*️⃣Pyramid of Tirana

Architect #MVRDV
City #Tirana
Country #Albania #EU

🔤The Pyramid of Tirana, originally built as a museum dedicated to the communist dictator Enver Hoxha, has been dramatically transformed by MVRDV. Reusing the concrete structure, the Pyramid is now an open sculpture in a new park. The park and the sculpture are home to an ensemble of colorful boxes, scattered in and around the original building. Steps have been added to the building’s sloping façades, allowing the people of Albania to literally walk all over the showpiece of the former dictator. #refurbishment

Since the fall of the communist regime, the building was variously used as a radio station, a nightclub, a conference venue, a broadcast center, and, during the 1999 Kosovo War, a base for NATO. The ever-changing uses left behind a patchwork of alterations that made the interior cluttered and dark.

The transformation of the Pyramid shows how a building can be made suitable for a new era, while at the same time preserving its complex history, and demonstrates that historic brutalist buildings are ideal for reuse. #heritage

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Colour #mixed
Material #rawconcrete
Function #public #community
Address: Bulevardi Dëshmorët e Kombit 5, Tiranë, Albania
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pics by #Ossip
text by Archdaily

*️⃣Galaxy Soho

Architect #Hadid #ZahaHadid #ZHA
City #Beijing
Country #China #AP

🔤Its architecture is a composition of five continuous, flowing volumes that are set apart, fused or linked by stretched bridges. These volumes adapt to each other in all directions, generating a panoramic architecture without corners or abrupt transitions that break the fluidity of its formal composition.

The great interior courts of the project are a reflection of traditional Chinese architecture where courtyards create an internal world of continuous open spaces.

The lower three levels of Galaxy SOHO house public facilities for retail and entertainment. The levels immediately above provide work spaces for clusters of innovative businesses. The top of the building is dedicated to bars and restaurants that offer views along one of the greatest avenues of the city. These different functions are interconnected through intimate interiors that are always linked with the city, helping to establish Galaxy SOHO as a major urban landmark for Beijing.

The RIBA stated Galaxy Soho in Beijing to be “distinctly urban rather than suburban, civic as much as it is commercial… Flowing bands of white aluminium and glass give the development an almost geological solidity and presence.”

Project was selected by #RIBA as the best building in international category in 2013. #award

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Colour #monochrome #white
Material #aluminium
Function #mixeduse #office #retail #mall
Address: China, Beijing, Dongcheng, Xiaopaifang Hu Tong, 小牌坊胡同甲7号 邮政编码: 100010
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pics by #HuftonCrow
text by Archdaily and architects

*️⃣Markthal Rotterdam

Architect #MVRDV
City #Rotterdam
Country #Netherlands #EU

🔤The municipality wanted to extend the existing open air market with a covered addition. According to stricter European rules in the future the open air sale of fresh and chilled food would not be permitted anymore. Next to this the municipality wanted to augment the amount of inhabitants in the city centre in order to create more capacity for the services in the area.

Provast and MVRDV had seen in the South of Europe that these kind of market halls are often dark, introverted buildings with little connection to the surrounding urban area. The building needed to be as open as possible to attract the public and at the same time it had to be closed off due to weather conditions.

The exterior of the Markthal is executed in grey natural stone, the same as on the pavements, to put the emphasis onto the interior.

A colourful mural by artists Arno Coenen and Iris Roskam lines the one-hectare surface beneath the arch. Printed onto perforated aluminium panels, it displays images of flowers and insects derived from 17th century Dutch paintings.

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Colour #mixed
Material #aluminium
Function #mixeduse #retail #mall #residential
Feature #interior #adminvisited
Address: Dominee Jan Scharpstraat 298, 3011 GZ Rotterdam, Netherlands
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#360architecture Website

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pics by #HuftonCrow, #Ossip, #Scagliola #Brakke and Markthal
text by Archdaily and Dezeen

*️⃣Sheraton Huzhou Hot Spring Resort

Architect #MAD
City #Huzhou
Country #China #AP

🔤Since ancient times, Huzhou has been known as “the house of silk” and “the land of plenty.” The hotel’s arcing form connects past and present and land and water. The unique design which integrates the building into the waterscape of Tai Lake, reflecting in the water below and creating a poetic echo of the natural landscape.

When night falls, the entire building is lit up brightly by both its interior and exterior lighting. Soft light wraps around the hotel and the water, resembling the bright moon rising above the lake, blending classic and modern through the reflection.

The Moon Hotel puts emphasis on the harmony of man and nature and enhances visitors' sensual and spiritual experiences.

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Function #hospitality #hotel
Feature #nightlight #onwater
Address: China, Zhejiang, Huzhou, Wuxing District, 太湖路5858号 邮政编码: 313006
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pics by #XiaZhi and McLennan
text by Archdaily

*️⃣Kurpaty health resort, Druzhba

Architect #Vasilevsky #IgorVasilevsky
City #Kurpaty close to #Yalta
Country #Russia #EU

🔤1980 leaders of the trade unions of the USSR and Czechoslovakia decided to jointly build a boarding house "Druzhba" in the Crimea for the workers of the two countries. The Czechs wanted the boarding house to be located in the place where their romantic youth passed - on the Golden Beach. But in those years the coast was already built up, there was only a narrow piece of territory with 40-degree slope between the road and the sea.

The place for construction had a fault in the earth's crust and the presence of a landslide, and was characterized by seismicity of 9 points.

Here is how Vasilevsky describes the choice of the way: "It was necessary to choose the most stable system. It turned out to be a "stool" on three legs, where all supports are evenly loaded. This was the basis of the structure. Everything that is in the object - floors, transverse and longitudinal walls - everything is included in the work. The structural solution, where there are no load-bearing and non-bearing elements, is ingenious."

Hence the unusual shape of Druzhba, which resembles a flying saucer.

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Material #rawconcrete
Function #hospitality #hotel
Feature #retro #cantilever
Address: Alupkinskoe sh., 12, p.g.t. Kurpaty
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pics by #Antipin and Pinterest
text by Wikipedia and archi.ru