VACANT VOID

LOCATION : Amsterdam, The Netherlands

PROJECT TYPE : Urban Regeneration | Strategies for Revitalization

COLLABORATORS : The Berlage, TU Delft

As a city develops, it is often confronted with issues of lack of space to supplement the growth. On the other hand, it also leaves behind vacant spaces in its wake. We began a research about these spaces in the city of Amsterdam as a part of a larger study at The Berlage. We found an alarming quantity of empty office spaces, with well stocked cubicles and noone to use them. On a parallel note, temporary activities occurring repeatedly in a specific place tends to generate much activity within an area. Our proposal was to bring both together, in an attempt to revitalize these vacant spaces through recurrent temporary programming, specific to the area. We are currently working on a design model for Chennai, to re-use its empty office spaces.

KNOWLEDGE SPACES

LOCATION : Amsterdam | Chennai [Proposed]

PROJECT TYPE : Work Environments

COLLABORATORS : The Berlage, TU Delft; Steelcase Workspace Futures 

Production of work and the environment it takes place in has been undergoing quiet and drastic changes over the last decade. Start-up offices and small scale business entrepreneurs are often seen working in cafes, public spaces, accomodative libraries etc. rather than full-fledged office scenarios. The design of the work space needs to be treated keeping in the mind the experience of the employees/knowledge producers. The study done previously at The Berlage in collaboration with Steelcase Inc. involvled analyzing and designing spaces for activity-based scenarios. Co-working spaces are a form of the new-age work environment, popular in Europe and the US. They are fast becoming a norm in India too. We are in the process of collaborating with a few incubators, and The Works@, Chennai, to develop a model for designing these knowledge spaces.  

PORTABLE PODS

LOCATION : Nagapattinam, Tamil Nadu

PROJECT TYPE : Disaster relief housing | Temporary structures

The project is an initiative toward developing flexible, mobile and instantly deployable prototypes primarily for disaster struct areas. Design of a single livable unit for 4 persons has been detailed and is ready to be taken to the testing stage, The unit is transformable when multiplied, into a classroom, a hospital, even an entire community. Every element is designed to be dismantled, with material specifications mentioned. We are on the look-out for prospective collaborators and vendors for the proposal.