The original house dates from 1959, the home of the current occupant’s grandmother. A typical Belgian subdivision house of that time. Sober in detailing, limited in daylight, and with no connection between the living space and the garden.
NOTAN OFFICE, a Brussels-based architecture, and urban design practice have demonstrated its expertise in transforming industrial courtyards into housing ensembles while preserving the essence of the place. The firm’s architectural strategy involves reusing in-situ elements and structural components, which helps them to create a strong identity that blends past, present, and future. By maintaining the existing DNA of the site, NOTAN OFFICE avoids disrupting the site’s historical significance, and their approach promotes a sense of continuity and respect for the site’s heritage. This technique is highly relevant for urban development projects, as it encourages a sustainable approach to architecture that values a location’s history and cultural heritage.
The project consists of the renovation of a unique home located in a modernist building from 1932, in the emblematic Barcelona neighborhood of Gràcia. It is a 100 square meters home for a couple who work mainly from home, with the possibility of starting a family in the future.
The house is located in a large block of apartments built in the early twentieth century on the Gran Via in Barcelona, on the edge of the mountain of Montjuïc. It is a very visible building due to its large size, known in the neighborhood as “Cal Drapaire”, and is included in the city’s Heritage Catalogue. The developer was a wealthy ragpicker, Pau Fornt, who built this mega building with six stairwells, ten floors high and 240 apartments for rent. It is said that he himself lived in the attic. Although they were low-income housing, the construction is very solid and the spaces are large compared to similar estates built in the nearby Eixample at the same time. The architect, Modest Feu, is the author of many interesting modernist and noucentist buildings, almost all located in the Sants district.
Mugou Village is located in the middle of the Li-Xi-He Plain, in Yilin Town, Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province. The Mugou New Village project is in response to Jiangsu Province’s “New Rural Community” construction, which was launched in 2020 and aims to enhance villagers’ living conditions, address the issue of rural hollowing out, and create an integrated relationship between urban and rural areas in the new era. The project intends to implement new functions and carry out centralized government collection in The Old Village of Mugou. It also aims to develop a new village 250 meters to the west of the old one for the construction of resettlement houses, with a total of 38 households relocated in the first phase.
We are facing such a scene – with the development of China’s urbanization, the construction land is gradually decreasing, and behind the fading waves, more old buildings are emerging in public, and the Somekh Building is one of them. Somekh Building was built in 1921 and is located in the historical and cultural area of the Bund. It is one of the most important works of the renowned Atkinson & Dallas Co. Ltd in modern Shanghai. In 2021, SHISUO was commissioned by the owner to do a renovation of the Somekh Building.
URBANUS believes that the preservation and regeneration of a historical industrial site not only can restore a place but also a spirit. A city’s industrial heritage should not become merely another consumer product in the post-industrial age. Its rich memory and legacy should be rediscovered, highlighted, and amplified so that it will take on a new life with the production of new ideas and infinite new possibilities. Thus, URBANUS proposes the novel concept of “making on-site” in the renovation of the brewery, making it a showcase of the city’s unique spirit while preserving its original architectural aesthetics, collective memory, and intrinsic character of an era. – Yan Meng
Context. The project consists of the rehabilitation of a Castilian mansion from the s. XVI had burned in a fire in 2011. Only the stone walls, the staircase with a vault, and the voussoirs of the collapsed arches remained. The building had formerly been used as the residence of the prior of the Monastery of Oña.
The ground floor of this typical Flemish townhouse consists of an entrance hall, and garage with an adjoining room furnished as an artist’s studio. The house had a typical extension with a kitchen, bathroom, and toilet. The degraded condition of this cramped extension became a strong argument for tearing it down. Instead, a new extension over the entire width of the main volume offers space for a dining room and kitchen. The artistic residents desired a strong graphic design for the expansion. Their dream was an extension with a reflection of their personality: colorful, graphic, dynamic, and daring.
Initially known as Casa MIC, Curitiba’s iconic brutalist residence, it is an original project of renowned architect Manoel Coelho, built in 1981, where he and his family lived for 40 years.
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