THOM MAYNE – 2005 PRITZKER PRIZE WINNER
“I love architecture that starts with impossibilities.”
“To produce something neutral is a failure.”
“Architecture is always a political statement.”
Thom Mayne is known for his experimental architectural forms, Morphosis is known for their bold designs, striking a balance between sculptural and monolithic forms. Some of the significant institutional buildings such as the New York’s Cooper Union building, The Emerson College in Los Angeles and Bloomberg center.
NEW YORK’S COOPER UNION
41 Cooper Square, the new academic building for The Cooper Union, aspires to manifest the character, culture and vibrancy of both the 150 year-old institution and of the city in which it was founded. The institution remains committed to Peter Cooper’s radically optimistic intention to provide an education “as free as water and air” and has subsequently grown to become a renowned intellectual and cultural center for the City of New York. This vertical piazza is the social heart of the building, providing a place for planned meetings, student gatherings, lectures, and for the intellectual debate that defines the academic environment. An undulating lattice envelopes a 20-foot wide grand stair which ascends four stories from the ground level through the sky-lit central atrium, which itself reaches to the full height of the building, defining the innovation and technological advancement for Architects & Engineers.
The building reverberates with light, shadow and transparency via a high performance exterior double skin whose semi-transparent layer of perforated stainless steel wraps the building’s glazed envelope to provide critical interior environmental control, while also allowing for transparencies to reveal the creative activity occurring within. Built in LEED Gold standards, Advanced green building initiatives include:
An operable building skin made of perforated stainless steel panels offset from a glass and aluminum window wall. The panels reduce the impact of heat radiation during the summer and insulate interior spaces during the winter.
Radiant heating and cooling ceiling panels introduce innovative HVAC technology that will boost energy efficiency. This contributes to making the new building 40 percent more energy efficient than a standard building of its type.
A full-height atrium enables unique circulation for building occupants, improves the flow of air and provides increased interior day lighting.
A green roof insulates the building, reduces city “heat island” effect, storm water runoff and pollutants; harvested water is reused.
A cogeneration plant provides additional power to the building, recovers waste heat and effectively cuts energy costs.
THE EMERSON COLLEGE, LOS ANGELES
Housing up to 217 students, the domestic zones frame a dynamic core dedicated to creativity, learning, and social interaction. Composed of two slender residential towers bridged by a multi-use platform, the 10-story square frame encloses a central open volume to create a flexible outdoor “room.” A sculpted form housing classrooms and administrative offices weaves through the void, defining multi-level terraces and active interstitial spaces that foster informal social activity and creative cross-pollination. Looking out onto the multi-level terrace, exterior corridors to student suites and common rooms are shaded by an undulating, textured metal scrim spanning the full height of the towers’ interior face. LEED Gold rating achieved, Defining the building’s facades to the East and West, the residential towers feature an active exterior skin. Responding to local weather conditions, the automated sunshade system opens and closes horizontal fins outside the high-performance glass curtain-wall to minimize heat gain while maximizing daylight and views. Further green initiatives include the use of recycled and rapidly renewable building materials, installation of efficient fixtures to reduce water use by 40%, energy savings in heating and cooling through a passive valence system, and a building management and commissioning infrastructure to monitor and optimize efficiency of all systems.
BLOOMBERG CENTER, NEW YORK
Bloomberg center is a institutional center in new york. The Center is a four-story building set beneath a photovoltaic canopy, with a low and narrow pro le framing stunning views across the island. One of the building’s most distinctive features is its facade, optimized to balance transparency—maximizing daylighting and exterior views, and opacity— maximizing insulation and reducing thermal bridging. A monumental stair rising from the main lobby guides vertical circulation to all levels. Highlighting Cornell Tech’s river-to- river campus, the main stair looks out onto Queens through a viewing corridor framed by other campus buildings. An open galleria extends throughout the length of the building, serving as a shared avenue for informal encounters, discussions, and collaborations. Collaborative and flexible spaces are as important as private and meditative spaces. While offering traditional classroom spaces and large open workspace areas, there are also clusters of break- out spaces, huddle rooms, and social areas that allow for group study, as well as quiet rooms and micro-pods that function as private work spaces or telephone booths.
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