Many buildings often fall into disuse due to our cities' constant economic, social, and technological changes. The programmatic inconsistency of current times demands great versatility and adaptability from our infrastructures, increasingly leading projects to become uninhabited, and left to abandonment and decay.
Next, we present a series of 20 Latin American projects in which old warehouses, homes, prisons, mills, and markets were recovered and transformed into Cultural Centers, Museums, and Galleries.
Hangar architecture is a relatively new building type. Ever since the Wright brothers stored and repaired their aircraft in a wooden hangar constructed in 1902, designers and builders have continued to rethink what these structures can be. Beyond actual airports and terminals, hangars are unique in that they're purpose-built to hold an aircraft or spacecraft. Today, how can this building type be challenged and reimagined?
Hydraulic tiles are tiles produced entirely by hand with cement-based raw materials. Created in the mid-1800s in Spain, and widely used in Europe and America, it is a versatile option that can not only be applied in public areas, such as squares and sidewalks, but also interiors, including floors, walls, and furniture. Their versatility stems from the fact that they are highly customizable, from their colors and patterns to their geometry and dimensions. Read below a mostly technical explanation of these tiles, their manufacture, and their installation.
Over the past few decades, interior spaces have become increasingly open and versatile. From the thick walls and multiple subdivisions of Palladian villas, for example, to today's free-standing and multi-functional plans, architecture attempts to combat obsolescence by providing consistently efficient environments for everyday life, considering both present and future use. And while Palladio's old villas can still accommodate a wide variety of functions and lifestyles, re-adapting their use without changing an inch of their original design, today, flexibility seems to be the recipe for extending the useful life of buildings as far as possible.
How, then, can we design spaces neutral and flexible enough to adapt to the evolving human being, while still accomplishing the needs that each person requires today? An ancient element could help redefine the way we conceive and inhabit space: curtains.
Forty-seven years after their first appearance, Lina Bo Bardi's iconic glass easels have returned to the gallery at São Paulo's Museum of Art (MASP), displaying some of the museum's most valuable paintings, spanning from the medieval to the modern, in an exhibition on the second floor of the museum.
Removed from display in 1996, the concrete pillars, wood and glass easels were reviewed by METRO Arquitetos, who became part of MASP's curatorial team -- in charge of exhibition design -- last December. Having carried out various exhibitions this year at the museum - such as Brazilian Art Through the 1900s - METRO Arquitetos decided to end the year by bringing back the easels, in an exhibition similar to the original one conceived by Lina, which almost five decades later, continues to impress with its innovative way of exhibiting art in museums.
We had the opportunity to visit the exhibition montage and speak with architect Martin Corullon about the return of the easels and the process of recovering the space as conceived by Lina for the museum. Read the complete interview below.
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