Light House Cinema, Dublin

Great surroundings will not camouflage poor programming in movie theaters. No matter how swanky the theater, if it shows poor movies, we just won’t go. Which isn’t to say that we have given up on movie-theater design. We still wish that one day, somewhere, someone is going to design a decidedly different, interesting and exciting movie theater.
Glimpses of brilliance are visible in the new Light House Cinema at Smithfield in Dublin, Ireland designed by Dublin’s award-winning DTA Architects Of course, you really need to design — and judge — a movie theater so that it looks and functions best when people are using it. So, having not paid personal visits to the new Light House, we cannot say for sure, but the images we have received of the empty space indicate that the play of light, color and height works exceptionally well here.
Light House cinema has been a bit of an institution in Dublin. It started showing Irish, independent, foreign-language, art house and classic cinema 20 years ago, closed in 1966, and re-opened this summer in its new, customized space. The four-screen, intimate art-house cinema includes a wonderful, inviting and open cafe that looks like something you’d see at an art museum, not a movie theatre. The leader of the Light House project at DTA was Derek Tynan and the project architect was Colin Mackay.

The new cinema benefited from the financial assistance of The Arts Council, the Irish Film Board, and the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism. For Dublin’s city planners, this was to be a cultural magnet and a focal point for the largest mixed-use development ever in Dublin’s inner city, the massive rejuvenation plan for the historical Smithfield Market area.
And if you’d like to make our wishes come true, please let us know of any supreme movie-theater design concepts you’ve seen, designed or commissioned. We are all eyes and ears. - Tuija Seipellsource: www.worldarchitecturenews.com
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RESTROOM DESIGNS

Bathroom, washroom, toilet, powder room, ladies’/men’s room, whatever we call it, it is the one place in any public or semi-public place — including restaurants, hotels, concert halls, clubs or bars — that really tells what the entire establishment is all about.

Sometimes it may be possible to fake customer care, cool or luxury at the front end, but the truth is always revealed in the loo. If the bathrooms are ordinary, filthy or in poor repair — or all three — you can be sure that the whole concept is just surface glare, without substance and without true respect of the guests.

Just as the owners’ attitudes are reflected in the staff they or their managers hire, their true values and beliefs are revealed in the places that get overlooked in poorly executed concepts: parking garages, coat checks, kitchens, and most visibly and most commonly, bathrooms.
It continues to baffle us why it is not obvious that the experience of going to a concert or dining at a restaurant includes the entire experience, not just parts of it. The divine food in a restaurant or the concert at a venue has a lot to cover up if the journey to your seat was poor agony. We have all had experiences like this: You were scared in the car park, got soaked in the line-up outside, had your wet coat crushed and your scarf dropped at the coat check, and when you proceeded to freshen up in the bathroom, it was completely uninspiring, poorly lit, ill-equipped and stinky. You are disappointed, but not surprised. It has happened too often.
Which is why we are glad that bathrooms are starting to get some serious design attention. There is so much room to impress and surprise that it is amazing everyone isn’t doing something about it. It is one huge untapped opportunity. Because most of us have been so thoroughly underwhelmed hundreds of times, our expectations are quite low to start with.
Owners and designers of such places have an unprecedented chance to surprise, please and pamper us, and to show that they really mean business all the way through.
We are hoping that we will be seeing much more of great bathroom design and that there will be fewer disappointments in your future. Let us know when that happens. - Tuija Seipell
source: www.thecoolhunter.net
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Estadio Internacional Monterrey, Monterrey, Mexico

HOK Sport unveils designs for the Estadio Internacional Monterrey, Mexico
Initial concept designs for the new 80,000 seat international stadium in Monterrey, Mexico, have been released by the designers HOK Sport. The design for the multi‐purpose venue situated close to the centre of Monterrey has been inspired by traditional Mexican themes and the stadium will accommodate soccer and NFL, as well as a capability for an international standard athletics track using a raised platform concept.

The design was inspired by a symbol of Mexican festivities – the ‘rehilete’ – a windmill that is given to children each year to celebrate National Day in Mexico. The windmill form has informed the overall composition of the stadium, with the design based on eight translucent overlapping leaves and which, by the use of variable lighting, can be made to appear to turn like a fan. The leaves will be constructed of steel mesh which will provide sun shading in a ‘weave’ based on traditional Mexican basket knitting by native Mexicans.

The stadium is to be constructed on a circular land bridge over the dry Santa Catarina River, creating both a physical and symbolic link between the northern and southern parts of the city.

Rod Sheard of HOK Sport said ‘’Mexico has so many wonderful traditions and a love of sport which is infectious; their ‘Ola Mexicana’, the Mexican Wave, has been adopted all over the world as a statement of people having fun, celebrating life. The wave originated in Mexico in 1984 from the University Stadium in an exhibition game between Mexico and Argentina. We were enthusiastic to design a stadium that possessed something of that magic, fun loving spirit and evoking the roots of the Mexican pre Hispanic culture’’.

César Esparza, CEO of Estadio Internacional Monterrey, said "We have been blessed by working with Rod Sheard’s team at HOK Sport. They have exceeded our very ambitious expectations and have developed a true global icon that will boost Monterrey’s image as a world class city. This stadium will put Monterrey on the world map".: www.worldarchitecturenews.com
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Museum of Islamic Arts, Doha, Qatar

The new Museum of Islamic Arts, Qatar opens its doors
Today marks the opening of the new Museum of Islamic Arts in Doha, Qatar. Veteran architect I M Pei designed the new development, which was commissioned by the rulers of Qatar - the al-Thani family, in what is believed to be his last ‘statement,’ building. The 45,000m2 building is located on purpose-built island at the Southern end of Doha bay, and while the exterior was finished in 2006 the museum itself has taken until now to open. The development is the first of its kind in the Persian Gulf and will house an extensive collection of Islamic art, plus a study, library and several restaurants.

The exterior of the museum is made up of a dramatic pile of white limestone shapes, and its design is inspired and derived from Islamic architecture, with its innate sense of intricate geometric patterns. The resulting structure takes the form of a series of square and octagonal blocks stacked on top of one another, culminating in a central tower. Inside the museum the various galleries are located around a towering atrium, capped with a dome.

The island that the museum sits on was purpose built at the request of I M Pei, as he didn’t want the building to become surrounded or hemmed in by new constructions, “Even a beautiful piece of work can be overshadowed or destroyed by something else,” he stated in a recent interview. It was his intent to create a building that embodies the essence of Islamic architecture, and in that task at least, he appears to have succeeded.

John Edwards
Reporter
source: www.worldarchitecturenews.com
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Shanghai Tower, Shanghai, China

Ground breaks on third of trio of towers in Shanghai’s Luijiazui Finance and Trade Zone
A 632 m tower designed by Gensler breaks ground today in Shanghai to complete a trio of new super-tall towers revolutionising China’s architectural record. Shanghai Tower will join and rise above the recently appraised ‘Best Tall Building Overall’ by the CTBUH, Shanghai World Financial Center and the Jin Mao Tower in the Luijiazui Finance and Trade Zone as China’s first ever super-tall district.

The tower, commissioned by Shanghai Tower Construction and Development Co., Ltd, will be the tallest in China with the highest open air observation deck in the world. Consisting of office space, a luxury hotel, retail and cultural venues the building will also hold connections to the Shanghai Metro and three floors of parking below ground level.

Shanghai Tower is organized as nine cylindrical buildings stacked one atop another. The inner layer of the double-skin façade encloses the stacked buildings, while a triangular exterior layer creates the second skin, or building envelope, which gently rotates as it rises. The spaces between the two façade layers create nine atrium sky gardens.

“This tower is symbolic of a nation whose future is filled with limitless opportunities,” said Qingwei Kong, President of Shanghai Tower Construction & Development Co., Ltd. “With Shanghai Tower we celebrate not only China’s economic success and increasing connection to the global community, but also our company’s commitment to developing properties that demonstrate the highest, noblest and most exquisite design achievements possible.”
source: www.worldarchitecturenews.com
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