be.

Preliminary sketch for the winner entry courtesy of the artist

HF: You trained as an architect but now have a successful international career as an architectural watercolor artist and author. How do you think the medium itself contributes to the scenes that you depict — in particular, in your winning entry?

TS: In my earlier days, I felt that I had to choose between my wish to become a visual artist and my desire to become an architect. In time, I became both, but my career interests operated on separate tracks, divided by an arbitrary and faulty belief that each had separate aims. It has taken many years for me to understand that these interests,  as well as many others, could be successfully merged into a single creative energy. The key to this for me was in realizing that all things — all ideas, all people, all places, all atmosphere and negative space itself has a kind of architecture. There is a shape and a volume to everything seen and unseen, real or simply imagined. And so anything can be studied, modeled and drawn. If I concentrate on drawing what I “see” rather than what I “look at” — drawing genuine emotional experiences rather than simple visual observations, the landscapes for creativity become boundless.

HF: Your winning entry was inspired by Italo Calvino’s classic, Invisible Cities. Are your other architectural paintings and drawings as conceptual as “Octavia – Suspended City”?

TS: Repeat readings of Invisible Cities helped me to form the cornerstone of what would become my “artistic voice”. I am more aware of contrasts than anything else as I move through the world. By that I mean of course the clash of dark and light, but also ideas about what is real or simply imagined, the man-made and the natural environments, warm and cool tonalities, vertical, horizontal, and diagonal energies, and thoughts about time — what is past, present, or yet to be.

As polarities meet and find some kind of resolution — or not — this is what my work is always about, trying to find a resolution on paper of two or more things in opposition. And so yes, such conceptual work is exactly what I have been long most interested in exploring.

HF: What first drew you to watercolor as a medium for depicting the built environment?

TS: As a choice of medium, watercolor is a perfect fit for me. It has the ability to be either very precise or completely abstract, controlled or wild. The use of watercolor is a study in edges: hard and explicit, or soft and ephemeral. Watercolors can at once be subtle and suggestive or bold and explicit.

I think of watercolor too as a “subtractive” process in that we begin with a piece of white paper, 100% in light. And we proceed to subtract away some of this light as we go. The transparent nature of watercolor enhances our potential to study light. And in the end, the parts of our work that are not painted can be as powerful and full of meaning as those which are painted.

And the connection to drawing itself cannot be ignored. I actually consider what I do with watercolor as drawing, but I draw with shapes of value and tone rather than with lines.

Planning the concept and colors for the winner entry, image courtesy of the artist

HF: My next question is somewhat related to the preceding one: How did the process and workflow of creating your drawing compare to traditional architectural drafting?

TS: As stated, watercolor is a form of drawing to me. But rather than depicting ideas of space and form with a line, we do so by using shapes of tone and value, shadow and light, and color. But line-based sketching and more precise architectural drawing are always an element in what I do as well. These are time-honored and beautiful means of expression which I hope never to abandon. In my work, I try to merge the precise with the suggested, the implied with the stated, and so while I wander quite far from my more precise architectural roots, they are always there as a kind of north star shading any wild flights of fancy with at least a note of plausibility.

HF: What one tip would you give the other participants looking to win next year’s One Drawing Challenge?

TS: Oh my … “ advice”. I always say that the best advice I have is to take very little advice. This is a glib non-answer I realize but there’s something in it. What I mean is that as we all try to improve and advance in our careers and our own sense of achievement, it becomes all-too easy to compare our work or measure ourselves against our colleagues or others whose work we admire. This is natural, but should be avoided as much as possible.

I am nowhere near the artist I hope to be some day, but I only started to make noticeable improvements when I trained my ego to be a bit more self-reliant and less “noisy”. It’s too easy to live on social media and if we succumb to the flattery or the uninformed critiques we hear online, we are doomed. I think we should take any feedback onboard, process it quickly and move past it.

Genuinely, I celebrate the accomplishments of my colleagues. But I understand that another’s win does not equal my loss. And anything I might achieve does not diminish any other’s work. While you can never draw or paint like anyone else, neither can anyone else draw or paint like you.

And so rather than by seeing the world always by looking outward, spend as much time exploring the worlds you see by looking inward. And listen. There is your voice telling you what you need to do and where you need to go. We already have within us all we need to do most anything we wish to do. So if we trust that voice and learn to hear it more clearly, it will lead us in the direction we should be traveling.

Interested in seeing more work by Thomas Schaller Fine Art? Peruse his portfolio and connect with the artist through your preferred channel:

> www.thomaswschaller.com
> www.facebook.com/thomaswschaller
> www.twitter.com/twschaller
> www.instagram.com/thomaswschaller

Judging is now underway for the Architizer Vision Awards. Do you want first access to the Winner’s Announcement, information about our Architecture Film Fest, special print publication and more? Sign up to receive key program updates >  

The post One Drawing Challenge Winner Explores Enduring Truths at the Heart of a Classic Book Beloved by Architects Worldwide appeared first on Journal.