It seems fitting that South Korea, home to one of the most advanced mobile cultures in the world, may get its own "hashtag"-like tower, if Bjarke Ingels has his way.
Samuel Medina looks at Bjarke Ingels Group's (BIG) recently released designs for the "Cross # Tower", which "takes four minimalist high-rise blocs and combines them in a jarring gravity-defying tic-tac-toe composition. The 280,000 square foot complex consists of two towers that act as pylons to brace the other two blocs, which have been flipped on their sides and suspended in the air. The resultant "#" form achieves a delicate weaving of solid and void, of private and public space, that connects different sections of the complex mid-air."
Echoing the popular typology, which was perhaps most famously promoted in Peter Eisenman, Richard Meier, Charles Gwathmey, and Steven Holl's World Trade Center proposal, "The project essentially condenses a neighborhood (or at least, a diagrammatic model of one) into the arms of the three-dimensional "#", creating a seductive if overly simplistic vision that projects a more sober and thoroughly apolitical view of the 'city in the sky,'" writes Medina.
FULL STORY: Press the # Key If You’d Like to Live in BIG’s Cross # Tower
Planetizen Federal Action Tracker
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Urban Design for Planners 1: Software Tools
This six-course series explores essential urban design concepts using open source software and equips planners with the tools they need to participate fully in the urban design process.
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