MassArt

MassArt Tree House Student ResidenceThink of the areas in and around Boston and most likely institutions of higher education come to mind: Harvard University, MIT, Boston University, to name a few.Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt) is relatively small in comparison but a new 20-story tower gives the college some exposure befitting one of the oldest art schools in the United States. Designed by ADD Inc, the aptly named Tree House Student Residence resembles a tree in its bark-like brown skin, while it also echoes Boston's traditional brick buildings. The architects answered a few questions about the project.

The exterior is an organic mosaic of over 5,000 composite aluminum panels of varying depths and hues.(Photo :Chuck Choi )Please provide an overview of the project.

Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt) is an urban arts school located in downtown Boston, along the Avenue of the Arts that is home to numerous artistic venues and educational institutions including Symphony Hall, the New England Conservatory, Northeastern University, and the Museum of Fine Arts. The Tree House project was the central component of MassArts desire to increase the percentage of students living on campus from 26% to 44%, including 95% of incoming freshman. At the core of the colleges transition from a commuter school to a residential campus was the desire to create a vibrant living and learning community to cultivate artistic, social and academic development.

The tower is located along the Avenue of the Arts, amidst academic facilities and residence halls.(Photo :Chuck Choi )Through a programming effort that included student focus groups, benchmarking tours of comparable projects, and freshman core curriculum demands, the building harmonizes the needs of college administrators and the unique learning/living requirements of nearly 500 incoming art school freshmen. The project features a ground floor caf and living room, a second-floor health center; and a Pajama Floor at the third level with communal kitchen, game room, laundry facilities, and fitness center. The residential floors include alternating studio spaces, lounges, project workrooms, and snack kitchens to create an informal studio atmosphere conducive to artistic dialogue and interdisciplinary collaboration. Hailed by critics as the most innovative new high rise in Boston, the project is a unique complement to the city skyline that expresses the character and creative force of the institution it serves.

Dark browns at the base mirror tree bark before growing progressively lighter to make the building appear taller and lighter in the skyline. Green window panels punctuate the faade like the leaves of a tree.(Photo :Chuck Choi )What are the main ideas and inspirations influencing the design of the building?

The exterior, inspired by Gustav Klimts 1909 Tree of Life painting, is an organic mosaic of composite aluminum panels of varying depths and hues. Dark browns at the base mirror tree bark before growing progressively lighter to make the building appear taller and lighter in the skyline. Green window panels punctuate the faade like the leaves of a tree.

The warm tones of the building skin were created with 5,500 metal panels, dimensionally organized in a two story repeat, but gradually increasing in the proportion of lighter panels over darker as the building rises from the "trunk" to the top. This, combined with higher glosses on lighter panels, gives the building its richness and subtle sense of strength as it becomes more gold toward the top of its canopy.

Inspired by Gustav Klimts Tree of Life, this innovative high rise expresses the character and creative force of the institution it serves.(Photo :Peter Vanderwarker )The projects interior spaces expand upon this concept through a bold color palette to create an engaging and light-filled environment. The lobby features an oversized, snaking yellow sofa that echoes the shapes of the landscaped plaza. The ceiling, constructed of lacquered western hemlock, reinforces the tree concept while steel door frames add an industrial element. Art is infused throughout the building ranging from commissioned alumni pieces in the lobby to a rotating gallery on the third floor. While the budget did not allow for expensive finishes, designers drew on the possibilities of modest materials such as carpet and paint to develop a bold visual statement that activates the space through color.

Students in the colleges architecture and interior design programs helped shape some of the projects common areas, including the ground floor caf.(Photo :Lucy Chen )From the onset, ADD Incs design team was challenged to differentiate the 20 occupied floors of this urban high-rise. The team responded through the use of boldly and distinctly colored corridors and common areas that change every two floors. As one travels vertically through the building, the palette grows from deep purples on the lower floors, to yellows, oranges, and finally blues on the upper levels. Through this simple technique, the residence hall has become a laboratory of sorts for art students to experience the effect of color on light, quality, mood, and identity of space.

The lobby features an over-sized, snaking yellow sofa that echoes the shapes of the landscaped plaza. The ceiling, constructed of lacquered western hemlock, reinforces the tree concept.(Photo :Lucy Chen )To what extent did the clients and/or future users of the building influence the design and the outcome of the building?

The design of The Tree House Residence hall exemplifies collaboration. During the design process, the team worked to harmonize the goals and aspirations of professors, administrators, students, trustees, alumni, city and state agencies, neighbors, and the buildings owner. ADD Inc conducted in-depth benchmarking tours, hosted focus groups and an 85-person design charrette, and developed full-scale mock-up units for students to experience and critique. Students in the colleges architecture and interior design programs helped shape some of the projects common spaces, including the ground floor caf.

The Pajama Floor allows students to lounge, play games, or study in groups.(Photo :Lucy Chen )Were there any significant challenges that arose during the project? If so, how did you respond to them?

The site poses significant construction and structural issues. It contains a large network of underground culverts that carry waste to a Massachusetts Water Resource Authority (MWRA) wastewater treatment plant serving a large percentage of downtown Boston buildings. Consequently, the 20-story dormitory sits on a relatively small footprintapproximately 55 feet by 125 feet. The architectural design is a tall, slender building that curves around and cantilevers over the MWRA easement. The height of the narrow structure and its cantilevered form necessitated unusually deep piles and additional bracing. The constrained footprint mandated that every square inch of space had to be utilized effectively in order to meet the program goals and requirements within the height constraints of the site. BIM modeling of all components and systems enabled real time visualization and coordination by all team members, allowing the team to recognize conflicts early in the design.

A communal kitchen accented by bold color is the center of an active residence life program.(Photo :Lucy Chen )How would you describe the architecture of Massachusetts and how does the building relate to it?

Many of the most-loved buildings of Massachusetts (especially Boston) are warm toned brick buildings in the historic neighborhoods of Beacon Hill, the North End, and the Back Bay. While the material of the Tree House is contemporary metal, the gold, tan, rust, and brown panels connect it to the historic clay color palette.

Email interview conducted by John Hill.

Designers drew on the possibilities of modest materials such as carpet and paint to develop a bold visual statement that activates the space through color.(Photo :Lucy Chen )

Ground Floor Plan(Drawing :ADD Inc. )

Pajama Floor / Level 3 Floor Plan(Drawing :ADD Inc. )

Typical Floor Plan(Drawing :ADD Inc. )

Floor By FloorThe NRH building isfour stories tall and offers a total of 76 beds, including four unique rooms, 24 single occupancy dormitory rooms and 24 double occupancy dormitory rooms.Restroom facilities in the NRH aresuite-style, configured such that two singles or two doubles will share facilities.See below for a full list of community areas available in the building. Click on the heading to view each level's floor plan.Lower Level(First Floor)Large Community KitchenLarge Community Television LoungeLaundry Room #1Indoor Bike StorageMusic/Multipurpose Room4 Single Occupancy Rooms4 Double Occupancy Rooms (8 beds)Ground Level(Second Floor)Large Community KitchenLarge Community Television LoungeLobby/MailboxesHousing OfficePublic Restrooms (2)Conference RoomVending Room4 Single Occupancy Rooms4 Double Occupancy Rooms (8 beds)Second Level(Third Floor)Community KitchenCommunity Television LoungeFood PantryStudy Room (Carrels)Study Room (Desk-Chairs)8 Single Occupancy Rooms8 Double Occupancy Rooms (16 beds)Third Level(Fourth Floor)Large Community KitchenLarge Community Television LoungeLaundry Room #2Study Room (Desk-Chairs)Chapel8 Single Occupancy Rooms8 Double Occupancy Rooms (16 beds)Floor Plans

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NEWS ARCHITECTURE DESIGN ART 2014 2015 2016Mangrove City: Emulating natures tropical beauty through complex designBY:DANIELLE DEL SOL| OCTOBER - 21 - 20101

Elements of natural beauty can often astound visually, but they are always infinitely more awe-inspiring when one considers the millions of complex details involved in their existence.Leng Pau Chung, an architecture student in Sarawak, Malaysia, harnesses this wonder in the skyscraper complex Mangrove City: the buildings mimic nature in their holistic form and evolutionary capabilities, but Chung shows the complexs beauty through the details.Set amongst mangrove wetlands, the buildings combine complex green technology and materials to create a structures that, like the mangroves that surround them, will endure.Plans for a wind turbine, rainwater harvesting, seawater filtration, daylight shutters, and water and energy distribution throughout the complex are fleshed out in great detail in ChungseVoloskyscrapers entry. As an example, Chung shows how, during different times of the day, the buildings solar integrated ETFE film can be repositioned to best generate energy and filter incoming sunlight.Flexible construction methods are used for the complexs structural plans to allow for future additions and alterations: like the mangroves, Mangrove City will have the capability to evolve. A tall high-rise that will house laboratories serves as the main, anchoring building of the complex. More labs are found in hallways that are attached horizontally to the main structure. These hallways are column-free and seemingly float in the air; however, they are in fact supported on both ends by a free standing greenhouse and a modular building that houses residences. A concrete slab raft that is reinforced from below supports the entire complex.By rising vertically, Mangrove City minimally impacts its surrounding inspiration. This will allow it, as Chung says, co-exist with Mother Nature for ever and ever.

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Rotating Mangrove Towers New Indonesian SustainabilityBY:LIDIJA GROZDANIC| JUNE - 20 - 20119

Designed byAgung Mahaputra,Andika Priya Utama,Arief Aditya Putra,Dely Hamzah,Nidia Safiana, andRahadi Utomo, the proposal offers a unique way of integrating densely populated architecture into the natural environment of Northern Jakarta. The site is surrounded by mangrove forest whose delicate ecosystem is left without an undue footprint. The idea consists of two asymmetrical towers that rotate to get the beautiful vista while capturing sunlight from morning to midday. A corridor without artificial air conditioner encircles each floor. The corridors serve as a barrier between the suns heat and the workspace. They absorb the heat gain while allowing light in thereby reducing the dependence on electricity for artificial light and air in the buildings.The Mangrove concept offers flexible spaces on each floor. A skeletal structure is used as the main structural system for the faade, which provides shade for interior spaces. The density of this shading system varies and is adjustable with the annual movement of the sun.The Towers are designed to become part of the mangrove forest of Jakarta in that it can be used by the public. They are open to the public as an extension of the forest: the Java sea, the mangroves, the promenade, the tower ground floor, the podium floor, and the roof floor are designed to be accessible by those who want to enjoy the north sea of Jakarta. A dynamic pedestrian bridge escorts visitors from the promenade up to the podium level. The buildings are inaccessible by car. In order to preserve the health of the forest, the project promotes accessibility to only pedestrians and cyclists.

Mangrove Tower in the Baltic SeaBY:ADMIN| JANUARY - 20 - 20104Green SkyscrapersIn the next few days we will showcase 25 innovative proposals for green skyscrapers. These projects were submitted for the Annual Skyscraper Competition from 2006 to 2009.Project15of25Jaakko Kallio-Koski, Toni sterlund, Joose MykknenFinland

Mangrove TowerThe Sea at RiskThe Baltic Sea is the second largest brackish water basin in the world in terms of water volume. The water of the Baltic Sea is a mixture of ocean water and fresh water brought by numerous rivers. The unique brackish-water ecosystem is very sensitive to disturbances. About 85 million people live in the Baltic Sea catchment area, placing severe pressure in the ecosystem.The Mangrove Tower is a temporary structure designed to prevent eutrophication in the sensitive archipelagos of the Baltic Sea. The actual process of reducing pollutants is simple, but needs a large scale self-sufficient system that can be relocated after the site has been cleaned.EutrophicationEutrophication is a major problem in the Baltic Sea since the 1800s when the Sea changed from an oliogotrophic clear-water sea into a eutrophic marine environment. It is a consequence of nutrient loading caused by human activity. Due to the large amounts of nutrients, microscopic phytoplankton has drastically increased and algae blooms have become prevalent. Increased primary production of the Sea increases the amount of organic matter in the sediment and leads to self feeding internal nutrient loading cycle. Organic matter that settles at the bottom of the sea begins to decompose. Decomposition consumes limited oxygen resources of the bottom water layers and turns it into an anoxic system.Mangrove TowerThe Mangrove Tower consists of a bundle of mangrove branches. Each branch being an independent unit; where the upper part contains wind turbines for generating power necessary for the water pumps located at the bottom. The Mangrove Tower is a water oxygenator that pumps surface water full of oxygen to the lower layers of the sea. The towers are placed in sheltered pools on the coast. Its morphogenetic structure allows the addition or removal of several braches without loss of structural stability.

Mangrove Tower - 1

Mangrove Visitor CentrePart 1 Project 2011Chzesiang ChootUniversity Of Malaya Kuala Lumpur Malaysia

The project sits in the heart of Kuantan, a city in Malaysia. Like many Malaysia cities, Kuantan is developing rapidly, the consequences being a loss of mangrove swamps area due to the pollution. The mangrove visitor centre intends to raise the awareness to the people about the important of mangrove as a part of the city.

With that in mind, the ultimate intention of the design is to incorporate the unique characteristic and behaviour of mangrove with the site`s element so that it is not just a building, but an architecture with natural feature.

The buildings is raised on stilts offered more benefits to the site than on the ground. It creates a public space underneath the building so that it encourages the movement from the city to the river. Not only that, the building somehow denote that the site as the most significant entrance to the river esplanade. Building acts like a mangrove, provide a large canopy to the pedestrian underneath it. The space was inspired by the spaces between the roots of the mangrove as the space where interactions happened. In addition, the stilts give a sense of fisherman village like what it has along the Kuantan River.

The form of the building appears to be two different languages are speaking to each other in a unique way. Again, it tries to enhance and highlight the paradox in the mangrove and the site. Besides, it also ties back the river and the city which has somewhat disconnected in the sense and also fully utilize the site as a threshold of city to the river.

Elevation design is taking consideration into the views from city towards mangrove and vice versa. The skin of building is designed so that the each block do not look so stiff and monotonous, the formal block appeared to have informal and random skin pattern while the informal block possessed the formal and regular skin pattern.

Chzesiang ChootTutor:Ezlina Adnan

Achrafieh 732 / Bernard Khoury Architects 18NOV2011 ProjectsBuilt ProjectsSelected ProjectsApartmentsBeirutHousingLebanonArchitect:Bernard Khoury ArchitectsPhotographer:Bernard Khoury ArchitectsMaterials:WoodSteelConcrete Bookmark 7K+ Share on emailBookmark this picture! Bernard Khoury Architects Architects:Bernard Khoury Architects Location:Beirut, Lebanon Architect:Bernard Khoury Architects Project Year:2008 Photographs:Bernard Khoury Architects

From the architect.The Achrafieh 732 Residential building by Bernard Khoury Architects, is located on a 209 square-meter land situated on Lot # 732 in a quiet residential area of Achrafieh,Beirut. The 9.8m-wide Eastern edge faces Chehade Street, which runs down perpendicular to Abdel Wahab el Inglizi Street.Bookmark this picture! Bernard Khoury ArchitectsThe building is located in a high-end neighborhood of Achrafieh. We propose to layout the residences in a longitudinal Loft-fashion, open to the east and west directions. The street level facade of the ground floor allows for both the pedestrian building entrance as well as for the vehicular entrance. Surface parking is provided on the ground floor, fitting the cars under the 3.5m high pilotis structure of the building.Bookmark this picture! Bernard Khoury ArchitectsThe open plan structure of the building allows for several layout combinations for every type of residence. Each apartment is completely glazed from one end, maximising its exposure to the outside. Apartments range from 167-334 m, among which are simplex apartments as well as 2-floor apartments distributed along 6 levels. In addition, each apartment has its allocated underground storage space situated in the basement level. The seventh and eighth floor house a 236m duplex-penthouse including 2 ample private terraces on each side, as well as an allocated underground storage.Bookmark this picture!typical floor planAs opposed to the usual typology of residential apartments that tend to scatter the balconies along the different peripheral sections of an apartment, three types of balconies are proposed: located on the western side is a generous deck, opening up the back edge of the building to a void, and separating it from its surroundings, giving the building a more domestic feel in such a dense urban context. On the Eastern edge of the building, 2 types of balconies are suggested: one is an organic-shaped wooden shell, accessed from the apartment by an opaque door, resulting into a secluded hide-out or fumoir. Whereas the main length of the faade benefits from a thin 70cm wide platform running adjacently to the glazed edge, allowing the apartments to expand once all the doors are slid open, and creating an outdoor extension to the reception areas.Bookmark this picture! Bernard Khoury ArchitectsA criss-crossed mesh of wooden stems mounted onto the east facade is alternately pinned down by jar planters. A jasmine plant climbs out of each jar and spreads onto this secondary skin allowing the building to transform seasonally along with its vegetation.Bookmark this picture! Bernard Khoury Architects

Bernard Khoury Architects











typical floor plan#skyscraper#reclaims,#renews, re-uses snow, rain, grey-water collected in the internal corners of the ocular forms. This#uniqueand novel#buildingis very rigorous in its design. All floor plates are usable, structurally inherent, and provide shelter above and below for farming and people, internal and external programing is included for wild life preserves and#recreationaluse for the public to participate#civicfunctions. true#highrise#architecture#futureplanning

Flex: Flexible Learning Environments / HMC Architects 19APR2011 byAlison Furuto ArticlesEducationalCaliforniaLos AngelesHMC ArchitectsUnited States Bookmark 56 Share on emailBookmark this picture!Courtesy of HMC ArchitectsIn 2010,Los AngelesUnified School District (LAUSD) held a design competition for a flexible solution to replace portable buildings across the district, andHMC Architectsaccepted the challenge. The district asked them to ignore their standards and put an emphasis on an ideas-based approach. They wanted creative, progressive responses to their problem, not dressed-up modular buildings. They challenged the traditional box shape of the classroom by looking at how the room is used and how it is currently under utilized. Although their design solution, which they named Flex, did not win the competition, their end product is a portable classroom solution that can be used at any school, with hope that their design can inspire other school districts to think differently when it comes to portable classrooms. More images and architects description after the break.Before they could begin brainstorming design solutions for the competition, they dove into some research about teaching philosophies. The future of teaching is becoming more and more about tailored individual instruction, self-guided instruction, and group learning activities. Socrates believed in enabling students to think for themselves, rather than filling their heads with right answers. He regularly engaged his pupils in dialogues by responding to their questions with questions, instead of answers. This process, known as the Socratic Method, encourages divergent thinking rather than convergent. Students are rearranged to face each other in the classroom, and are given opportunities to examine a common piece of work, whether it is in the form of a novel, poem, art print, or piece of music. After studying the common piece, open-ended questions are posed. Open-ended questions allow students to think critically, analyze multiple meanings in text, and express ideas with clarity and confidence. Participants feel a certain degree of emotional safety when they understand that this format is based on dialogue and is not necessarily a debate.Bookmark this picture!aerial viewDialogue is exploratory and involves the suspension of biases and prejudices. Discussion/debate is a transfer of information designed to win an argument and bring closure. Once teachers and students learn to dialogue, they find that the ability to ask meaningful questions that stimulate thoughtful interchanges of ideas is more important than the answer. Participants in a Socratic Seminar respond to one another with respect by carefully listening instead of interrupting. Students are encouraged to paraphrase essential elements of anothers ideas before responding, either in support or in disagreement. Members of the dialogue look each other in the eyes and use each others names. This simple act of socialization reinforces appropriate behaviors and promotes team building. Now imagine if a classroom flexed with these needs in mind and encouraged dialogue.Bookmark this picture!view from covered dining areaThey started the design process by examining the standard classroom box. First, the teaching wall is usually centered on one wall, all students facing forward. This follows the I teach, you listen and take notes model of instruction. Second, the two sides and back wall of the classroom are mostly used for hanging student work, fixed computer stations, large displays, maps, or storage. Third, and most important, the corners of the box-shaped classroom are largely unused for instruction due to the fact that they are hard to see from the opposite sides of the room. These corners are often used as informal storage areas, or clutter. The real estate that is usable for instruction on a 30 long teaching wall is actually about 20 due to sight lines.Bookmark this picture!view from second floor balconyThese realizations about the classroom box led them to a hexagon layout. With a hexagon, the teacher has three walls instead of one for instruction, and each wall is centrally focused back to the student to create a panoramic display. The walls can also integrate technology such as smart boards, flat panel monitors, student voting/scorekeeping, sliding marker boards with storage, and even fold out tables. And by introducing a hexagonal layout, both standard classroom configurations (teacher lecturing class), and informal instruction (group work/study sessions) work well within this configuration. Also, the connection between classrooms is enhanced. With the box, there are three interior and one exterior connection, however, the hexagon has two more walls to work with, so you can have up to five interior connections.Bookmark this picture!view inside learning environmentThe hexagon shaped classroom is not a new idea. Past explorations had varying levels of success based on the technology at the time. There are now a plethora of systems on the market that perform at rates never before seen. From movable wall systems, to sound-absorbing materials, to resilient finishes, they now have the technology to make the hexagon classroom a success.Bookmark this picture!inside new learning environmentSustainable strategies were integrated from the outset to create a space that was designed for quick assembly/disassembly and built from recycled materials. They also explored integrating photovoltaic panels, green screens, rainwater harvesting, chilled beam system, dry fixtures, grey-water reuse, low carbon materials, and zero waste construction.Bookmark this picture!advantages of a hexagonal classroomIn the case of the classroom, form follows function as the space conforms to the student and teachers needs, not the other way around. Due to the uniformity of the shape, all beams, columns, and wall panels/storefront systems can be the same size. Using Flex, the entire school can be mass produced in a factory and shipped to the site for quick assembly. Also, panels are interchangeable, and customization has endless possibilities. An interior modular learning system can be integrated using a kit-of-parts to create endless configurations. The hexagon can also be configured to accommodate a variety of spaces including but not limited to administration, library, food service, multi-purpose, or indoor dining. Imagine the infinite possibilities when new design solutions meet and direct the changing landscape of classroom instruction.Bookmark this picture!modular system

view inside learning environment

aerial view

inside new learning environment

view from covered dining area

Courtesy of HMC Architects

renewable strategies

modular system

advantages of a hexagonal classroom

various program configurations: library specialists

various program configurations: science labs

view from second floor balcony

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Review: How Buildings Learn by Stewart Brand

How Buildings LearnStewart Brand's quest for adaptive architecture

If you look at a photo of a city, any city, from fifty years ago, that city is going to look a lot different than now. A hundred or more years ago, even existing buildings are unrecognizable. This may seem obvious, yet surprisingly little thought is given to what happens after a building is built by designers or owners. A building may change owners, change tenants, change uses, get a facelift, add on, tear down, reconfigure, and so on. We are still using buildings that were built before mechanical heating and cooling was commonplace, and libraries are now as full of computers as books. In fact, such changes are the rule rather than the exception, yet little thought is given to this fact. Brand's book is an attempt to redress this omission.

Brand's major thesis can be summed up in this quote:"A building is not something you finish. A building is something you start."Brand is interested in the long-term -- what happens after the building is built, how do people adapt it and adapt to it over time, and what kinds of modifications are made over the life of a building which is often much longer than a human lifespan, and spends time looking at various case studies in order to come up with a philosophy of how to build buildings that evolve over time -"Evolutionary design is better than visionary design."

For the sake of use, buildings fall into three major categories - commercial, residential and institutional.1. Commercial buildingshave to adapt quickly, often radically, because of intense competitive pressure to perform, and they are subject to the rapid advances that occur in any industry.2. Domestic buildingshomesare the steadiest changers, responding directly to the family's ideas and annoyances, growth and prospects.3. Institutional buildingsact as if they were designed specifically to prevent change for the organization inside and to convey timeless reliability to everyone outside. When forced to change anyway, as they always are, they do so with expensive reluctance and all possible delay.Brand considers the question by means of his experience in a brand new media lab designed by the world famous modernist architect I.M. Pei, which he considers typical of "overdesigned" modernist architecture focused on looks rather than daily use:...Here was a building purpose-built to house a diverse array of disciplines and people collaborating on deep research in fast-evolving computer and communication technologies. Consider in that light the building's dominant feature--its vast, sterile atrium. In many research buildings a central atrium serves to bring people together with open stairways, casual meeting areas, and a shared entrance where everyone sees each other daily. The Media Lab's atrium cuts people off from each other. There are three widely separated entrances (each huge and glassy), three elevators, few stairs, and from nowhere can you see other humans in the five-story-high space. Where people might be visible, they are carefully obscured by internal windows of smoked glass.The atrium uses up so much of the building that actual working office and lab space is severely limited, making growth and new programs nearly impossible and exacerbating academic turf battles from the first day. Nowhere in the whole building is there a place for casual meetings, except for a tiny, overused kitchen. Corridors are narrow and barren. Getting new cabling through the interior concrete walls--a necessity in such a laboratory--requires bringing in jackhammers. You can't even move office walls around, thanks to the overhead fluorescent lights being at a Pei-signature 45-degree angle to everything else.The Media Lab building, I discovered, is not unusually bad. Its badness is the norm in new buildings overdesigned by architects. How did architects come to be such an obstacle to adaptivity in buildings? That's a central question not just for building users but for the architectural profession, which regards itself these years as being in crisis. Design professor C. Thomas Mitchell voices a common indictment:"A range of observers of architecture are now suggesting that the field may be bankrupt, the profession itself impotent, and the methods inapplicable to contemporary design tasks. It is further suggested that collectively they are incapable of producing pleasant, livable, and humane environments, except perhaps occasionally and then only by chance."pp 52-53Brand contrasts this with the universally beloved Building 20 on the MIT campus. This building was not designed by a famous architect, but quickly thrown up to provide a place for researchers to work on radar projects during world War Two:...But the most loved and legendary building of all at MIT is a surprise: a temporary building left over from World War II without even a name, only a number: Building 20. It is a sprawling 250,000-square-foot three-story wood structure"The only building on campus you can cut with a saw," says an admirer. Constructed hastily in 1943 for the urgent development of radar and almost immediately slated for demolition. When I last saw it in 1993, it was still in use and still slated for demolition. In 1978 The MIT Museum assembled an exhibit to honor the perpetual fruitfulness of Building 20. The press release read: Unusual flexibility made the building ideal for laboratory and experimental space. Made to support heavy loads and of wood construction, it allowed a use of space which accommodated the enlargement of the working either horizontally or vertically. Even the roof was used for short-term structures to house equipment and test instruments. Although Building 20 was built with the intention to tear it down after the end of World War II, it has remained these thirty-five years providing a special function and acquiring its own history and anecdotes. Not assigned to any one school. department, or center, it seems to always have had space for the beginning project, the graduate student's experiment, the interdisciplinary research center. ...Building 20 was too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter, Spartan in its amenities, often dirty, and implacably ugly. Whatever was the attraction? The organizers of a 1978 exhibit queried alumni of the building and got illuminating answers. "Windows that open and shut at will of the owner (Martha Ditmeyer) "The ability to personalize your space and shape it to various purposes. If you don't like a wall, just stick your elbow through it." (Jonathan Allen). "If you want to bore a hole in the floor to get a little extra vertical space, you do it. You don't ask. It's the best experimental building ever built." (Albert Hill) "One never needs to worry about injuring the architectural or artistic value of the environment." (Morris Halle) "We feel our space is really ours. We designed it, we run it. The building is full of small microenvironments, each of which is different and each a creative space. Thus the building has a lot of personality. Also it's nice to be in a building that has such prestige (Heather Lechtman)In 1991 I asked Jerome Wiesner, retired president of MIT, why he thought that "temporary" Building 20 was still around after half a century. His first answer was practical: "At $300 a square foot, it would take $75 million to replace." His next answer was aesthetic: "It's a very matter-of-fact building. It puts on the personality of the people in it." His final answer was personal. When he was appointed president of the university, he quietly kept a hideaway office in Building 20 because that was where "Nobody complained when you nailed something to a door."Every university has similar stories. Temporary is permanent, and permanent is temporary. Grand, final-solution buildings obsolesce and have to be torn down because they were too overspecified to their original purpose to adapt easily to anything else. Temporary buildings are thrown up quickly and roughly to house temporary projects. Those projects move on soon enough, but they are immediately supplanted by other temporary projects--of which, it turns out, there is an endless supply. The projects flourish in the low supervision environment, free of turf battles because the turf isn't worth fighting over. "We did some of our best work in the trailers, didn't we?" I once heard a Nobel-winning physicist remark. Low Road buildings keep being valuable precisely because they are disposable.pp. 25-28Building 20, then is Brand's ideal of buildings - nothing too fancy, sturdy structure, flexible spaces that can be adapted by the end users (he's a fan of wood for its malleability,"Wood is already the most adaptive of all building materials because amateurs are comfortable messing with it"p.194), easily comprehensible plan layout, common spaces for collaboration. It's easy to poke a hole and run new services as need be - a must for the fast-changing technology of MIT. The users much favor usability over "high" design that looks good in magazines or reflect some "genius" designer's personal style.

Had Brand stuck around MIT a bit longer, he would have an even more egregious example of brand-name folly and overdesigning. The Stata Center by world-famous brand-name Frank Gehry had so many problems that the owners sued Gehry and the construction company:

The Ray and Maria Stata Center at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is an outlandish cartoon village in listing brick and scrolling aluminum, with a Mbius-strip main corridor inside. An italic-angled entrance, shaped like the cutting edge itself, ushers visitors off the drab Cambridge street. But then you see it, that universal symbol of malfunction: an orange mechanical lift.Yes, MIT, the very apogee of tech sophistication, seems to have bought itself a bright-yellow lemon. The showstopper home for its computer-science, linguistics, and philosophy departments cost $300 million to build ($200 million more than initial estimates) and opened in 2004 (four years behind schedule). And now the school has turned to the courts to express its buyer's remorse. A lawsuit filed in October against both the construction firm and the architect alleges "design and construction failures," negligence, and breach of contract, which have cost the university $1.5 million in repairs already, with millions more likely to come.The suit grabbed headlines because the architect's name is Frank Gehry, fueling a backlash against celebrity architects and their flashy designs. The go-to guy for this take is John Silber, the former president of Boston University, who has just published a book called Architecture of the Absurd: How "Genius" Disfigured a Practical Art. The Stata Center is on the cover.This kerfuffle may have little to do with outward appearances, though. True, some of Gehry's other buildings have been tweaked after opening their doors, as when the steel-sided Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles had to be sanded to remove a glare that could practically cook eggs on the sidewalk. And occupants have questioned elements of the Stata Center's design. ("I still would prefer straight to slanted walls, so as to put up bookshelves and a blackboard," says linguist Noam Chomsky, who has an office there.)Lost in the Funhouse(Fast Company)

On the other hand, the building has features that Brand would highly approve of:The building will never be finished. Says Gehry: Im happy when the building is forgiving enough so you can do things to it without destroying it. Put a new light where you want, knock out a wall. Says a Stata linguist: Any kind of scientific work is always under construction, always still being built. When you publish a book or a paper its never finished, its just a step on the way to the next one.It occurred to Gehry long ago that his buildings looked more interesting while they were under construction than when they were finished. Ever since, hes sought ways to give buildings that restless sense of something still happening. Nothing about the Stata feels finished. Since it opened, its been in a constant state of minor modification, as the researchers fit it to their needs. The architecture is a metaphor for the science: always an open question, always a work in progress.Not everyone loves the Statas unfinished indoor materials, which are raw metal, glass, plywood, industrial lamps, exposed wires, and raw concrete. But they understand the motive, which is that Gehry wanted his building to feel like a warehouse, easy to change and rearrange.Theres lots of wasted space. Another winning move is the amazing amount of unprogrammed space. An efficiency expert would call it a total waste. This is space that isnt anyones turf. Its everywhere. Its the stuff of those village greens and generous elevator lounges. People grab it when they need it. A space may become the overflow site for some experiment. Or students may clutter it with a newly invented game, or an impromptu discussion or party. They eat and study anywhere and everywhere: The undergraduates really mill in the building. Some of them walk in out of curiosity and end up working with us.

Because so much space isnt under anyones direct supervision, the Stata feels free and relaxed. And the openness means that its parts are visible to one another: People can be seen to be working. You can see the building is alive. You can feel part of a community that is working hard. I used to have to go to a conference on the West Coast to find out what the guy next to me was working on. Theres connectivity. There are even windows in the fire stairs.Does Gehry's Stata Center Really Work?(Bloomberg Businessweek)

Brand accuses architects of practicing "magazine architecture" -- designing novel buildings that photograph well for inclusion in architecture magazines in order to win awards and attract new clients, rather than delivering buildings that are practical, workable and adaptable:At a building preservation conference in Charleston, South Carolina, I chatted with an architecture student. Interested primarily in rehab and restoration work, she referred unflatteringly to the majority of her 450 fellow students at the Tulane University Architecture Department as "magazine architects." By which she meant image-driven and fad-driven architects, because architecture magazines probe no deeper than the look and style of the buildings they cover. They never interview clients or users. They never criticize buildings except, rarely, in terms of being bad art or off-trend. Articles consist primarily of stylized color photographs. Reports cover only new or newly renovated buildings, often in language that sounds like the "prismatic luminescence" school of fine writing. The subject is taste, not use; commercial success, not operational success.Architecture magazines are about what sells. They are advertising, cover to cover.A major culprit is architectural photography, according to a group of Architecture Department faculty I had lunch with at the University of California, Berkeley. Clare Cooper Marcus said it most clearly: "You get work through getting awards, and the award system is based on photographs. Not use. Not context. Just purely visual photographs taken before people start using the building." Tales were told of ambitious architects specifically designing their buildings to photograph well at the expense of performing well. Art must be inherently radical, but buildings are inherently conservative. Art must experiment to do its job. Most experiments fail. Art costs extra. How much extra are you willing to pay to live in a failed experiment? Art flouts convention. Convention became conventional because it works. Aspiring to art means aspiring to a building that almost certainly cannot work, because the old good solutions are thrown away. The roof has a dramatic new look, and it leaks dramatically.The Gehry example above seems to prove the points - Gehry's amoebic forms dissolving into one another seem tailor-made for photographs, but the projecting windows and irregular shapes cost more to construct, are inherently less resistant to water and so must use complex sealants and waterproofing systems subject to failure, and require overengineered structures just to stand up. But it looks good in a magazine, and it reinforces the Gehry "brand," and that's all that matters. Users are usually concerned with more mundane matters:Does the building manage to keep the rain out? That's a core issue seldom mentioned in the magazines but incessantly mentioned by building users, usually through clenched teeth. They can't believe it when their expensive new building, by a famous architect, crafted with up-to-the-minute high-tech materials, leaks. The flat roof leaks, the parapets leak, the Modernist right angle between roof and wall leaks, the numerous service penetrations through the roof leak; the wall itself, made of a single layer of snazzy new material and without benefit of roof overhang, leaks. In the 1980s, 80 percent of the ever-growing postconstruction claims against architects were for leaks.Architects, he says, are obsessed with thelookof the building, that is, the surface facade, while giving short shrift to such important things as the structure, the services, and the space planning:A building's exterior is a strange thing to concentrate on anyway. All that effort goes into impressing the wrong peoplepassers-by instead of the people who use the building. Only if there is a heavily trafficked courtyard or garden do the building dwellers notice the exterior at all after the first few days. Most often they don't even enter by way of the facade and big lobby; they come in by the garage door. And yet, ever since the Renaissance, "the history of architecture is the history of facades." It is a massive misdirection of money and design effort, considering how badly buildings need their fundamentals taken care of. Chris Alexander is vehement: "Our present attitude is all reversed. What you have is extremely inexpensive structure and all this glitz on the surface. The structure rots after thirty years, and the glitz is so expensive that you daren't even fuck with it." Architects got themselves stuck in the skin trade. Frank Duffy observes, "The only area of architectural discretion in artistic or financial terms is the skin. The architectural imagination has allowed itself to be well and truly marginalized." It happened because architects offered themselves as providers of instant solutions, and only the look of a building gives instant gratification. When the space planning doesn't work out and needs improvement, or the structure indeed rots, where's the architect? Long gone.This leads Brand to a theory of adaptable buildings, or"steps toward an adaptive architecture."His idea is that a building is actually a collection of severaldiscrete interacting components, each of which exists for a varying duration of time. For example, the site is often determined by lot lines extending back generations (as in the case of London, for example). The structure often lasts for centuries and can remain even with a new skin. But interior walls and services are apt to rapid change over the lifetime of even a single user of the building, such as an expanding business. Things like furniture are constantly on the move. Here he quotes British architect Frank Duffy, a former president or the RIBA, and theorist of building change:"Our basic argument is that there isn't such a thing as a building," says Duffy. "A building properly conceived is several layers of longevity of built components." He distinguishes four layers, which he calls Shell, Services, Scenery, and Set. Shell is the structure, which lasts the lifetime of the building (fifty years in Britain, closer to thirty-five in North America). Services are the cabling, plumbing, air conditioning, and elevators ("lifts"), which have to be replaced dropped ceilings, etc., which changes every five to seven years. Set is the shifting of furniture by the occupants, often a matter of months or weeks.A design imperative emerges: An adaptive building has to allow slippage between the differently-paced systems of Site, Structure, Skin, Services, Space plan, and Stuff . Otherwise the slow systems block the flow of the quick ones, and the quick ones tear up the slow ones with their constant change. Embedding the systems together may look efficient at first, but over time it is the opposite. and destructive as well. p.12Brand redefines these discrete elements, from longest-lasting to highest turnover, asSite, Structure, Skin, Services, andStuff:1. Site:The geographical setting, the urban location, and the legally defined lot whose boundaries and context outlast ephemeral buildings.2. Structure:the foundation and load-bearing elements. Architects would probably include what is called the "core" --the vertical circulation elements such as stairs and elevators, since these are usually constructed at the same time and are an integral part of the layout (and sometimes the structural design as well. Brand classes elevators as services). He quotes Christopher Alexander saying a structure should last for 300 years or more.3. Skin:the exterior surface of the building (architects would call this the weather barrier). Architects also refer to this as the "Shell" - often "structure, and core and shell are separate construction packages in modern fast-paced construction.4. Services:The working guts of a building, electrical wiring, plumbing, HVAC ducts, communication and alarms, and moving parts like elevators and escalators. These Brand believes should be very changeable as technology changes -"We overestimate technological change in the sort term and underestimate it in the long term."5. Space Plan:The interior arrangement of doors and walls."Turbulent commercial space can change every 3 years or so, exceptionally quiet homes might wait 30 years."6. Stuff:Chairs, desks, sofas, bookshelves, computers, etc."Furniture is called mobilia in Italian for good reason."

Brand classifies two major approaches to adaptable building historically - theHigh Road- buildings that are such high quality and design that they remain for centuries, often becoming subject to historical preservation statutes, and theLow Road- utilitarian vernacular buildings where no one cares what you do to them over time, and thus are endlessly adaptable though adaptive re-use, additions, renovations, etc.A Low Road building needs only to be roomy and cheap. Structurally it should be robust enough to take the major changes in use it will attract. Finish can be minimal and ornament modest or absent entirely. Initial Services can be rudimentary. Design it primarily for storage and it will soon attract creative human occupants. p.194The High Road examples he uses are three presidential estates that have existed in one form or another to the present day: George Washington's Mount Vernon, James Madison's Montpelier, and Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. Perhaps not surprisingly it is Jefferson, the architect's house, which is the most resistant to change. He also looks at Boston's Athenaeum library and the Chatsworth estate in England (contemporary readers might wish to imagine Downton Abbey, especially it's latest incarnation as a museum/tourist attraction/filming set):

Whereas Low Road buildings are successively gutted and begun anew, High Road buildings are successively refined. These are precisely the two principal strategies of biological populations--the opponent versus the preserver: "R-strategy" versus "K-strategy" in the jargon. It is the difference between annual and perennial plants--between weeds like dandelions which scatter profuse seeds to the winds, and dominant species like oak trees, which nurture their few acorns and then build an environment that protects the next generation. Individuals of opportunistic species are typically small, short-lived, and independent, putting all their energy into productivity. Preserver species are more often large, long-lived, densely interdependent and competitive, rationing their energy for high efficiency.The sustained complexity of High Road buildings leads in the fullness of time to rich specialization. they cannot help becoming unique. they respond to so many hidden forces, they are in part mysterious, sustained by subtleties. At the same time they are filled with obsolete oddities, preserved out of habit until odd new uses are found for them. (Where can we string the new fiberoptic cable? How about the old laundry chute?) High road buildings are common, but the points I want to make about them are best demonstrated in extreme examples.pp. 38"Beauty is in what time does," says Frank Duffy. Something strange happens when a building ages past a human generation or two. Any building older than 100 years will be considered beautiful, no matter what. Having outlived its period of being out of fashion, plus several passing fashions since that, it is beyond fashion. If it has kept High Road continuity, the whole place is highly adapted, complex and mysterious, a keeper of secrets. Since few buildings live so long, it has earned the stature of rarity and the respect we give longevity. p. 91Both strategies work, as long as you stay away from Magazine architecture - the "no road" approach:If you want a lovable building, a strategic decision needs to be made right at the beginning. The design and construction can fruitfully take either the High Road or Low Road, toward beloved permanence or toward beloved disposability. The High Road requires Structure built to last and some areas of very high finish indeed, particularly with the Skin and at least some interiors, to set a high standard for future work. The major threat to an urban High Road building over time is shifting real-estate values, so either a financial endowment or great public esteem is needed to protect the property. A Low Road building needs only to be roomy and cheap. Structurally it should be robust enough to take the major changes in use it will attract. Finish can be minimal and ornament modest or absent entirely. Initial Services can be rudimentary. Design it primarily for storage and it will soon attract creative human occupants. p. 193-194Not surprisingly, Brand is a fan of vernacular architecture--"everything not designed by professional architects in other words, most of the world's buildings."Vernacular buildings are adapted from a long period of trial and error to a unique locale and incorporate generations of knowledge of how to solve problems and provide for comfort and durability in a particular climate. Examples featured prominently include the Medieval three-aisled structures, New England saltbox (Cape Cod) homes, bungalows of the 1920-1930, Santa-Fe style, which has been successfully updated to make Santa Fe a leading tourist destination, and Victorian Painted Ladies, which have contributed to San Francisco's postcard charm (and sky-high property values). He thoroughly renounces and criticizes novel structures like the geodesic domes which he played such a huge role in popularizing as the publisher of theWhole Earth Catalog:Vernacular building traditions have the attention span to incorporate generational knowledge about long-term problems such as maintaining and growing a building over time. High-style architecture likes to solve old problems in new ways, which is a formula for disaster, according to Dell Upton at the University of California. Vernacular builders, he says, are content to accept well-proven old solutions to old problems. Then they can concentrate all their design ingenuity strictly on new problems, it any. When the standard local root design works pretty well, and materials and skills are readily available for later repair, why would you mess with that?

Brand includes other ideas such as scenario planning taken from military and corporate planning boards to take programming a step further and anticipate future changes rather than just present uses. He talks about the Post Occupancy Evaluation done by architects and how it should be standard practice. He cites the example of John Abrams, a residential builder in Martha's Vineyard who photographs each wall of a home after the services are installed but before the drywall goes on and keys them to a set of floor plans. He celebrates "the romance of maintenance" as an all-too-neglected portion of building creation and ownership"If you want a building to learn, you have to pays its tuition. p.190"

He gives various tips on what an adaptive building should incorporate:The simpler a roofpitched, of coursethe less it leaks or needs maintenance. Complexity can come later if it must. Roofs that are built fussy at the beginning are an obstacle to later change. The more a roof overhangs, the better it protects the walls from sun and rain. The lighter the color of the roof, the better it will stand up to solar deterioration, keep the building cool, and lessen the stress of temperature change in the roof materials. Walls...should be vertical and should begin flat and simple, like a good initial roof. They should invite easy penetration with new doors or windows. This is the great attraction of stud walls. p.195...external walls can take either a High Road or Low Road approach, encouraging either permanence or change. Low Road walls offer a further choicethey can be funky or high tech. One of the best of the funky is the highly forgiving board-and-batten. For high-tech Low Road walls, the current acme is the variations on Dryvit known in the trade as "exterior insulation and finish systems" (EIFS). High Road walls are nearly always masonry. Stone is grander. Brick is more adaptable...I favor keeping Services separate from Skin as well as from Structure...The conservative tacticat higher initial costof installing overcapacity electrical feeders and breakers, oversize chases, and an apparent excess of outlets is nearly always rewarded. The general rule is: oversize your components....Anticipate greater connectivity always. All new buildings should have extra conduit laid throughouttwo or three or more vacant half-inch plastic conduits with labeled string hanging out of the ends waiting for unplanned phone lines, speaker leads, computer wires, coaxial cable, or what have you.As for shape: be square. The only configuration of space that grows well and subdivides well and is really efficient to use is the rectangle. ...If you start boxy and simple, outside and in, then you can let complications develop with time, responsive to use. Prematurely convoluted surfaces are expensive to build, a nuisance to maintain, and hard to change...The way rooms and floors are laid out can be crucial for a building's resilience to changing times... p. 192The book is consistent with Brand's ideas about long-term thinking and sustainability, which influenced his creation of the Long Now Foundation. Buildings should be built with the long-term use in mind, not as jewels for magazine covers. They will change over time, it's just a matter of how much and how seamless that process is, even if the ultimate change is tearing the thing down.

A host of "alternative" architecture thinkers are found in the pages of the book - Christopher Alexander, Jane Jacobs, Leon Krier, Frank Duffy, Joel Garreau, Lloyd Kahn, along with quotes from other thinkers (Henry Glassie, Ivan Ilich, Gregory Bateson, et al.)

Ironically, the years since Brand's book was published has seen a resurgence in the conversion of old industrial buildings to new uses such as lofts, apartments, condominiums, offices and art galleries. These are being done in older post-industrial neighborhoods from Brooklyn and Soho to the Pearl District in Portland, and everywhere in between including the Rust Belt. The very things that make this possible - sturdy, fireproof structures of concrete and heavy timber, regular structural grids, wide open floor plates, high ceilings, wood stud walls, square and rectangular building shapes, low-maintenance brick walls with operable windows and skylights, lots of extra floor space - are precisely what Brand recommends be incorporated into new buildings to make them viable in the long term.

While Brand has a lot of good advice, and his outsider prespective is refreshing, it's hard to see it being widley taken up in a world where architects are busy putting up condominium towers and building art galleries and shopping malls for the one percent in wealthy urban enclaves like Manhattan and Dubai, while older neighborhoods succumb to foreclosure blight and are being bulldozed . As investment manager Jeremy Grantham put it,"Capitalism doesn't care about your grandchildren."Still, there's plenty to chew on here for people who are looking for a more adaptive, resilient and humane architecture that creates a sense of place beyond the needs of short-term profit. While it doesn't get the headlines of Frank Gehry or Zaha Hadid, good, small-scale solutions are being built along these lines in various locations around the world, and from these we could learn to build a new type of architecture that is built around human needs, resilience, durability and adaptability, rather than novelty, fashion and luxury. See this good example of co-housing from Germany:

R50 cohousing is a new model typology for low-cost and affordable housing offering a maximum capacity for adaptation and flexibility throughout its lifetime. Social, cultural, economic and ecological aspects have been considered equally to define a contemporary sustainable approach to urban living...Meeting the owners aspiration for collective and affordable living and working, the architectural concept is based on a compact and efficient structure with carefully detailed connections on different scales. It is based on a concrete skeleton with one access and two service cores, an independent timber facade and a suspended steel construction for the all around balconies. A slightly sunken basement level provides access to the building and merges private and public spaces. Each apartment and all additional community spaces were developed by an intensive process of consultations, discussions and design. Based on the structural framework the sizes of apartments could be determined and individual requirements accommodated in the floor plans. In parallel to this process, a common standard for fixtures and fittings was developed and defined, which has resulted in a collective approach to interior fittings, the use of materials and some surfaces left unfinished, whilst allowing individual layouts of the apartments. This kind of structured yet open design process has not only allowed for extensive participation, self-directed design and self-building, but has also led to mutual agreement on the type, location, size and design of spaces shared by residents.

R50 Cohousing / ifau und Jesko Fezer + HEIDE & VON BECKERATH(Arch Daily)Another great example is incremental hosing designed to help repair slums, such as The Quinta Monroy houses in Chile. Residents start with the gray, concrete structure and foundations, then fill in the adjacent spaces with their own materials over time.

Has This Chilean Architect Figured Out How To Fix Slums?(Mother Jones)In the waterside slums of Port Harcourt, Nigeria, 480,000 residents face the threat of displacement as the government seeks to redevelop their land, claiming urban renewal is necessary for economic development. But Kunl Adeyemi has an alternative solution. He envisages a city of floating homes that would allow residents to remain within their community, and safe from rising tides, while at the same time improving the quality of their lives.

In Pakistan, Yasmeen Lari is applying skills learned building vast commercial structures and restoring historic national monuments to help communities at risk from flood and earthquake damage. She has built more than 36,000 safe homes and won the UN Recognition Award in the process.

But perhaps most striking of all are the buildings of the Vietnamese architect Vo Trong Nghia. Since the economic boom of the 2000s, population and pollution in the country has soared. Only 2.5% of Ho Chi Minh City is green space and nine in 10 children under five suffer respiratory illness. Nghia is combatting these problems with green architecture: buildings infused with living plants and trees. Vietnamese cities have lost their tropical beauty, he says. For a modern architect the most important mission is to bring green spaces back.

Rebel architects: building a better world(Guardian)

Top of FormNumber of toilets required in buildingsHow many toilets are required for employees who work inside buildings?The requirements for toilet pans and urinals in buildings are set out in the New Zealand Building Code, which is part of the Building Regulations 1992, administered by theDepartment of Building and Housing.The requirements depend on the building use, including whether the toilets will be used by employees only, or by members of the public as well.The following tables set out the numbers to be provided in commercial and industrial premises used by employees only. Refer to theBuilding Code Approved Document Clause G1: Personal Hygienefor further details and requirements in other situations.Unisex toilet facilities

Design occupancyNumber

151

6302

Greater than 30add 1 per 40

Separate toilet facilities females


1101

11502

51903


Separate toilet facilities males (toilet pans only)


1101

11502

51903


Separate toilet facilities males (toilet pans and urinals)

Toilet pansUrinals

Design occupancyNumberDesign occupancyNumber

110111501

116021515502

611203Greater than 550add 1 per 450


Date Modified: Wednesday, 9 December 2009Disclaimer: The content on this website covers common problems. It will not answer every question and should not be used as a substitute for legislation or legal advice.State sector employers and employees may be affected by some differences in the laws that apply to them (e.g. State Sector Act 1988).The Department of Labour takes no responsibility for the results of any actions taken on the basis of information on this website, nor for any errors or omissions.Need More Help? Click here to send us a query if you need further help.Related FAQs This FAQ has no related items.Send this FAQ Use your Browser Print option to print this page Use your Browser Send option to email a link or copyBottom of Form

SECTION 2902 MINIMUM PLUMBING FACILITIES

[P] 2902.1 Minimum number of fixtures.Plumbing fixtures shall be provided for the type of occupancy and in the minimum number shown in Table 2902.1. Types of occupancies not shown in Table 2902.1 shall be considered individually by thebuilding official. The number of occupants shall be determined by this code. Occupancy classification shall be determined in accordance withChapter 3.

[P] TABLE 2902.1 MINIMUM NUMBER OF REQUIRED PLUMBING FIXTURESa(SeeSections 2902.2and2902.3)

No.CLASSIFICATIONOCCUPANCYDESCRIPTIONWATER CLOSETS(URINALS SEE SECTION 419.2 OF THEINTERNATIONAL PLUMBING CODE)LAVATORIESBATHTUBS/ SHOWERSDRINKING FOUNTAINSe,f(SEE SECTION410.1 OF THEINTERNATIONAL PLUMBING CODE)OTHER

MALEFEMALEMALEFEMALE

1Assembly(continued)A-1dTheaters and other buildings for the performing arts and motion pictures1 per 1251 per 651 per 2001 per 5001 service sink

A-2dNightclubs, bars, taverns, dance halls and buildings for similar purposes1 per 401 per 401 per 751 per 5001 service sink

Restaurants, banquet halls and food courts1 per 751 per 751 per 2001 per 5001 service sink

A-3dAuditoriums without permanent seating, art galleries, exhibition halls, museums, lecture halls, libraries, arcades and gymnasiums1 per 1251 per 651 per 2001 per 5001 service sink

Passenger terminals and transportation facilities1 per 5001 per 5001 per 7501 per 1,0001 service sink

Places of worship and other religious services1 per 1501 per 751 per 2001 per 1,0001 service sink

(continued)

[P] TABLE 2902.1continued MINIMUM NUMBER OF REQUIRED PLUMBING FIXTURESa

No.CLASSIFICATIONOCCUPANCYDESCRIPTIONWATER CLOSETS(URINALS SEE SECTION 419.2 OF THEINTERNATIONAL PLUMBING CODE)LAVATORIESBATHTUBS/ SHOWERSDRINKING FOUNTAINSe,f(SEE SECTION410.1 OF THEINTERNATIONAL PLUMBING CODE)OTHER


1AssemblyA-4Coliseums, arenas, skating rinks, pools and tennis courts for indoor sporting events and activities1 per 75 for the first 1,500 and 1 per 120 for the remainder exceeding 1,5001 per 40 for the first 1,520 and 1 per 60 for the remainder exceeding 1,5201 per 2001 per 1501 per 1,0001 service sink

A-5Stadiums, amusement parks, bleachers and grandstands for outdoor sporting events and activities1 per 75 for the first 1,500 and 1 per 120 for the remainder exceeding 1,5001 per 40 for the first 1,520 and 1 per 60 for the remainder exceeding 1,5201 per 2001 per 1501 per 1,0001 service sink

2BusinessBBuildings for the transaction of business, professional services, other services involving merchandise, office buildings, banks, light industrial and similar uses1 per 25 for the first 50 and 1 per 50 for the remainder exceeding 501 per 40 for the first 80 and 1 per 80 for the remainder exceeding 801 per 1001 service sinkg

3EducationalEEducational facilities1 per 501 per 501 per 1001 service sink

4Factory and industrialF-1 and F-2Structures in which occupants are engaged in work fabricating, assembly or processing of products or materials1 per 1001 per 100See Section 411 of theInternational Plumbing Code1 per 4001 service sink

5InstitutionalI-1Residential care1 per 101 per 101 per 81 per 1001 service sink

I-2Hospitals, ambulatory nursing home care recipientb1 per per roomc1 per per roomc1 per 151 per 1001 service sink

Employees, other than residential careb1 per 251 per 351 per 100

Visitors, other than residential care1 per 751 per 1001 per 500

I-3Prisonsb1 per cell1 per cell1 per 151 per 1001 service sink

I-3Reformatories, detention centers and correctional centersb1 per 151 per 151 per 151 per 1001 service sink

Employeesb1 per 251 per 351 per 100

I-4Adult day care and child day care1 per 151 per 1511 per 1001 service sink

(continued)

[P]TABLE2902.1continued MINIMUM NUMBER OF REQUIRED PLUMBING FIXTURESa(SeeSections2902.2and2902.3)

No.CLASSIFICATIONOCCUPANCYDESCRIPTIONWATER CLOSETS(URINALS SEE SECTION 419.2 OF THEINTERNATIONAL PLUMBING CODE)LAVATORIESBATHTUBSORSHOWERSDRINKING FOUNTAINSe,f(SEE SECTION 410.1 OF THEINTERNATIONAL PLUMBING CODE)OTHER


6MercantileMRetail stores, service stations, shops, salesrooms, markets and shopping centers1 per 5001 per 7501 per 1,0001 service sinkg

7ResidentialR-1Hotels, motels, boarding houses (transient)1 per sleeping unit1 per sleeping unit1 per sleeping unit1 service sink

R-2Dormitories, fraternities, sororities and boarding houses (not transient)1 per 101 per 101 per 81 per 1001 service sink

R-2Apartment house1 per dwelling unit1 per dwelling unit1 per dwelling unit1 kitchen sink per dwelling unit; 1 automatic clothes washer connection per 20 dwelling units

R-3One- and two-family dwellings1 per dwelling unit1 per 101 per dwelling unit1 kitchen sink per dwelling unit; 1 automatic clothes washer connection per dwelling unit

R-3Congregate living facilities with 16 or fewer persons1 per 101 per 101 per 81 per 1001 service sink

R-4Congregate living facilities with 16 or fewer persons1 per 101 per 101 per 81 per 1001 service sink

8StorageS-1 S-2Structures for the storage of goods, warehouses, storehouses and freight depots, low and moderate hazard1 per 1001 per 100See Section 411 of theInternational Plumbing Code1 per 1,0001 service sink

a. The fixtures shown are based on one fixture being the minimum required for the number of persons indicated or any fraction of the number of persons indicated. The number of occupants shall be determined by this code.

b. Toilet facilities for employees shall be separate from facilities for inmates or care recipients.

c. A single-occupant toilet room with one water closet and one lavatory serving not more than two adjacent patient sleeping units shall be permitted where such room is provided with direct access from each patient sleeping unit and with provisions for privacy.

d. The occupant load for seasonal outdoor seating and entertainment areas shall be included when determining the minimum number of facilities required.

e. The minimum number of required drinking fountains shall comply with Table 2902.1 andChapter 11.

f. Drinking fountains are not required for an occupant load of 15 or fewer.

g. For business and mercantile occupancies with an occupant load of 15 or fewer, service sinks shall not be required.

[P] 2902.1.1 Fixture calculations.To determine theoccupant loadof each sex, the totaloccupant loadshall be divided in half. To determine the required number of fixtures, the fixture ratio or ratios for each fixture type shall be applied to theoccupant loadof each sex in accordance with Table 2902.1. Fractional numbers resulting from applying the fixture ratios of Table 2902.1 shall be rounded up to the next whole number. For calculations involving multiple occupancies, such fractional numbers for each occupancy shall first be summed and then rounded up to the next whole number.

Exception:The totaloccupant loadshall not be required to be divided in half whereapprovedstatistical data indicate a distribution of the sexes of other than 50 percent of each sex.[P] 2902.1.2 Family or assisted-use toilet and bath fixtures.Fixtures located within family or assisted-use toilet and bathing rooms required bySection 1109.2.1are permitted to be included in the number of required fixtures for either the male or female occupants in assembly and mercantile occupancies.[P] 2902.2 Separate facilities.Where plumbing fixtures are required, separate facilities shall be provided for each sex.

Exceptions:

1. Separate facilities shall not be required fordwelling unitsandsleeping units.2. Separate facilities shall not be required in structures or tenant spaces with a totaloccupant load, including both employees and customers, of 15 or less.3. Separate facilities shall not be required in mercantile occupancies in which the maximum occupant load is 100 or less.[P] 2902.2.1 Family or assisted-use toilet facilities serving as separate facilities.Where a building or tenant space requires a separate toilet facility for each sex and each toilet facility is required to have only one water closet, two family/assisted-use toilet facilities shall be permitted to serve as the required separate facilities. Family or assisted-use toilet facilities shall not be required to be identified for exclusive use by either sex as required bySection 2902.4.[P] 2902.3 Employee and public toilet facilities.Customers, patrons and visitors shall be provided with public toilet facilities in structures and tenant spaces intended for public utilization. The number of plumbing fixtures located within the required toilet facilities shall be provided in accordance withSection 2902.1for all users. Employees shall be provided with toilet facilities in all occupancies. Employee toilet facilities shall either be separate or combined employee and public toilet facilities.

Exception:Public toilet facilities shall not be required in open or enclosed parking garages. Toilet facilities shall not be required in parking garages where there are no parking attendants.

[P] 2902.3.1 Access.The route to the public toilet facilities required bySection 2902.3shall not pass through kitchens, storage rooms or closets. Access to the required facilities shall be from within the building or from the exterior of the building. All routes shall comply with the accessibility requirements of this code. The public shall have access to the required toilet facilities at all times that the building is occupied.[P] 2902.3.2 Location of toilet facilities in occupancies otherthan malls.In occupancies other than covered and open mall buildings, the requiredpublicand employee toilet facilities shall be located not more than one story above or below the space required to be provided with toilet facilities, and the path of travel to such facilities shall not exceed a distance of 500 feet (152 m).

Exception:The location and maximum travel distances to required employee facilities in factory and industrial occupancies are permitted to exceed that required by this section, provided that the location and maximum travel distance areapproved.[P] 2902.3.3 Location of toilet facilities in malls.In covered and open mall buildings, the requiredpublicand employee toilet facilities shall be located not more than one story above or below the space required to be provided with toilet facilities, and the path of travel to such facilities shall not exceed a distance of 300 feet (91 440 mm). In mall buildings, the required facilities shall be based on total square footage (m2) within a covered mall building or within the perimeter line of an open mall building, and facilities shall be installed in each individual store or in a central toilet area located in accordance with this section. The maximum travel distance to central toilet facilities in mall buildings shall be measured from the main entrance of any store or tenant space. In mall buildings, where employees toilet facilities are not provided in the individual store, the maximum travel distance shall be measured from the employees work area of the store or tenant space.[P] 2902.3.4 Pay facilities.Where pay facilities are installed, such facilities shall be in excess of the required minimum facilities. Required facilities shall be free of charge.[P] 2902.3.5 Door locking.Where a toilet room is provided for the use of multiple occupants, the egress door for the room shall not be lockable from the inside of the room. This section does not apply to family or assisted-use toilet rooms.[P] 2902.4 Signage.Required public facilities shall be designated by a legible sign for each sex. Signs shall be readily visible and located near the entrance to each toilet facility. Signs for accessible toilet facilities shall comply withSection 1110.

[P] 2902.4.1 Directional signage.Directional signage indicating the route to the public facilities shall be posted in accordance withSection 3107. Such signage shall be located in acorridoror aisle, at the entrance to the facilities for customers and visitors.[P] 2902.5 Drinking fountain location.Drinking fountains shall not be required to be located in individual tenant spaces provided that public drinking fountains are located within a travel distance of 500 feet of the most remote location in the tenant space and not more than one story above or below the tenant space. Where the tenant space is in a covered or open mall, such distance shall not exceed 300 feet. Drinking fountains shall be located on an accessible route.

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Home> Topic areas> Sustainability> Articles> Flood mitigation solutions in buildings (part one)Flood mitigation solutions in buildings (part one)by Anthony LymathArchitect/Technical Author, NBSOverviewBarely a year seems to pass nowadays without flooding being a feature of the national news. It is an emotive subject due to the degree of devastation it can cause not only can severe flooding endanger life, but even at moderate levels can lead to substantial damage and disruption to normal patterns of life. Water source contamination and inhibited access are significant problems, coupled with the ease with which internal fixtures and decorations can be damaged irreparably. A flooded house can be uninhabitable for months, and subsequent insurance costs can rise considerably as a result. And now the UK governments plans to overhaul their flood-cover agreement with the insurance industry are coming under scrutiny, over concerns that a significant proportion of the population could find their property not only uninsurable, but also un-mortgageable and, in extreme cases, unsellable. Fortunately there are a number of measures that can be taken to minimise both the risks and impact of flood damage, both for new development and for existing buildings.Flood avoidance strategies for new buildingsAt the outset of a project, preliminary issues such as building siting and orientation, landform/topography and site location should all be considered, with respect to the proximity of the development to areas of potential flooding. Consultation with the Environment Agency (EA) and relevant Lead Local Flood Authoritys (LLFA) extensive flood risk information services should form part of the initial site analysis and data searches, to ascertain current and future risk of flooding from the various different sources. This information should be used to identify the development site at lowest risk of flooding, from those available.Planning legislationUnder the previous legislation,Planning Policy Statement PPS25in England and Wales sought to discourage building on floodplains without first undertaking a flood risk assessment, followed by the setting of minimum floor heights above predicted flood levels. The subsequent replacement by theNational Planning Policy Framework(NPPF) broadens the requirement for Local Planning Authorities (LPAs) to adopt proactive strategies to mitigate and adapt to climate change, taking full account of flood risk, coastal change and water supply and demand considerations.... the essence of the policy is safeguarding land from development that is required for current and future flood management.Planning policy on the issue of flood risk is quite explicit, and follows a specific sequence of measures. The procedure is set out in the NPPF and its supportingTechnical Guidancedocument, and is summarised below. However, the essence of the policy is safeguarding land from development that is required for current and future flood management.Initially, the LPA conducts a Strategic Flood Risk Assessment (SFRA), which evaluates flood risk across the extent of the area under their control. This SFRA supports and informs the Local Plan, in conjunction with the Flood Zone maps produced by the EA and LLFA, enabling them to target future development away from areas at highest risk of flooding.The SFRA is also used to inform the sustainability appraisal (incorporating the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive) of local development documents, and will provide the basis from which to apply the Sequential Test and Exception Test, in both the developmentallocationand developmentcontrolprocesses. These tests are described below.The EA (and also, now, the LLFA, who is typically the Local Authority [LA]) produce detailed flood maps which until recently have only identified sea and river flooding, ignoring the presence of existing defences. However, flood risk is defined in theTechnical Guidancedocument as including all sources of flooding and surface water-flood maps have now been added to the EA website. These maps classify flood risk into one of three categories, numbered Flood Zone 1, 2, 3 respectively. Zone 3 is further broken down into a and b subdivisions. Flood Zones 2 and 3 are illustrated on the maps, whereas Zone 1 (the lowest risk) is deemed to comprise all other land. The NPPF states that the overall aim should be to steer new development to Flood Zone 1, but that where development is necessary, it should be made safe without increasing flood risk elsewhere.Flood Zone 1is defined as Low Probability with a less than 0.1% (1:1000) annual probability of river or sea flooding. Development proposals on sites over one hectare, must be supported by a Site-Specific Flood Risk Assessment (SSFRA). This must consider the vulnerability to flooding from all sources (including river and sea flooding), as well as the potential to increase the risk of flooding elsewhere due to surface water run-off from hard surfaces within those development proposals. It should also demonstrate how these flood risks will be managed so that the development remains safe throughout its lifetime, taking climate change into account. Furthermore, an evacuation plan for the development should be prepared, in consultation with the emergency services. There is no restriction on the type of development which may take place in this Zone.Minor developments are unlikely to raise significant flood risk issues unless they would have an adverse effect on a watercourse, floodplain or its flood defences; would impede access to flood defence and management facilities; or where the cumulative impact of such developments would have a significant effect on local flood storage capacity or flood flows.Technical Guidance, NPPF

Flood Zone 2, Medium Probability, is classified as having a risk of either: between 1% and 0.1% probability of river flooding; or between 0.5% and 0.1% probability of sea flooding.Only certain types (listed in the table below) of development are considered appropriate for this Zone, and all development proposals in this Zone (and above) must be accompanied by a SSFRA.

Flood Zone 3ais defined as High Probability, with a greater than 1% chance of annual river flooding, or greater than 0.5% sea flooding risk.More vulnerable uses, and essential infrastructure, should only be allowed in this Zone if the Exception Test is passed (see below), and that infrastructure should be designed to be immune to flooding.

Flood Zone 3bis the floodplain land itself, and only water-compatible uses should be permitted. Even then, no net loss of floodplain storage should result; water flows should not be impeded; and flood risk should not be increased elsewhere as a result.

The following table, adapted from the NPPF Technical Guidance document, illustrates the types of development that are considered suitable for each Flood Zone.Flood Zone 1Flood Zone 2Flood Zone 3aFlood Zone 3b

Essential infrastructureAppropriateAppropriateAppropriateAppropriate

Highly vulnerableAppropriateException Test requiredNot appropriateNot appropriate

More vulnerableAppropriateAppropriateException Test requiredNot appropriate

Less vulnerableAppropriateAppropriateAppropriateNot appropriate

Water-compatibleAppropriateAppropriateAppropriateAppropriate

The development classifications themselves are as follows (adapted from the NPPFTechnical Guidancedocument):Essential infrastructure Essential transport infrastructure (including mass evacuation routes) which has to cross the area at risk. Essential utility infrastructure which has to be located in a flood risk area for operational reasons, including electricity generating power stations and grid and primary substations; and water treatment works that need to remain operational in times of flood. Wind turbines.

Highly vulnerable Police stations, ambulance stations and fire stations and command centres and telecommunications installations required to be operational during flooding. Emergency dispersal points. Basement dwellings. Caravans, mobile homes and park homes intended for permanent residential use. Sequential & Exception Tests required for mobile- or park-home sites. Installations requiring hazardous substances consent (see Circular 04/00Planning controls for hazardous substances). Where there is a demonstrable need to locate such installations for bulk storage of materials with port or other similar facilities, or such installations with energy infrastructure or carbon capture and storage installations, that require coastal or water-side locations, or need to be located in other high flood risk areas, in these instances the facilities should be classified as essential infrastructure. LPA also to take NPPF planning policy on pollution into account.

More vulnerable Hospitals. Residential institutions such as residential care homes

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