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Steel Mesh Kraken Sunken Off British Virgin Islands to Create an Artificial Reef

23 Oct

[ By SA Rogers in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

Perched atop the Kodiak Queen, a former WW2-era Navy fuel barge, this 80-foot ‘Kraken’ now serves as the base of an artificial reef and marine research station on the ocean floor near the British Virgin Islands. The project, entitled BVI Art Reef, accomplishes a range of goals all at once: saving a decorated ship from destruction, transplanting coral to a new site in the hopes that it will flourish, creating an epic dive site and underwater art gallery, and providing a new habitat for marine life.

Photographer Owen Buggy documented the process, from the early stages of building the massive sea monster to sinking it in April 2017 to checking out the results a few months later. Sunken off the coast of the island Virgin Gorda with the help of tugboats and helicopters, the installation is already helping to rehabilitate heavily over-fished marine populations. Filmmaker Rob Sorrenti also got some great footage, presented as a documentary entitled ‘The Kodiak Queen,’ which is due for release in early 2018.

“This is the story of learning from past lessons and coming together to create something greater; rooted in joy and fueled by the power of play,” reads the BVI website. “This is the story of a group of friends from around the world who fell in love with the BVIs… and turned a weapon of war into a platform for unity – and a catalyst for new growth. This charitable kick-off in the British Virgin Islands combine art, ocean conservation, world history, marine science and economy… to solve a series of challenges in the BVIs by asking: how can we use play and collaboration to install permanent solutions that boost the local economy, secure the prosperity of these pristine islands for generations to come?”

“Our solution: a fantasy art eco-dive and ocean conservation site that puts the BVIs on the map as having one of the most unique and meaningful dive sites in the world… and one of the most forward-thinking approaches to creative problem solving that secures the education of its youth, and the health and prosperity of this island nation.”

Get updates on the project at the BVI Art Reef Facebook page.

[ By SA Rogers in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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Marine Miracle: Walk on Water at This Sunken Seaside Pavilion

29 Mar

[ By Steph in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

walk on water pavilion 3

Walk right out onto the surface of the sea or follow a path that takes you into a tranquil space beneath the waves at the ‘Thematic Pavilion,’ a mostly-submerged nautical exhibition space envisioned for South Korea. Daniel Valle Architects intentionally give the structure an uneasy, delicate sense of equilibrium with the water, drawing parallels to the realities many coastal communities could face in the not-so-distant future as sea levels rise. A visitor’s experience changes depending on the state of the water, with paths appearing and disappearing.

walk on water pavilion

walk on water pavilion 2

The pavilion features subtle raised areas offering clear paths that remain above the surface even when water levels are high and, presumably, when rocked by the wake of a nearby ship. In much the same fashion as a submarine, a water tank keeps the ship-like structure submerged for exhibitions featuring water-based technologies, and raises it above the surface afterward so it can be used like an ordinary boat.

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The exhibitions themselves range from the dazzlingly visual, like water shows, to the technical, like hydraulics and cooling systems. “The design aims to raise people’s attention on the ocean and coastal environmental crisis,” say the architects. “The design hopes to provoke the deepest impression to the visitors and prepare them for information and critique on all issues related to the oceans and coastlines. The beauty of scene after visiting the exhibition space and returning to the top plaza will contribute to develop an optimistic conclusion.”

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While it seems like a lack of railings could lead some people to walk right off the edge, people in other areas of the world don’t seem to require the same kind of safety hand-holding as Americans, so maybe they’d be fine. The renderings look especially cool after dark, with illuminated water spouts shooting up into the sky. Though the proposal wasn’t chosen for the Expo 2012 in Yeosu, it’s an interesting idea that could provide inspiration to other structures blurring the lines between architecture and ship building.

[ By Steph in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Sunken Central Park: ‘Sidescraper’ Wraps Excavated Landscape

28 Mar

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

excavated central park skyscraper

Conceived of as a hybrid, multi-functional work of landscape architecture, this award-winning design proposes digging down to the bedrock beneath Central Park and erecting a reflective “horizontal skyscraper” around its perimeter, providing 7 square miles of peripheral housing with views out over the park.

excavated park design

Designed by Yitan Sun and Jianshi Wu, the concept received first place in eVolo’s annual skyscraper competition. The proposal includes a continguous 1,000-foot-tall (and 100-foot-deep) structure, creating a looping horizontal-and-vertical skyscraper (or perhaps: sidescraper).

excavated landscape architecture nyc

By carving into the ground, new inhabitable areas are created, while mega-structure winds along the freshly-exposed cliff faces. The designers see this move as an inversion of the typical relationship between landscapes and buildings, with architecture forming a framework around outdoor space (versus a plaza surrounding a traditional skyscraper).

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They also maintain that the project would democratize access to the park by providing more people with greater proximity. On the one hand, it would indeed create more housing units with direct access to and views of the park, decreasing distance for many residents. On the other hand, the resulting residential units would no doubt still remain expensive real estate, and, in most regards, the park is already quite open and accessible.

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The displaced dirt and rocks from the excavation would be used to create additional three-dimensional topographies around the city, added to parks and open spaces and creating greater variety within the urban park system of Manhattan.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

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Sunken Ruins of Alexandria to be World’s First Underwater Museum

04 Nov

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

sunken egypt underwater museum

The Ministry of Antiquities in Egypt is planning to turn submerged ruins of ancient Alexandria into an underwater museum, allowing tourists access to 2,500 of subsurface stonework dating back to 365 AD.

sunken ruins

Plans or this ambitious intervention, designed by French architect Jacques Rougerie, were put on hold for years during a period of regional turmoil, but are now back on track. Fiberglass tunnels will connect waterfront galleries to underwater viewing areas where visitors can see the ruins in context.

The 270,000 square foot area in Alexandria Bay is protected by the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage and includes the Lighthouse of Alexandria, one of the seven ancient wonders of the world. Much of the area was submerged in the Middle Ages due to earthquakes.

underwater museum

Part of the purpose of the project is to further protect the ruins, which are prominent targets for thieves and difficult to police without permanent surrounding infrastructure and round-the-lock eyes on the site. “The museum will reshape the Arab region, as it will be the first of its kind in the world,” said Youssef Khalifa, chair of the Central Administration of Lower Egypt Antiquities. “Undoubtedly it will revive tourism and boost the Egyptian economy after a long recession.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Converted Cockpit: Cockfighting Arena Turned into Sunken Garden

03 Jun

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

converted cockpit terraces greenery

Traditionally legal in Peru, many citizens nonetheless find cockfights a morbid and gruesome affair and are thus celebrating the transformation of this sunken coliseum into a meditative and memorial public green space.

memorial terraces trees water

Paths, greenery and water features were added in part to lend the sensibilities of monuments and memorials to the place, commemorating the animals who suffered and died within the ring.

convertd cockpit side stairs

Remade by 2.8x Architects, this coliseum in Lima, Peru, has many preserved and reused elements, including large stones and cast concrete either left in place or redeployed on the property with new purposes in mind.

fighting pit ring memorail

Since cockfighting has been historically seen a sport in the region (and heavily bet upon), bird fighting pits (aka “cockpits”) in the country have been correspondingly prominent and well-constructed places, not the seedy sideshows one may imagine in locations where it is illegal. The driving idea was to reflect the history of the space in the form of preserved ruins while also providing a new experience in this unusually enclosed, semi-subterranean space.

convertd sunken cockpit

One can still imagine the historical horrors that took place before the conversion – armed with spurs for battle, cocks set about slashing and scraping one another, often resulting in the death of one or both combatants. At the same time, an abstracted yin-and-yang symbol at the center of the sunken circle and lush vegetation on all sides (filling the former stands and seats) conjure fresh and more optimistic feelings and associations among neighbors and visitors.

converted cockfighting arena

From the designers: “So the curved lines of the terraces contemplated in the project go on top of the remaining concrete stands, and the levels of these terraces try to maintain the original levels of some of the stands. This way the proportions of the coliseum continue. In the same way, the central space of the garden keeps the same dimensions and characteristics of the arena where the birds used to fight. The project has as background the hills of the residential area. It is because of the surroundings where the project is located, with hills all around, that we chose irregular “talamolle” stone as the main building material.”

memorial garden at night

“We also used terrazzo, concrete, and green painted iron for some details like the fountain, the circular bench, the wire net, and the ramp at the entry among others. To reinforce the idea of a memorial garden and a place suitable for meditation, elements such as water, a circular ramp all around, and a curved path of stone crossing the central space were included. The path together with the central circular garden form the ying yang, that is the equilibrium center of the whole space. At night the diffused illumination has an important role too.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Sunken Sky: Courtyard Light Well Suspended in Warehouse Loft

20 Feb

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

converted warehouse 1

A formerly dark, poorly ventilated caviar warehouse is illuminated naturally thanks to a sunken courtyard with a retractible glass roof, connecting the interior spaces to an outdoor terrace, acting as both a space and a sort of floating lantern in the unit. Many of the historic details of the 1884 building in Manhattan’s Tribeca North have been preserved in the renovation, including weathered roof joists, antique windows and brick walls.

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The converted loft by architect Andrew Franz occupies the top floor and roof of the old industrial building, reusing as many of the original materials as possible. The glass courtyard functions as a mid-level in the open-plan space, with a new staircase with reclaimed walnut roof joists as the treads and landing leading up to the transparent indoor/outdoor room.

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When the retractible roof is open, fresh air flows freely into the living space. When closed, it functions as a 150-square-foot skylight during the day. An additional staircase provides access to a rooftop garden planted with native, low-water plant species.

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New walnut cabinetry connects the modern elements of the loft to the historic, highlighting the building’s industrial past and simultaneously creating a space that feels warm and comfortable. Vivid orange in the kitchen backsplash and furniture add pops of color throughout the mostly-neutral space.

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Sunken Memorial Garden Sliced into Submerged Cruise Ship

27 Dec

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

Submerged sea vessels have long been destinations for diving tourists or (intentional or accidental) marine life habitats, but what if they could serve some function still visible on the surface of the water, like a memorial to those lost when the ship sunk?

The New Concordia Island Contest winners, Alexander Laing and Francesco Matteo Belfiore, propose slicing the section of the Italian cruise ship that crashed in January of 2012 and planting a garden in the resulting voids, leaving the lower, still-submerged areas as habitat zones.

The contest itself “aims to rethink the disaster of the ship Costa Concordia as exceptional opportunity to imagine the future of the wreck and that of the Island of Giglio. It is also a chance to wonder about needs for architecture to build new landscapes on traces and remains of a traumatic event …. The jury has selected the projects that have responded in a more comprehensive way to the questions raised by the contest, interweaving visionaries contents to pragmatic and real solutions.”

The clean and simple solution of the winning proposal defers to both nature and humans, a tribute to the disaster as well as the lives lost. Other intervention propositions of runner-up submissions trended toward either extreme: leaving the wreck mainly as-is and building around it, or, at the opposite end of the spectrum, creating underwater passageways and making the remaining structure physically accessible to people.

360Photography

Posts Tagged ‘Sunken’

Steel Mesh Kraken Sunken Off British Virgin Islands to Create an Artificial Reef

Marine Miracle: Walk on Water at This Sunken Seaside Pavilion

Sunken Central Park: ‘Sidescraper’ Wraps Excavated Landscape

Sunken Ruins of Alexandria to be World’s First Underwater Museum

Converted Cockpit: Cockfighting Arena Turned into Sunken Garden

Sunken Sky: Courtyard Light Well Suspended in Warehouse Loft

Sunken Memorial Garden Sliced into Submerged Cruise Ship

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