We are honored to announce that MIT Site 4 is a finalist in the 2021 Boston Society of Architects Honor Awards for Design Excellence, a program that recognizes projects that thoughtfully address issues such as sustainability and social equity while setting the standard for future, innovative work in our community.
Join the NADAAA team at the BSA Awards Gala on January 27 at BSA Space for the awards announcements and recognitions. Tickets available HERE.
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APR’s 2021 Global Future Design Awards Jury selected MIT Site 4, RISD North Hall, Adams Street Branch Library, and Villa Varoise as winners in their respective categories of Mixed-Use, Housing, Institutional, and Residential projects.
La Biennale Architettura 2021 will close on November 22nd. Curator Hashim Sarkis is leading closing meetings this week with a series of panels on Saturday morning at the Teatro Piccolo Arsenale including a panel with Nader. Saturday’s panels will focus on the question: How is architectural education responding to the many challenges that a rapidly changing world is putting in front of us?
For more info and to join the Live Stream click HERE.
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Since 1994 The American Architecture Awards, organized by The Chicago Athenaeum, The European Center for Architecture, Art, Design, and Urban Studies, and the Metropolitan Arts Press, has honored “the most significant new contemporary architecture, landscape architecture, interiors, and urban planning in the United States”. This is the country’s most prestigious project award program led by a non-commercial, non-trade affiliated, public arts, culture, and educational institution.
MIT Site 4 won best student housing project and the Daniels Building won both best large educational building and “Best in Show”! See all the 2021 winners HERE.
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Nader was interviewed outside the Arsenale at the Veneta Porta Lignea for Holcim‘s Building Conversations series where he discusses NADAAA’s explorations of urban planning, housing, and hybrid material systems for the 2021 Venice Biennale.
Find more of Holcim’s interviews of ‘architects inspiring us’ HERE.
The Venice Biennale Architettura 2021: How will we live together?
The Giardino delle Vergini occupies a critical location in Venice, at once a destination at the end of the Arsenale, but also its gateway as one arrives by boat.
Historically, this vaporetto stop has been seen as a back door, but with the Arsenale serving as an important open space during the COVID pandemic, more outdoor installations have been conceived as part of this year’s exhibitions, warranting a gateway that acknowledges this new front door. With assembly and disassembly strategically conceived, our aim was to develop proposals that could be erected in less than two days without having a substantial impact on the context, its fondamenta, and gardens. The final gate proposal has also been an opportunity to recall the symbol of Venice, the winged lion of St. Mark who holds the welcoming words in an open book to the waters: Pax Tibi Marce Evangelista Meus.
With an eye towards optimization, we looked to adopt a panel of cross-laminated timber (CLT) as a single member into which we could carve and stencil – without waste of material or labor.
MASS CUSTOMIZATION Our first approach adopted a mass-customized strategy to optimize a cantilevered structure, giving depth to the core span, while milling out material at the cantilevered edges, drawing out the herringbone pattern of the CLT to the surface (above animation and below left). Ironically, this approach also increased the use of material and labor.
CRITICAL REDUCTIVISM Our second approach aimed to address the predicament of labor and materials with the idea of building the entire installation out of one CLT slab (shown below right). This effectively relegates the exposure of the CLT end-grain to the edges of the slab, where the silhouette of the CLT plank is excavated with divots to allow nested joints for compressive and tensile members.
Articulating a base, a shaft, and a lintel whose function is to frame the threshold into the Giardino. The base serves as a wood foundation, liberating it from any penetration into the Venetian soil. The “piloti” is triangulated, a figural “V”, and an allusive registration of the open book containing Venice’s welcoming words – all while framing a view of the fortification tower beyond the lagoon.
The lintel is displaced asymmetrically, cantilevering over the passage of arrival, pushing the structural capacity of this installation to its limits; a stone of Venice maintains its balance on the opposing end. Set on the stones of the fondamenta, this wood construction is a reminder of the very wood piles that hold up this maritime city.
We also wished to develop a structure that would help to bring people together, frame the space at the Giardino, serve as an edge for the garden, frame the serene view north towards the lagoon, and provide a foreground for other installations of the Biennale.
The 17th Venice Architecture Biennale “How Will We Live Together?” is curated by Hashim Sarkis.
Project Team: Principals: Nader Tehrani, Arthur Chang, Alexandru Vilcu, Eric Cheung
In collaboration with: Canducci Group, Structural Engineer Consultant Andrea Canducci, Alessandro Canducci, Alessandra Feduzi, Giulia Leopardi, Antonio Eroi
Donors/Sponsors Means Method Mission Canducci Group Elise Jaffe + Jeffrey Brown Payanini SRL
