Press release - Renzo Piano Building Workshop

Transcription

Renzo Piano Building Workshop
La méthode
Piano
EXHIBITION
PRESS RELEASE
Press Contacts
Claudine Colin Communication
Patricia Lachance 0033 (0)1 42 72 60 01 - 0033 (0)6 85 90 39 69
[email protected]
Cité de l’Architecture & du Patrimoine
Fabien Tison Le Roux 0033 (0)1 58 51 52 85 - 0033 (0)6 23 76 59 80
[email protected]
Caroline Loizel 0033 (0)1 58 51 52 82 - 0033 (0)6 86 75 11 29
[email protected]
Cover
Poster Renzo Piano Building Workshop, 2009-2015
© Michel Denancé. Graphic design: gr20paris
©
RPBW - Renzo
Piano
Building Workshop
RENZO
PIANO
BUILDING
WORKSHOP
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
La méthode
Piano
SUMMARY
A method without discourse
by Francis Rambert p.4
Prehistory / Early works p.6
Landscapes p.8
Confrontations p.12
Urbans heritage p.16
Heights p.22
Pieces of the city p.26
Materials p.32
Press images p.36
Credits & thanks p.42
Partners p.44
Pratical informations p.48
EXHIBITION
PRESS RELEASE
A method
without discourse
Using the green felt-tip pen that he is never without, Renzo Piano sketches, drafts, annotates, and
works up his projects, mapping out their future
direction. Whilst intuition might be his guide, it is
exploration that has always been his motivation,
like a navigator seeking new horizons. Thus begins
an unparalleled piece of teamwork. Because for
Piano, the singular is plural.
Born in Genoa, a port city with a global outlook, Piano today works on every continent. The
son of a builder, he grew up in the world of construction. Fascinated by Jean Prouvé, whose lectures he attended early in his career, drawn to
Louis Kahn, in whose office he worked for a time
before returning to Europe, Piano was particularly
interested in experimentation – beginning with
lightweight structures in the early 1960s – investigating technology, space, and the city.
From the outset, Renzo Piano – who celebrates 50 years of practice this year – has never
worked alone, preferring to engage in a critical dialogue with like-minded individuals, in an exchange
of views on the ‘hypothesis’. Following early collaboration with his brother Ermanno, an engineer,
the real starting point was teaming up with Richard
Rogers, winning this Italian–British team the international competition for the Pompidou Centre in
Paris in 1971. Things continued with Peter Rice – ‘a
poet of structures’; their complicity was as exceptional as it was irreplaceable. Finally, and quite logically, came the Renzo Piano Building Workshop,
established in 1981.
If Piano himself is the heart of this adventure
– and there is a genuine taste for adventure in
every project – working as a team is the key. Held
together by a great mixing of cultures (Japanese,
Swiss, Lebanese, Dutch, German, French, Italian…),
the office, which today comprises 150 people, is
distinctive for its ‘method’; all the partners, many
of whom have been there for 25 years, have grown
up with the office. Theirs is a participative method
that pays no heed to fashion, and that they apply to
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP every project whatever its scale, from a cultural
foundation nestling at the heart of a Haussmannian
block in Paris, to a new university campus in
Manhattan’s grid, via a contemporary city gate
made in stone, for Valletta, city of the Knights of
Malta.
This method has repeatedly proven itself.
No theorising, but a collective practice, with neither discourse nor protocol. Piano’s method, in
search of a constructive truth, takes an approach
to the profession that breaks with the idea of the
artist’s gesture, the dazzling stroke that carries
everything. Architects, engineers, consultants
and of course the client, are fully involved with the
design process, a process that is the opposite of
top down and that promotes lateral thinking.
Preferring practical knowledge to conceptual ideas, Piano and his team work less with materiality than with materials (most recently rammed
earth in Uganda), they enjoy putting things together – Piano’s trademark. They research and test
ideas using models and prototypes, where precision is the solution to complexity. Hundreds of
models are made in their street-front workshop in
Paris and at the slightly more hidden office at
Punta Nave, just outside Genoa. Multiple “versions
enable us to understand how the pieces will work
with each other,” explains Piano.
Piano’s method is also about the pedagogy
of a project. This workshop-exhibition takes a journey through RPBW’s recent projects via a series of
very detailed work tables that invite the visitor to
immerse themselves in each project, its genesis
and its specific logic. Whose idea was it, actually?
No one can remember, and it is not important. It is
the intelligence of the built project that counts.
Francis Rambert, Co-curator
Director of the French Institute of architecture
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
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1. Reinforced polyester space frames 2 - Pensilina Esso, 1964-1965
Studio Piano © Fondazione Renzo Piano
Prehistory
Early Works
Between 1964 and 1970 Renzo Piano engaged in a
series of constructional experiments: prefabricated structures, mainly in plastic. The first example
(1964-65) was a roof made of elements in reinforced polyester. The individual pieces were produced by hand molding on wooden templates. A
steel plate embedded in the apex of each pyramidmade it possible to join the elements together by
means of steel rods and bolts.
The timber building workshop (1965) and the
mobile sulfur-mining structure (1966) were both
barrel vaults made by assembling pieces in a rhomboidal form, respectively in galvanized sheet metal
and reinforced polyester. Each element had four
lateral wings folded and drilled for bolting. Special
glazed pieces at the top and base of the structure
let in the natural light.
The roofing of the inflatable elements (1966)
in polyethylene was manufactured serially and the
pieces were then assembled. A rigid square base,
measuring 120 x 120 cm and 3 mm thick, was welded to an inflatable upper hemispheric cup, 50 cm
high and 1 mm thick. The valve controlling the air
doubled as a fastening screw and the connecting
aluminum rods acted as both tensioners and compressed airducts.
For the 14th Milan Triennale in 1968 Piano
devised a machine for manufacturing shell structures. A coordinate-measuring machine transferred the measurements of a scale model, divided
into sectors, toa computer controlling a grid of
mechanical jacks, which reproduced the curvatures of the model on a flexible rubber slab. On the
slab as many pieces of the structure were formed
as the number of sectors of the model. The pieces
obtained were then assembled on site with polymer resins.
The open-plan house at Garonne (1968) had
a roof structure consisting of timber pyramids,
nailed together to compose spatial trusses drawn
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP into tension by parallel steel cables that joined
their lower vertices. This rigid spatial structure
supported the shed skylights in reinforced
polyester.
For the headquarters of the family’s construction business (1966-1969), Piano developed a
square panel roof measuring 2.50 m per side in
reinforced polyester. At the center of each piece a
star-shaped radial corrugation surrounded a steel
reinforcing plate embedded in the plastic. This
plate received the thrust of a lower strut, stretched
by a grid of steel cables. This tension, through the
star-shaped corrugation, was transferred to the
surface of the panel which was thus stiffened by it.
Next to this factory Piano built his officeworkshop (1968-69) The basic structural element
was a steel pyramid with a base measuring 2 x 2 m,
and 1 m high. Assembled vertically or horizontally,
this became the load-bearing structure for both
the walls and the flat roof. On the roof Piano adopted a patented shed panel in reinforced polyester,
opaque in the sections facing south and translucent in those facing north.
Finally, the Pavilion of Italian Industry at the
1970 Osaka Universal Expo. This was a lightweight
box in reinforced polyester on a square plan measuring 38 meters per side and 10 m high. The structure consisted of 17 steel pillars supporting a
network of steel rods. The walls and roof of the
pavilion were made of large prefabricated panels of
reinforced polyester. In the central corrugation of
each piece was embedded a plate connected to
a joint with four pulleys that intercepted the network of ties.
By tightening the threaded rod, the tension
transferred the stress to the reinforced polyester
element, so making it rigid.
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
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4. Palazzina per uffici, 14th Triennale of Milan, Italy, 1967
Studio Piano © Fondazione Renzo Piano
7
LANDSCAPES
Seeking a symbiosis with the landscape, by creating your own
landscape; choosing to make a structure disappear or to assert it.
Be it a contemporary ‘village’ – referencing the Melanesian huts
of Nouméa – to house a new cultural centre between the ocean
and the lagoon, or quite another type of village – a group of scientific
establishments in San Francisco, tucked beneath a topographic green
roof in one of the biggest urban parks in the world – the solution
is bioclimatic, low-tech even in the case of the Antipodes.
These two very specific projects – one filtering the trade
winds and relating structurally to the New Caledonia pines on one
pacific coast, the other blending into a linear park while becoming
a major new part of it on the other side of the ocean – each
generate their own landscape using very different methods
of construction.
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP LA MÉTHODE PIANO
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9. Tjibaou Cultural Center, Nouméa, New-Caledonia, 1991-1998, RPBW
Ph : John Gollings © ADCK – Centre Culturel Tjibaou © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
Tjibaou Cultural Center
Nouméa, New Caledonia
1991 - 1998
Erected in honour of the New Caledonian political leader
assassinated in 1989, the Jean-Marie Tjibaou Cultural
Centre pays homage to Kanak culture and draws on local
building traditions and expertise by intertwining the
ancient and the modern.
An understanding of the development of Kanak culture was a vital part
of this project – becoming familiar with Kanak history, environment and beliefs
made it possible to design a building that would fit within this context. Close
working relationships with local people, Marie-Claude Tjibaou (Jean-Marie
Tjibaou’s widow), and anthropologist Alban Bensa, were an essential part of
this learning process.
Taking inspiration from the Kanak people’s deep ties with nature, the
project sought to meet two main objectives: one was to represent the Kanak’s
talent for building, and the other was the use of modern materials such as glass,
aluminium, steel and modern light technologies along with the more traditional
wood and stone.
The Centre is a cluster of ‘huts’, small pavilions and tree-filled spaces. It is
located on a spit of land called the Tina Peninsula, surrounded by water on three
sides. The site’s lush vegetation is cut through with trails and paths, amongst
which there are ‘villages’: clusters of buildings with strong ties to their context,
their semicircular layout defining open communal areas.
The structure and above all, the functionality of New Caledonian huts were
reproduced and adapted, architecturally as well as socially. There are ten huts,
of three different sizes, from 20 to 28 m in height, all interconnected by a
footpath. Within the Cultural Centre these huts serve various functions.
The first group comprises exhibition spaces, a second series of huts houses
research areas, a conference room and a library. The last series of huts
contains studios for music, dance, painting and sculpture.
These buildings have a curved shape that references traditional Kanak
constructions but here rather than the traditional woven vegetable fibre, these
buildings are made of wooden ribs and slats: traditional exteriors inside of
which all the benefits of modern technology are provided. Low maintenance,
termite-repellent iroko wood was chosen for the project. The buildings have
a highly efficient passive ventilation system which eliminated the need for
mechanical air conditioning. Thanks to the double outer facade, air circulates
freely between the layers of slatted wood. The angling of the apertures of the
external facade was designed to harness the monsoon winds coming in from
the sea, the prevailing winds. The flow of air is regulated by adjustable louvers,
which open when the wind is light to allow for fresh air, but close when wind
speeds pick up. After it was first designed, this unique solution was tested
on scale models in a wind tunnel.
11. Tjibaou Cultural Center, Nouméa, New Caledonia, 1991-1998, RPBW
Ph : John Gollings
© ADCK – Centre CulturelTjibaou
© RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
8. Sketch of Renzo Piano, Tjibaou Cultural Center, Nouméa, New Caledonia,
1991-1998, RPBW
10
California Academy of Sciences
San Francisco, California, USA
2000 - 2008
Designing a great cultural and scientific institution
in San Francisco, a city with a strong collective
vocation for the environment, also meant finding
a language that expressed this shared vision of the
present inan immediate way. Through the evocative
spaces of the Museum of Natural History, the
large green roof that breathes and the successful
coexistence of outreach activities and research,
the new headquarters of the California Academy
of Sciences wanted, using architecture, to convey
their passion for knowledge of nature and the fact
that the earth is fragile.
The California Academy of Sciences was founded in San Francisco in 1853.
It is one of the most prestigious institutions in the US, and one of the few
institutes of natural sciences in which public experience and scientific research
occur at the same location.
Following the widespread destruction of the Academy buildings by the
Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989, a consultation for this new building was held.
Today’s Academy sits on the Golden Gate Park site of its predecessor, which
was comprised of 11 buildings built between 1916 and 1976 and grouped around
a central courtyard. Of these buildings, three have been conserved within
the new project: the African Hall, the North American Hall and the Steinhart
Aquarium. The new building has maintained the same position and orientation
as the original, all the functions laid out around a central courtyard, which acts
as entrance lobby and pivotal centre to the collections. This connection point
is covered by a concave glass canopy with a reticular structure reminiscent
of a spider’s web, open at the centre.
Combining exhibition space, education, conservation and research beneath
one roof, the Academy also comprises natural history museum, aquarium and
planetarium. The varied shapes of these different elements are expressed in
the building’s roofline, which follows the form of its components.
The entire 37.000 sq. m complex is like a piece of the park that has been
cut away and lifted 10 m up above the ground. This “living roof ” is covered
with 1,700,000 selected autochthonous plants planted in specially conceived
biodegradable coconut-fibre containers. The roof is flat at its perimeter and,
like a natural landscape, becomes increasingly undulating as it moves away
from the edge to form a series of domes of various sizes rising up from the roof
plane. The two main domes cover the planetarium and rain forest exhibitions.
The domes are speckled with a pattern of skylights automated to open and
close for ventilation.
The soil’s moisture, combined with the phenomenon of thermal inertia,
cools the inside of the museum significantly, thus avoiding the need for airconditioning in the ground-floor public areas and the research offices along
the facade.
Photovoltaic cells are contained between the two glass panels that form
the transparent canopy around the perimeter of the green roof; they provide
more than 5% of the electricity required by the museum. The choice of
materials, recycling, the positioning of the spaces with respect to the natural
lighting,natural ventilation, water usage, rainwater recovery and energy
production: all of these design issues became an integral part of the project
itself, and helped the museum obtain LEED platinum certification.
14 & 15 California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco, California, USA, 2000- 2008, RPBW
California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco, California, USA, 2000-2008, RPBW
Ph : Tim Griffith © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
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CONFRONTATIONS
What style, what context should be applied when working
on a site marked by the presence of an architectural masterpiece?
The challenge is significant, be it in France or the United States:
the undulating landscape of Ronchamp indelibly marked by
Le Corbusier, or by Louis Kahn on the flats of Fort Worth, Texas.
In the face of these giants of architecture, there is precious
little room for manoeuvre; anything that disturbs the iconsof
an era will not be easily forgiven. Here is the answer, set into the
topography of the Haute-Saône, and neatly resolved in a friendly
face-off in the Texan city. Whether it is building a monastery
or extending a museum, the silent dimension becomes part
of the conceptual debate. For the Poor Claires at Ronchamp,
an architecture that ‘disappears’ creates the ideal conditions
for contemplation; for the American museum, an architecture
of serial repetition and logic serves to house their collections.
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26. Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastery, France, 2006-2011, RPBW
Ph : Michel Denancé © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastery
Ronchamp, France
2006 - 2011
The Chapel of Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp was
designed by Le Corbusier and is one the 20th-century’s
most important works of architecture. For years now
it has been a heavily frequented site of international
cultural tourism, so much so that the site needed urgent
attention in order to restore the spirtual and religious
dimension originally intended for Ronchamp by its
architect. In a wider effort to improve the area, the
Œuvre Notre Dame du Haut commissioned Renzo Piano
Building Workshop to design a convent for the Poor
Clare sisters, as well as a small new building to welcome
visitors, the Porterie. Hugging the hill’s slope, the new
buildings are protected architecture with a resolved
interior featuring large picture windows that frame
the woods and its light.
When Le Corbusier was working at Ronchamp on the restructuring of a small
medieval Marian church, a place of popular worship destroyed by bombs in 1944,
he often went up to the top of the Bourlémont hill “to gain familiarity with the
ground and horizons.” The Chapel of Notre Dame du Haut (1950-1955) was to be
one of his most intense and unusual projects, a clear and strong work steeped in
introspection and worship.
It was the building’s sense of silence, combined with the ‘acoustics of the
landscape’, which inspired the project for the new Poor Clare convent. Located
on the slope of the hill at the edge of a wood, it cannot be seen from the Chapel
with which, although physically apart, it has a close spiritual relationship. The
new convent means the site now has a permanent resident community, and this,
together with the other improvements made to the welcome facilities and the
landscape as a whole, has contributed to the restoration of the site.
The convent is a small building made of pale cement that compliments the
red Bourlémont rock that surrounds it. It is composed of a series of living units
for the nuns with a common area and offices, and a linear building of the same
size housing guest quarters. A small separate oratory built into a hill not far away
also blends in with its surroundings. The building’s flat roofs are planted and here
and there, slender strips of zinc window awnings can be seen.
The overall design is based on a repetitive pattern of the living units
(2.70x2.70x 2.70 m), modularity being a very rational principle for construction,
but also because this minimalist approach fits in well with the principles of
the discrete and active community spirit of the Poor Clares. All of the spaces
are imbedded in the hillside and the south western facade of each unit has a
small winter garden that looks out towards the acacia and chestnut woods. The
repeated use of a single building material – bare pale cement – gives the project
a unified visual impact while occasional fields of colour light up the interiors,
accompanied by the presence of the wooden furniture, and the glass and the
aluminium of the window frames. The sense of introspection and peace, and the
spatial quality of the rooms, are further enhanced by the immaterial presence of
silence and light.
23 & 28. Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastery, France, 2006-2011, RPBW
22. Sketch of Renzo Piano, Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastery, France,
2006-2011, RPBW
14
Kimbell Art Museum expansion
Fort Worth, Texas, États-Unis
2006 - 2011
The Kimbell Art Museum’s original building was
designed by Louis Kahn in 1972. The new building
by Renzo Piano Building Workshop was recently
inaugurated and establishes a close, respectful and
frank dialogue with this powerful yet delicate older
building. The new Renzo Piano Pavilion (named by
the building’s owner) accommodates the museum’s
growing exhibition and education programmes,
allowing the original Kahn building to revert to the
display of the museum’s permanent collection.
The programmes and collection of the Kimbell Art Museum have grown
dramatically in recent years, far beyond anything envisioned by the museum
in the 1970s. Addressing the severe lack of space for the museum’s exhibition
and education programmes, the new Renzo Piano Pavilion provides gallery
space for temporary exhibitions, classrooms and studios for the museum’s
education department, a large 298- seat auditorium, an expanded library and
underground parking. The expansion roughly doubles the Museum’s gallery
space. Furthermore, the siting of the new building, and the access into it from
the car park, will correct the tendency of most visitors to enter the museum’s
original building by what Kahn considered the back entrance, directing them
naturally to the front entrance in the west facade.
Subtly echoing Kahn’s building in height, scale and general layout, the
RPBW building has a more open, transparent character. Light, discreet (half
the footprint hidden underground), yet with its own character, setting up a
dialogue between old and new.
The new building consists of two connected structures. The front
section – the ‘Flying pavilion’ facing the west façade of Kahn’s building across
landscaped grounds – has a three-part facade, referencing the activities
inside. At its centre a lightweight, transparent, glazed section serves as the
new museum entrance. On either side, behind pale concrete walls are two
gallery spaces for temporary exhibitions. A sequence of square concrete
columns wraps around the sides of the building, supporting solid wooden
beams and the overhanging eaves of the glass roof, providing shade for the
glazed facades facing north and south. In the galleries, a sophisticated roof
system layers stretched fabric, the wooden beams, glass, aluminium louvres
(and photovoltaic cells), to create a controlled day-lit environment. This can be
supplemented by lighting hidden behind the scrim fabric. A glazed passageway
leads into the building’s second structure. Hidden under a turf, insulating
roof are a third gallery for light-sensitive works, an auditorium and museum
education facilities.
Glass, concrete, and wood are the predominant materials used in the new
building, echoing those used in the original. Views through the new building
to the landscape and Kahn building beyond emphasise the key motifs of
transparency and openness.
29 & 31. Kimbelle Art Museum, Forth Worth, Texas, USA, 2006-2011, RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux © RPBW – Renzo Piano BuildingWorkshop Architects
15
URBAN
HERITAGE
Insertion, integration, installation; a trilogy that summarize
the challenge of ‘building a city into a city’. At the heart of
a Haussmannian block in Paris, an organic piece of architecture
emerges, the result of the synthesis of the confines of its
surroundings. At the centre of an ancient fort in a regional
French city, a military site has been converted for a university.
Enmeshed in the grids of Manhattan’s streets, in a
neighbourhood transformed in part by the conversion of a raised
railway line into a park, stands the new home of a prestigious
cultural institution, one that is already endowed with a building
by Marcel Breuer. All these are projects that regenerate the fabric
of a city by entering into a dialogue with their 18th, 19th or 20th
century contexts.
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37. Whitney Museum of American Art, Gansevoort, New-York, USA, 2007-2015, RPBW
Ph : Karin Jobst © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
Jérôme Seydoux-Pathé Foundation
Paris, France
2006 - 2014
The art of inserting a new building into an historic city
block means engaging in an open, physical dialogue
with the existing city buildings.
Building onto a structure also presents an opportunity
for a wideranging renovation project, a reclaiming of
space. The new headquarters of the Fondation Jérôme
Seydoux-Pathé is an unexpected presence, a curved
volume glimpsed floating in the middle of a courtyard,
anchored on just a few supports. It is complimented by
a group of birch trees, a floral island set in the dense
mineral context of the city.
The Fondation Jérôme Seydoux-Pathé is an organisation dedicated to the
preservation of Pathé’s heritage, and to the promotion of cinematography. Its
new headquarters sits at the centre of a block in Paris’ XIII arrondissement,
where a mid-19th century theatre - transformed into one of Paris’ first cinemas
in the mid-1900s, radically transformed again in the 1960s - once stood. The
new building houses Pathé’s archives, exhibition spaces for temporary and
permanent collections, a 70-seat screening room, and the Pathé Foundation’s
offices.
The project called for the demolition of the two existing buildings to create
an organic shaped ‘creature’ that better responds to the restrictions of the
site. The idea was to respond to the functional and representative programme
requested by the Fondation, while at the same time increasing the quality
of the space surrounding the new building. The facade on the avenue des
Gobelins has been restored and preserved, for its historic and artistic value.
Decorated with sculptures by a young Auguste Rodin, it is not only a historical
landmark, but also an iconic building for the Gobelins area.
A new transparent building just behind the street facade that looks a little
like a greenhouse, is the public area of the Foundation. From this building
visitors have a view through the transparent ground floor of the second
building in the courtyard that houses the project’s main activities, to the
garden beyond.
The peculiar design of this building is determined by the limits and
requirements of the site. While keeping its distance from the surrounding
buildings, the new building actually improves its neighbours’ access to daylight
and air and by reducing the building’s footprint, the project creates space for
a garden at the back of the site.
The upper part of the building is made of glass, providing natural light for
the Foundation’s offices. From the street the building is glimpsed through and
over the restored façade - a discreet presence during the daytime, it will softly
glow at night.
32 & 34 Pathé Foundation, Paris, France, 2006-2014, RPBW
Ph : Michel Denancé
18
The Whitney Museum of American Art
New York, États-Unis
2007 - 2015
In 1914 the sculptor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney
opened the Whitney Studio in Greenwich Village.
This was a space where American artists could meet
and exhibit their works. When the Metropolitan Museum
refused a donation of 500 works from her collection,
Gertrude decided to create a museum of her own in 1931.
In 1954 the premises were moved to 54th Street, and,
twelve years later, to Madison Avenue, in the famous
building designed by Marcel Breuer. Some decades
later this proved to be too small for a collection that
meanwhile had grown out of all proportion, and the
galleries were too cramped to exhibit many of the more
monumental sculptures. As space ran short, the museum
hived off various functions into other nearby buildings
over the years.
The new home of the Whitney Museum designed by the
Renzo Piano Building Workshop brings together all the
spaces of the museum in the new building, equipped
with numerous, flexible galleries that for the first time
make it possible to exhibit many items of the collection
that were previously kept in storage.
The original commission received in 2003 envisaged an extension Breuer’s
museum. However, lack of space and planning restrictions led in 2006 to the
radical decision to construct a new building. The choice fell on a site in the
Meatpacking District that still retains an industrial character, not far from
Greenwich Village and the High Line. This was to be a homecoming for the
Whitney, not far from where the museum was founded.
The site is bounded on the west by the Hudson River and on the east by the
start of the High Line. On the ground floor the mass of the complex is raised up
off the ground and set back from the street. Tall windows screen a public “plaza”:
the urban heart of the project. It is fully open to the public and the teeming life
of the district, enlivened by the museum’s reception areas, an open gallery and
restaurant.
Above, laid out on eight levels, are the 200 000 square feet of the museum space.
The plan of the building is divided into two parts, distributed on either side of the
central spine that houses the stairs, elevators and utilities. The part to the north
contains the spaces used for the preparation of exhibitions and workshops, the
part to the south houses the exhibition spaces. Laid out on the second and third
floors, with scenic windows overlooking the river, is a multifunctional theater
seating 170: a space that was never available to the Whitney in its previous
locations. Thanks to the fully retractable seats, the theater can also be converted
into a cinema, exhibition gallery and a space for dance and artistic performances.
The external form of the building – with large volumes set side by side, cut
with sharp edges, with a more imposing mass towards the river and irregular
and stepped down towards the city – interprets the imperfect and variegated
character of the Meatpacking District where the dockside and industrial
atmosphere of old New York still lives on.
From the fifth to the eighth level the great galleries open out, offering
twofold views across the city and river. The largest gallery, on the fifth floor,
is a rectangular space covering approximately 18 000 square feet unobstructed
with pillars: 81 m long and 22.5 wide. To the east each gallery opens onto a
terrace, which doubles as outdoor exhibition space. The gallery on the top floor,
the eighth, is naturally lit by a shed roof that captures light from the north: the
best for works of art. The external staircase that relegates the terraces and
cooling towers that soar over the rooftop are reinterpretations of the fire stairs
and tanks characteristic of buildings in New York. They further disarticulate
the mass of the museum, integrating it into the texture of the district and
mediating the transition between the building and the sky.
A reinforced concrete base supports the building’s steel frame, filled in,
along the central spine, with precast concrete panels from Canada, and the
remaining surfaces with steel plates that incorporate the structural functions
and insulation. Splendid panels 8 mm thick in gray-blue steel, alternating with
longitudinal windows to the north and regular openings to the south and west,
wrap around the building like ribbons, responding to the different climatic
conditions and reflecting the waters of the Hudson and the lights of New York.
35 & 39. Whitney Museum of American Art, Gansevoort,
New-York, USA, 2007-2015, RPBW
Ph : Karin Jobst © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
19
Citadel University Campus of Amiens
Amiens, France
2010 - in progress
The citadel is a pentagonal defensive fort,
commissioned by Henri IV and built by Jean Errard
de Bar-le-Duc at the beginning of the 17th century.
It occupies a key area of the city of Amiens, on the
northern bank of the river Somme, between the
historic city centre and the northern quarters.
Occupied by the army, who forbade public access until
1993, it was the subject of an architectural competition
in 2010. The idea was to restore the fort and give it a
place at the heart of city life by installing a university
campus for 4,000 students (part of l’Université de
Picardie Jules-Verne [UPJV]), at the centre of a vast
new public space.
The conversion and re-opening of the citadel, the restoration of its three
historic gates, and the opening of two new points of access to the east will
create a vast area of interface between the northern quarters and the city
centre. The site will accommodate not only university buildings but also two
restaurants (including a student restaurant), two cafes, and will have the
capacity to host events such as concerts or open-air cinema. The 500-seat
university auditorium will also be used for theatre productions or concerts.
The library will be open to all. The citadel only retains three bastions, two were
demolished in the 1960s to build the Avenue du Général de Gaulle. The site
groups a complex mix of buildings constructed over the years. The project
proposed demolishing the buildings of lesser historic value, the renovation
of the two main buildings dating from the 19th century (the stables and the
barracks), as well as the restoration of the classified buildings.
The former parade ground becomes the nerve-centre of this new city
neighbourhood and is conceived as a public communal space. It is bound to
the north by the barracks and to the south by the stables. The auditoria
building closes the western side, while the eastern edge opens onto the
Avenue du Général de Gaulle. The ground treatment in the new square is a
major new innovation; it is made of pieces of extruded terracotta, ‘diabolos’,
designed specifically for this project. Their joints are filled with a mix of
crushed stone and earth in which grass will grow. It is a self-draining surface
that allows the square to be perfectly flat.
On this vegetal/mineral carpet stands the ‘signal’ building, three spaces one
on top of the other: a restaurant on the ground floor with two spaces for the
university above. The smallest of these, coloured red, visually frames the
cathedral and Perret’s tower in the distance. Their prime location will make
them attractive for other functions (exhibitions, conferences etc).
To the north, the roof of the former barracks has its full length covered
with the same material used for the square. It becomes a giant urban viewing
platform, 115m long, open to all. The library, which occupies the whole of the
lower ground floor of the building (level with the bottom of the moat), is lit
from above through a huge glazed roof at ground floor level on its southern
facade. The student restaurant is housed on the ground floor and opens onto
the square.
The barracks’ facades have been cleaned and the building is traversed
by two full-height passages. The eastern passage gives access to the mostly
glazed covered street that joins it on three levels to the three northern
pavilions. The western passage gives access to a landscaped path that ends
at the Abbeville postern. From there, a footbridge crosses the moat and leads
to the northern plateau, where there is a sports centre.
The fully glazed facades of the north pavilions are equipped with
automated openings for natural ventilation. Structurally, they have a steel
post and beam frame that supports a terracotta/concrete composite floor.
The floors are pre-fabricated using approximately 8m-long sections of halfbarrel vault-shaped terracotta extrusions, which are interlocked by a castconcrete beam through their centre. To the south of the square, the stables,
which benefit from generous volumes, have been converted into classrooms.
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP A set-back attic floor replaces the original pitched roof. The building is
enlarged and extended beyond a covered courtyard to provide space for
administrative offices. These extensions have large glazed facades similar to
those of the northern pavilions, in contrast to the thick brick walls, and the
substantial joists of the wooden floors that have been revealed and restored.
The sports centre located outside the fortified perimeter on the northern
plateau is the first facility for an area of great potential, facing the ramparts
of the citadel, which on this side reach 25m high. This area will be studied for
future development.
Inside the citadel a large park, within the bastions and curtain walls,
occupies the higher part of the ramparts, where a promenade is accessible via
ramps and three lifts. At the foot of the ramparts, the moats and counterscarp
make up another section of the park. The whole area has been replanted with
trees to encourage biodiversity.
↑
40. Citadelle University Campus, Amiens, France
2010-in progress, RPBW
Ph : AIA Paysage
→
Citadelle University Campus, Amiens, France
Ph : Hugo Miserey
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
20
21
HEIGHTS
Scraping the sky, clinging to the ground: that, beyond the
technical, is the challenge of high-rise architecture. Its place in
the neighbourhood and the relationship with its surroundings are
its social and environmental challenges. The subject of towers
in European cities provokes debate, even anger, in some countries
more than others. In London a point spears the sky, while in Paris,
a series of high-rise plateaus take shape; mixed-use and linked
to a railway station for the former, single-use and built on a great
slab over a bundle of railway tracks for the latter. In Southwark,
opposite the City of London with its forest of towers, or in
Batignolles at the heart of a new deliberately diverse Parisian
neighbourhood, each tower is very specific, impossible to
compare: the one following the concept of a vertical city with
a ‘piazza in the sky’ by the Thames, the othera law courts mixing
vertical and horizontal on the edge of Paris. On either side of the
channel, both aresingular, solitary towers that invite you inside.
22
59. The ‘Shard’ London Bridge Tower, London, UK, 2000-2012, RPBW
Paris Courthouse
Paris, France
2010 - in progress
Since the Middle Ages, Parisian justice has been
dispensed from the famous building that surrounds
the Sainte-Chapelle on the Ile de la Cité. However,
over the years an increasing
shortage of space has resulted in a good many offices
having to be located in a multitude of locations spread
out over all four corners of the city. The new Paris law
courts, currently under construction at the Porte de
Clichy, will enable the judicial institution’s courtrooms
and offices to occupy the same building. The historic
courts on the Ile de la Cité will continue to house
important and symbolic activities such as the court
of Assize (Crown Court) and the Court of Appeal.
When the competition was first launched, the French government
suggested dividing the law courts into two separate buildings, the first
would accommodate public functions, such as courtrooms, and the second,
offices. The key idea behind Renzo Piano Building Workshop’s project was
to house all of these spaces in one single large building, capable, by its size
and importance, of becoming the starting point for the rehabilitation and
redevelopment of the area around the Porte de Clichy.
The building rises out of an L-shaped site, between the city ring road
and Martin Luther King park. An extension of the principal axis through the
adjacent park (on the diagonal) separates the main facade of the new building
from the triangular piazza in front of it.
The new law courts will stand 160 m high, have an internal area of around
100,000 sq m and will accommodate up to 8,000 people per day. The building
has a plinth five to eight storeys high, which follows the shape of the site, on
top of which stands a tower of three superimposed parallelepipeds, whose
section diminishes as the tower gets higher, creating a distinctive stepping
profile that will distinguish the law courts from more conventional towers.
The building’s facades are fully glazed. On the three blocks of the tower, fine
blades extend the glazing beyond the facade, exalting its verticality.
The office facades on the eastern and western sides give views towards
Montmartre and the Eiffel Tower; the north and south facades, which are
narrower, look towards central Paris or towards Clichy and Mont-Valérien.
The building is entered at ground floor level, from the piazza, into the
monumental public lobby, where the flux of visitors and employees are greeted
and directed. This rectangular space is the full height of the plinth, up to 28 m,
and is notable for its slender steel columns and the amount of natural light that
enters via skylights and through the glazed facade that looks onto the piazza.
Via this monumental room and the two small atria on either side of it, natural
light can penetrate to the heart of the building. The plinth also contains the 90
courtrooms. Fitted out with parquet and beech-wood panelling, they all benefit
from daylight that filters through the facades. Behind the courtrooms, the
council chamber and the deliberation rooms, also fitted out in wood, are visible
from outside through the glazed facade.
The eighth floor has a 7,000 sq m planted terrace; the staff restaurant
opens onto this large garden. The tower’s outline breaks in two places, on the
19th and 29th floors, where ‘hanging gardens’ have been made. These green
details extend Martin Luther King park right onto the building and are part of
the design of a really ‘green’ skyscraper.
An external lift with panoramic views climbs a fissure on the eastern
facade that captures the morning light. On either side are meeting rooms and
break-out spaces. This fissure, the building’s ‘spinal column’ transforms the
facade into a three-dimensional element, articulating its positive and negative
spaces and giving a depth to the volumes of the building. Photovoltaic
panels lined up on many of the floors on the east- and west-facing facades
demonstrate the wish to move towards using alternative energy in public
buildings.
The building’s primary structure, robust and orthogonal, ensures
a flexibility over the long term that will be able to accommodate future
requirements and any changes in the way the justice system operates.
56. Paris Courthouse, view from the garden Martin Luther King,
Paris, France, 2010-in progress, RPBW
© RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects,
render by Joachim Lézie-Cobert
58. Paris Courthouse, lobby,
Paris, France, 2010-in progress, RPBW
© RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects,
render by Kevin Prigniel
24
The Shard - London Bridge Tower
London, United Kingdom
2000 - 2012
The London Bridge Tower, also known as the Shard,
is a 72-storey, mixeduse tower located beside London
Bridge Station on the south bank of the river Thames.
This project was a response to the urban vision
of London Mayor Ken Livingstone and to his policy
of encouraging high-density development at key
transport nodes in London. This sort of sustainable
urban extension relies on the proximity of public
transportation, discourages car use and helps to
reduce traffic congestion in the city.
A mix of uses – residential, offices and retail – creates a building that is in
use 24 hours a day. The slender, pyramidal form of the tower was determined by
its suitability to this mix: large floor plates at the bottom for offices; restaurants,
public spaces and a hotel located in the middle; private apartments at the top of
the building. The final floors accommodate a public viewing gallery, 240 m above
street level. This arrangement of functions also allows the tower to taper off and
disappear into the sky, a particularly important detail for Renzo Piano Building
Workshop given the building’s prominence on the London skyline.
Eight sloping glass facades, the “shards”, define the shape and visual quality
of the tower, fragmenting the scale of the building and reflecting the light in
unpredictable ways. Opening vents in the gaps or “fractures” between the
shards, provide natural ventilation to winter gardens.
The extra-white glass used on the Shard gives the tower a lightness and
a sensitivity to the changing sky around it, the Shard’s colour and mood are
constantly changing. It required a particular technical solution to ensure the
facade’s performance in terms of controlling light and heat. A double-skin,
naturally ventilated facade with internal blinds that respond automatically to
changes in light levels was developed. The logic is very simple: external blinds
are very effective in keeping solar gain out of a building, but unprotected
external blinds are not appropriate for a tall building, hence the extra layer of
glass facade on the outside.
As part of the project, a section of London Bridge Station’s concourse was
also redeveloped and the London Bridge Tower has been the stimulus for much
of the regeneration of the surrounding area, now known as the London Bridge
Quarter.
59. The ‘Shard’ London Bridge Tower, London, UK, 2000-2012, RPBW
Ph : Chris Martin
60. Sketch of Renzo Piano, The Shard, London, UK, 2000-2012, RPBW
25
PIECES
OF THE CITY
Stitching back together, or reoccupying – strategies aiming
to re-establish links through the fabric of thecity that apply
in Europe as well as in the United States.
In Oslo a new urban block unites a museum with offices,
extending the city with an architectural idea that has a lightness
that appears to float. Reconnecting the city of Athens with
the sea via a giant slope, a huge public park, beneath which
are tucked two arts centres.
In Trento, at the foot of the Alps, creating a section
of city, an eco-neighbourhood, that incorporates a museum
into an area of housing. Developing a new campus for a great
American university: a new site, a new concept that includes
a slice of urbanism, opening the buildings up at ground floor level
to New York’s Harlem neighbourhood. Four projects designed
around the fundamental concept of public space.
26
51. Le Albere area and MUSE, Residential facade, Trento, Italy, 2002-in progress, RPBW
Ph : Enrico Cano © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art
Oslo, Norway
2006 - 2012
Tjuvholmen is a new cultural quarter located to the
south-west of Oslo’s city centre. Integrating art and
leisure, the complex combines the Astrup Fearnley
Museum and an office building, with a new public
sculpture park, swimming beach and waterside
promenade. As a continuation of the redevelopment
of the Aker Brygge area of the city, site of former
shipyards, Tjuvholmen has a privileged location right
on the water’s edge, with views out over the fjord
and back to the city centre.
43 & 45. Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, Norway, 2006- 2012, RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux © RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP RPBW was commissioned to build a new home for the permanent collection
of the Astrup Fearnley Museum, a separate space for its temporary exhibitions,
and an office building with its own exhibition area for a private art collection.
Three timber-clad buildings shelter under a single swooping glass roof in
a newly landscaped public sculpture garden.
A tour of the museum takes the visitor on a journey through ten rooms
and includes all three buildings. The Art Museum, on the north side of the
canal that cuts through the middle of the site, houses the Astrup Fearnley’s
permanent collection of contemporary art. This building connects at ground level
underneath the main stair and piazza on Tjuvholmen Allee, into the ground floor
of the adjacent office building, where a private art collection is displayed.
To the south, over a footbridge across the canal, is the museum’s space for
temporary exhibitions. Gallery space is spread over two floors, giving the visitor
a diverse range of spaces and volumes to experience, shaped by the curve of the
sloping roof and lit via a spectacular skylight. An exterior roof terrace at second
floor level provides a generous exhibition space for sculpture.
The four-storey office building is arranged around a central, day-lit atrium.
Conference rooms and terraces on the upper floors take advantage of the
spectacular views. The landscaping of the surroundings was an integral part
of the project. A promenade along the waterfront links Tjuvholmen back to
the city centre. The cafe, a beach for swimming, and the sculpture park are all
designed to attract a diverse range of visitors and create a truly public space.
One of the most prominent elements of this project is the huge glass
roof that soars over the complex, linking the buildings together and giving
the development a presence on the waterfront. Its curved shape, formed by
laminated wood beams, crosses the canal between the buildings. The beams
are supported by slender steel columns, reinforced with cable rigging, which
refer to the maritime character of the site. On Skjaeret, the roof almost touches
the ground. A small pond prevents people from climbing on the glass.
The glass on the roof has a white ceramic frit, reducing its transparency
by 40%. On the facades, wherever possible, low-iron glass has been used to
enhance transparency and to minimise the discoloration of the light into the
exhibition spaces.
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
28
Columbia University, New Campus
New York, USA
2002 - in progress
Renzo Piano Building Workshop teamed up with
SOM on the master plan of Columbia University’s
new Manhattanville Campus. The first phase of the
Harlem development is on site, and will include four
buildings designed by RPBW: the Jerome L. Greene
Science Center, the Lenfest Center for the Arts,
the Forum, and the School of International and Public
Affairs. Columbia University has always been an urban
institution. The new campus will be a place of research
and knowledge production integrated with the city,
in close contact with its social reality, street culture
and energy.
The proposed Manhattanville Campus is a vision for a new campus of the
21st century, rooted in a commitment to diversity and accessibility, while at the
same time meeting the growing space needs of the University. This 631,740 sq m
long-term master plan will include academic, research, recreational, residential,
administrative, and support space for the University, as well as publicly
accessible open space and commercial, cultural, and social spaces, seeking to
actively engage with the community.
Perhaps the overriding feature of the overall scheme is its permeability.
Unlike the gated campus just five blocks south at Morningside Heights, the
Manhattanville development is designed to be part of the neighbourhood and
open to all. University programs have been pushed up a floor or more above
street level, creating what has been termed the “Urban Layer”, whereby the
ground floor of each building on the new campus will be devoted to public
activity. Retail, restaurants, galleries and performance spaces, health clinics,
community meeting space and a variety of University–community partnerships
will fill this hybrid space, accessible to all.
Throughout the new Manhattanville Campus, all streets will remain public
and open to vehicular traffic, and pedestrian access through the campus will be
enhanced by tree-lined streets and widened sidewalks connecting the campus
and the neighbourhood to the Hudson River Waterfront Park. Together with
the “Urban Layer”, a network of large and small open spaces and a north–south
pedestrian route weaves the campus together.
The master plan will be completed in successive phases, the first of which
is a triangular area located at the southern end of the overall site between 125th
Street and 130th Street, and bound on the east and west by Broadway and
Riverside Drive. This first phase, already under construction, includes the Jerome
L. Greene Science Center (housing the Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute),
the Lenfest Center for the Arts (housing the School of the Arts and the Wallach
Gallery), a shared meeting building called the Forum, and potentially the future
School of International and Public Affairs. These buildings are to be centred
around a public open space, landscaped with trees and lawns, which will serve
as the threshold and entrance lobby into the development. The accessibility and
transparency of the street level throughout the new development has largely
been achieved by the relegation of support space to underground levels, with
the construction of a central energy plant which will eventually provide for
phase 1 and phase 2.
The US Green Building Council has awarded Columbia University’s
Manhattanville Campus plan its highest LEED Platinum. This designation
represents the first LEED-ND Platinum certification in New York City and the
first for a university plan nationwide.
46. Columbia University, New- York, USA, 2007-in progress, RPBW
29
Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Centre
Athens, Greece
2008 - in progress
The Stavros Niarchos Cultural Centre will be
constructed in Kallithea, 4 km south of central Athens.
An important cultural and educational project, the site
will comprise the National Library of Greece and the
Greek National Opera in a 170,000 sq m landscaped
park. Currently a parking lot left over from the 2004
Olympic Games, once the site of a racetrack, when
complete, the project will restore the site’s lost
connections with the city and the sea.
As one of Athens’ earliest seaports on Faliro Bay, Kallithea has always had
a strong relationship with the water. At present, however, despite its proximity,
there is no view of the sea from the site. To restore this, an artificial hill is being
created at the south (seaward) end of the site. The sloping park will culminate
in the cultural centre building, giving it spectacular views towards the sea.
Both opera and library are combined in one building, with a public space,
known as the Agora, providing access and connections between the two main
facilities. The opera wing will be composed of two auditoria, one (450 seats)
dedicated to traditional operas and ballets, the other (1.400 seats) for more
experimental performances. The library is intended not only as a place for
learning and preserving culture, but also as a public resource, a space
where culture is truly accessible to share and enjoy.
The entirely glass-walled library reading room sits on top of the building
just underneath the canopy roof. A square horizontal transparent box, it will
enjoy 360-degree views of Athens and the sea. The site’s visual and physical
connection with water will continue in the park with a new canal that will run
along a north–south, main pedestrian axis, the Esplanade. The canopy roof
provides essential shade and will be topped with 10.000 sq m of photovoltaic
cells, enough to generate 1.5 megawatt of power for the library and opera
house. This field of cells should allow the building to be self-sufficient in
energy terms during normal opening hours. Wherever possible, natural
ventilation will be used.
The visual connection with the water will continue to the park, where it
will focus on a channel to the side of the Esplanade, the main pedestrian axis
of the site, in the north-south direction.
The complex is aiming for a LEED platinum rating.
48. Stavros Niarchos Foundation, Athens, Greece, 2008-in progress, RPBW
© RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects render by Lucien Puech
30
‘Le Albere’ area and MuSe, Science Museum
Trento, Italy
2002 - in progress
The Quartiere delle Albere district, the site of a former
Michelin factory, is now a new part of the city of Trento.
This transformed post-industrial brownfield site now
shares many characteristics with Trento’s urban
fabric – the clear hierarchy of the design, its functional
stratification and an overall similarity in the size of
buildings and materials used for their construction.
This urban renewal project has reconnected the city
to its natural context, which in Trento is defined by
the nearby Adige River and Monte Bondone.
This new district, for a long time physically separated
from the city centre by the railway, now feels
psychologically closer. Quartiere delle Albere is home
to MuSe, the new Science Museum, serving to reinforce
the cultural identity of this area of Trento.
The boundaries of the new district, which covers an area of 116,300 sq m,
are clearly defined by the Adige River to the west and the railway to the east.
The northern edge borders the Palazzo delle Albere, a renaissance villa-cumfortress. The project called for a mixed development so that the area could be,
in and of itself, self-contained with all the services and functions that implies.
The new buildings have a clear and unified horizontal impact on a similar scale
to those in Trento’s historical centre and are located on the eastern side of the
huge site, leaving the western part open for a new public park facing the river.
The buildings are interspersed with green areas and waterways, a system of
canals that crosses over the entire area and actively connects it with the river
and natural landscape.
The layout of the commercial buildings is linear and their ‘green’ facades
become something of a natural screen hiding the tracks along which they are,
to a large degree, lined up. The residential buildings have open courtyards that
have been cut into them so that glimpses of the internal treed gardens can be
seen from the outside. The buildings are four to five storeys high and their zinc
roofs give the neighbourhood a certain visual unity. A taller building stands on
either side of the complex: a multipurpose building to the south and MuSe – a
large interactive science museum - on the northern end. The museum acts as the
project’s magnet and, together with the Palazzo delle Albere (today the Modern
and Contemporary Art Museum), attracts the public and confirms the revitalized
area’s vocation for culture and recreation. The layout of the urban plan placed
these two buildings as its main anchors, surrounded by water and connected to
one another by the two main pathways: one is a straight footpath along the east
and the other a curved one along a canal that serves to connect the buildings to
the park.
The regeneration of the Quartiere delle Albere project had sustainability as
an integral part of the design. The buildings use little energy with the extensive
use of renewable resources. MuSe has been given LEED Gold certification, and all
of the residences and offices have a level B CasaClima classification. They were
among the winners of the 2013 CasaClima Awards.
50. Le Albere and MUSE Science Museum, Trento, Italy
Ph : Enrico Cano
©RPBW – Renzo Piano Building Workshop Architects
52. Le Albere, area and MUSE, Interior view of the science museum,
Trento, Italy, 2002-in progress, RPBW
Ph : Hufton+Crow
31
MATERIALS
Stone and earth, what could be more simple? A city gate linking
the parliament and opera in Valletta, Malta, anda paediatric
hospital in Entebbe, Uganda. The use of raw, ancestral materials
for contemporary projects in Europe and Africa is another type
of challenge. Opening a quarry to extract the same stone that was
used by the Maltese knights to build their fortress-city is a way of
renewing links with history and geology. Chosen for its structural
potential, it was also used for its properties as a facing material. Whereas RPBW had already worked with stone to build the
arches of a basilica in Italy, working with rammed earth was a first
for the practice. Choosing earth is part of a contextual approach:
their first experience with the material took place on the banks
of Lake Victoria, for a wonderful humanitarian project.
32
63. Valletta City Gate, detail, Valletta, Malta, 2009-2015, RPBW
Valletta City Gate
Valletta, Malta
2009 - 2014
The City Gate project is a complex operation to
reconfigure the entrance to the city of Valletta. The
project has four parts: the Valletta City Gate and the
square immediately outside the ramparts, the design of
a theatre ‘machine’ to be used for open-air productions
in the ruins of the old opera house (destroyed and
never rebuilt), the construction of a new Parliament
building, and the relandscaping of the moat.
The bridge leading to the Valletta City Gate had been repeatedly enlarged
over the years until it had lost both its original function and proportions,
ultimately becoming a mix of city square and bridge. With the aim of resolving
this rather unsatisfactory transformation, the project focuses on returning the
bridge to the dimensions of Dingli’s original 1633 gate, by demolishing later
additions. This allows passers-by to once again have the sensation of crossing
a real bridge, giving them views of the moat and fortifications. Valletta’s first
city gate was probably a single tunnel through the city’s ramparts. The initial
objective of the project was therefore to reinstate the ramparts’ original feeling
of depth and strength. Spurning any sort of decoration, the new city gate is a
simple breach in the wall, only 8m wide. The architecture is very plain, giving
the impression of power and austerity, stripped of any decorative flourish that
might distract from its timeless, authentic presence. It is made of immense
blocks of stone, cut through and framed by tall blades of steel that mark the
divide between past and present. Its tapered shape and the two 25m-high steel
masts are all that is required to confer this breach the status of Valletta City
Gate. A hard stone quarry was opened on Gozo especially for this project. Pope
Pius V Street, which ran inside the gate at a raised level, has been demolished
and replaced by two gently sloping wide flights of stairs that link the bastions
of St James’s Cavalier and St John’s Cavalier to Republic Street.
The gate and the moat will be linked by a stair and a panoramic lift that will
allow visitors to explore the depths of the moat, where a Mediterranean garden
is to replace the former car park.
The parliament building comprises two massive blocks in stone that
stand on slender columns to give a lightness to the building, whose shape
respects the existing street layout. The northern block is principally given
over to the parliament chamber, while the south block accommodates members
of parliament’s offices and the offices of the Prime Minister and Leader of
the Opposition.
Creating a porous urban block was at the forefront of the building’s volumetric
design. The two blocks are separated by a central courtyard, which also serves
as the main entrance to the building. The courtyard is conceived in such a
way that views through to St James’s Cavalier from Republic Street are not
obscured.
The parliament’s facades are faced in solid stone. This stone has been sculpted
as if eroded by the rays of the sun and the vistas from the building, to create
a fully functional device that filters solar radiation while allowing natural
daylight inside, all the while maintaining views from the building. Each of
these blocks of facade has been sculpted by CNC machinery. The result is
a stone architecture that is fitting for its historic context but also the product
of cutting-edge technology.
A cultural space on the ground floor of the parliament building is open to
visitors coming through the city gate.
Energy use and environmental considerations are principal components
in the design of this building. The thermal inertia of solid stone, combined with
natural ventilation, noticeably reduces energy requirements that are met by
geothermal energy: a system of 40 shafts sunk into rock to depths of 140 m,
which is 100 m below sea-level.
In addition, the roof is covered with 600 sq m of photovoltaic panels – an
ambitious energy strategy that allows the building to generate 100% of the
energy required to heat it in the winter and 80% of its cooling requirements
during the summer months.
62. Valletta City Gate, view of the project from republic street looking south,
Valletta, Malta, 2009-2015, RPBW
64. Valletta City Gate, South elevation of the office building from St Jamses staircase,
34
Children’s Surgery Center
Entebbe, Uganda
2013 - in progress
Emergency’s new Center for Pediatric Surgery in
Uganda, south of the city of Kampala, on the north shore
of Lake Victoria, is not only a hospital ofexcellence, but
a building that enriches the area in a number of ways.
Emergency’s hospitals provide health services but also act as training
centers for local doctors and nurses. Having the opportunity to follow courses
of higher education at home, doctors and nurses in the region will no longer be
forced to go abroad to specialize, often without returning. With the new center
of pediatric surgery they will be able to operate in a hospital of excellence, with
equipment comparable to the best medical centers in the West. The building will
also serve as an architectural model for the region: a rational building, advanced
in energy conservation and the use of natural resources, and built with the local
pisé (rammed earth) technology.
The hospital is set in woodland sloping gently down towards Lake Victoria.
Protected by large horizontal roofs, the hospital is divided into three parallel
wings. The first is the smallest one, being laid out on a single story and houses
the reception areas. The other two are longer and consist of a ground floor and
lower ground floor. They flank the central block with the operating rooms and
intensive care unit.
The south wing houses the doctors’ offices, pharmacy and rooms for clinical
examinations. The north wing contains, on the ground floor, the inpatient
rooms and two play areas: one at the front and the other in the middle. The
lower ground floor, overlooking the park, contains the teaching rooms for staff
training, offices and the dining room. Since it is a children’s hospital, particular
care was devoted to spaces for the well-being of the children, with a colorful
decor, gathering places and areas for getting to know the medical staff. A second
building to the west of the hospital houses staff quarters.
The focus of the hospital’s spatial layout is the central garden, with a big tree
growing there. Traversed by a sheltered walkway, the garden is overlooked by the
distribution corridors and patients’ rooms, and isbathed in natural light from the
generous windows running from floor to ceiling.
Rammed earth is the oldest of all building materials and is still used in many
parts of the world, from Africa to Central and Latin America, Asia and Oceania.
Rather than bringing completely alien materials and construction techniques into
this part of the world, the Renzo Piano Building Workshop chose to respect and
build on this local building tradition. Rammed earth or pisé uses a mixture of soil,
sand, gravel and small amounts of water. The mixture is then placed in a timber
formwork and compacted at regular intervals with mechanical tampers. Despite
its great thermal inertia, rammed earth is generally deficient in mechanical
strength and resistance to rain. So experiments were conducted to improve
the material, sending several samples from the site in Uganda to the Mapei
laboratory in Milan. The tests using innovative chemical and siloxane thickeners
greatly improved the material’s mechanical strength and surface resistance.
These technical advances were applied to the material in the construction of the
mock-up of a portion of the wall on the site in Uganda, carefully monitored to
assess its behavior. Different minerals and oxides were also added to the mixture
so as to color the surface of the masonry at different heights.
Above the walls spreads a broad, airy roof, whose eaves extend far beyond
the sides of the building. A large awning, the distinguishing sign of the building,
shades, protects and cools the hospital spaces. The roof is articulated as a series
of wooden beams bound by steel tie rods. This structure supports a surface area
of 5000 square meters of photovoltaic panels, produced and donated by Enel
Greenpower, capable ofproducing up to 400 kW of energy.
65. Children's Surgery Center, Mock up, Entebbe, Uganda
© Emergency NGO Technical department
67. Children's Surgery Center, cross section, Entebbe, Uganda
35
Press images
Early works
1
2
4
3
5
4
5
9
11
Tjibaou Cultural Center,
Nouméa, New-Caledonia, 1991-1998
6
7
10
8
California Academy of Sciences,
San Francisco, California, USA, 2000-2008
12
13
14
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP 15
16
18
20
17
19
21
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
36
Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastry,
Ronchamp, France, 2006-2011
22
23
25
27
24
26
28
Kimbell Art Museum expansion,
Forth Worth, Texas, USA, 2006-2011
Jérôme Seydoux - Pathé Foundation,
Paris, France, 2006-2014
30
29
33
31
32
34
Whitney Museum Museum of American Art at Gansevoort,
New-York, USA, 2007-2015
35
37
36
38
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
37
Press images
Citadel University Campus of Amiens,
Amiens, France, 2010-in progress
Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art,
Oslo, Norway, 2006-2012
44
5
41
40
43
42
Columbia University, New Manhattanville Campus
New-York, USA, 2007-in progress
45
Stavros Niarchos Cultural Center,
Athens, Greece, 2008-in progress
48
47
46
Le Albere area and MUSE Science Museum,
Trento, Italy, 2002-in progress
49
50
53
51
55
54
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
38
Paris Courhouse,
Paris, France, 2010-in progress
56
57
58
Valletta City Gate,
Valletta, Malta, 2009-2014
The Shard, London Bridge Tower
London, UK, 2000-2012
62
61
59
63
64
60
Children's Surgery Center
Entebbe, Uganda, 2013-in progress
1
2
3
39
Captions & Credits
Prehistory / Early Works
1. Reinforced Polyester Space Frames,
1967
Studio Piano
© Fondazione Renzo Piano
2. Palazzina per uffici, 14th Triennale
of Milano, Italy, 1967
Studio Piano
3. Reinforced Polyester Space Frames,
1967
Studio Piano
4. Palazzina per uffici, 14th Triennale
of Milano, Italy, 1967
Studio Piano
5. Free plan houses - La Garonne,
1968-1969
Studio Piano
Tjibaou Cultural Center,
Nouméa, New-Caledonia, 1991-1998
6. Tjibaou Cultural Center, Nouméa,
New-Caledonia, 1991-1998, RPBW
Ph : Pierre-Alain Pantz
©ADCK – Centre Culturel Tjibaou
©RPBW – Renzo Piano Building
Workshop Architects
7. Centre Culturel Tjibaou, Nouméa,
Ph : Pierre-Alain Pantz
© ADCK – Centre Culturel Tjibaou
© RPBW – Renzo Piano Building
Workshop Architects
8. Sketch of Renzo Piano,
Tjibaou Cultural Center, Nouméa,
Workshop Architects
New-Caledonia, 1991 - 1998, RPBW
Ph : John Gollings
Workshop Architects
10. Centre Culturel Tjibaou, Nouméa,
Workshop Architects
Ph : John Gollings
Workshop Architects
California Academy of Sciences,
San Francisco, USA, 2000-2008
12. California Academy of Sciences,
San Francisco, USA, 2000-2008, RPBW
Ph : John Mc Neal
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tim Griffith
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tim Griffith
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tim Griffith
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tim Griffith
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tom Fox SWA Group
Workshop Architects
Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastery,
Ronchamp, 2006-2011
22. Sketch Renzo Piano,
Ronchamp Gatehouse and Monastery,
France, 2006-2011, RPBW
Workshop Architects
23. Ronchamp Gatehouse and
Monastery, France, 2006-2011, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tim Griffith
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Ph : Justin Lee
Workshop Architects
Ph : Tom Fox SWA Group
Workshop Architects
Kimbell Art Museum expansion,
Forth Worth, Texas, USA, 2006-2011
29. Kimbell Art Museum expansion,
Forth Worth, Texas, USA, 2006-2011,
RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
30. Kimbell Art Museum expansion, site
plan, Forth Worth, Texas, USA
2006-2011, RPBW
Workshop Architects
31. Kimbell Art Museum expansion,
Forth Worth, Texas, USA, 2006-2011,
RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
Jérôme Seydoux - Pathé Foundation,
Paris, France, 2006-2014
32. Jérôme Seydoux - Pathé Foundation, Paris, France, 2006-2014, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Whitney Museum of American Arts,
New-York, USA, 2007-2015
35. Whitney Museum of American
Art, Gansevoort, New-York, USA,
2007-2015, RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
2007-2015, RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
2007-2015, RPBW
Ph : Karin Jobst
Workshop Architects
Art, élévation sud, Gansevoort,
New-York, USA, 2007-2015, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Art, Gansevoort, New-York, USA
2007-2015, RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
40
Citadel University Campus,
Amiens, France, 2010-in progress
Le Albere area and MUSE Science
Museum, Trento, Italy, 2002-in progress
40. Citadel University Campus, Amiens,
France, 2010-in progress, RPBW
Ph : AIA Paysage
Workshop Architects
49. Le Albere and MUSE Science
Museum, Trento, Italy,
2002-in progresss, RPBW
Ph : Enrico Cano
Workshop Architects
Workshop Architects
Ph : Hugo Miserey
Workshop Architects
Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art,
Oslo, Norway, 2006-2012
43. Astrup Fearnlay Museum of Modern
Art, Oslo, Norway, 2006-2012, RPBW
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
Art, Oslo, Norway, 2006-2012, RPBW
2006-2012, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Art, Oslo, Norway, 2006-2012, RPBW,
Ph : Nic Lehoux
Workshop Architects
Columbia University, New Manhattanville Campus, New-York, USA,
2007-in progresss
46. Sketch of Renzo Piano,
Columbia University, New-York, USA,
Workshop Architects
47. Columbia University,
New-York, USA, site map,
2007-in progresss, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Stavros Niarchos Foundation,
Athens, Greece, 2008-in progress
48. Stavros Niarchos Foundation,
Athens, Greece, 2008-in progress,
RPBW
Workshop Architects render by Lucien
Puech
Museum, Trento, Italy
Ph : Enrico Cano
Workshop Architects
Museum, residential facade, Trento,
Italy, 2002-in progress, RPBW
Ph : Enrico Cano
Workshop Architects
Museum, Interior view of the museum,
Trento, Italy, 2002-in progress, RPBW
Ph : Hufton+Crow
Workshop Architects
Museum, residences, Trento, Italy,
Ph : Shunji Ishida
Workshop Architects
Museum, East-West section of the
Science Museum, Trento, Italy, 2002-in
progress, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Museum, Trento, Italy, 2002-in
progress, RPBW
Ph : Enrico Cano
Workshop Architects
58. Paris Courthouse, lobby,
Paris, France, 2010-in progress,
RPBW
Workshop Architects,
render by Kevin Prignie
The Shard - London Bridge Tower
Londres, 2000-2012
59. The Shard-London Bridge Tower,
London, UK, 2000-2012, RPBW
Workshop Architects
60. Sketch of Renzo Piano, The
Shard-London Bridge Tower, London,
UK, 2000-2012, RPBW
Workshop Architects
Children's Surgery Center
Entebbe, Uganda 2013- in progress
65. Children's Surgery Center, Mock up,
Entebbe, Uganda
Workshop Architects
© Emergency NGO Technical
department
66. Children's Surgery Center, site plan,
Entebbe, Uganda
Workshop Architects
67. Children's Surgery Center, cross
section, Entebbe, Uganda
Workshop Architects
61. The Shard-London Bridge Tower,
London, UK, 2000-2012, RPBW
Ph : Chris Martin
Workshop Architects
Valletta City Gate,
Valletta, Malta, 2009-2015
62. Valletta City Gate, View of the
project from republic street, Valletta,
Malta, 2009-2015, RPBW
Workshop Architects
63. Valletta City Gate, détail,
Workshop Architects
64. Valletta City Gate, South elevation
of the office building from St Jamses
staircase, Valletta, Malta, 2009-2015,
RPBW
Workshop Architects
Paris Courthouse,
Paris, France, 2010-in progress
56. Paris Courthouse, view from the
garden Martin Luther King, Paris,
render by Joachim Lézie-Cobert
57. Paris Courthouse, night view of
the East facade, Paris, France,
render by Labtop
41
Credits
The Piano Method
An exhibition produced by
The Cité de l’architecture & du
patrimoine, adapted from the
former exhibition « Pezzo per
Pezzo », developed by Renzo Piano
Building Workshop and the Renzo
Piano Foundation.
Cité de l’architecture
& du patrimoine
Guy Amsellem, président
Luc Lièvre, general manager
Renzo Piano Building Workshop,
Architects
Renzo Piano Foundation
The exhibition
Curator (Paris)
Francis Rambert, head of French
Institute of architecture (IFA), Cité
de l’architecture & du patrimoine
Conception et réalisation
Giorgio Bianchi, Milly Rossato Piano,
Stefania Canta and Elena
Spadavecchia
with
Chiara Bennati, Chiara Casazza,
Lorenzo Ciccarelli, Christophe
Colson, Cino Ermentini, Philippe
Goubet and Andrea Malgeri
General organisation
Cité de l’architecture & du patrimoine, production of exhibitions
department
Myriam Feuchot, head of
department ; Marion Zirk, project
leader ; Amélie Matray, works
manager ; Jonathan Deledicq,
technical manager, assisted of
Junior Mwanga, apprentice and Yan
Gaillard, management accountant ;
with Jérôme Richard, digital data
manager.
Graphism
gr20paris
Models
Restoration : Andrea Malgeri
Model Pompidou Lego, 1997,
loan from Rogers Stirk Harbour +
Partners
Production of the exhibition
Layout : Corégie
Printing : Atelier Demaille (Paris),
Prepress Genova (Italie)
Transport : Excess events (Paris)
and ASP Fine Art Services (Italie)
Lights
Design : Juan Echeverri Velasquez
and Denis Perrin, IGuzzini France
Installation : Suncom
Workshop
« La périphérie » with five national
schools of architecture : Versailles,
Marne-la-Vallée, Val-de-Seine,
Toulouse and Strasbourg.
Communication and sponsorship
& du patrimoine
David Madec, head of
communication and partnerships
Muriel Sassen, head of
developpment and sponsorship
Anne Ruelland, head of publics
department
Texts
Authors : Anna Foppiano and
Lorenzo Ciccarelli, Renzo Piano
Building Workshop and Francis
Rambert
Translations : Annabel Gray,
Miranda Westwood, Geraldine
Jamin, Lexling and Richard Sadleir
Editing : Martine Colombet,
responsable éditoriale (Ifa),
Claire Gausse
Interviews
The interviews have been
conducted by Francis Rambert
Transcript : Anne Appathurai and
Jean-Pierre Pinco
(media solution)
42
Thanks
The Cité de l’architecture & du
patrimoine and Renzo Piano
Building Workshop would like to
thank :
The teams of the agencies from
Genova, Paris and New York
and the Fondazione Renzo Piano ;
The partners and associates,
with whom the interviews have
been shot during october 2015 :
Emanuela Baglietto, Antonio
Belvedere, Giorgio Bianchi, Mark
Carroll, Antoine Chaaya, Emanuele
Donadel, Philippe Goubet, Giorgio
Grandi, Shunji Ishida, Joost
Moolhuijzen, Bernard Plattner,
Thorsten Sahlmann, Elisabetta
Trezzani.
The exhibition is supported by :
iGuzzini France
the media partners
Télérama, 1ERE, France Ô, A Nous
Paris, RATP, Marie Claire Maison,
UGC, Le Monde, France Inter
The headteachers and teachers
of national schools of architecture :
ENSA Marseille
Jean Marc Zuretti, Rémy Marciano
ENSA Strasbourg
Éric Gross, Georges Heintz
ENSA Toulouse
Monique Reyren Rémi Papillault,
Anne Péré
ENSA Val de Seine
Philippe Bach, Philippe Gazeau,
Stéphane Maupin
ENSA de la Ville et des territoires à
Marnes la Vallée
Amina Sellali, Éric Lapierre
ENSA Versailles
Vincent Michel,
Emmanuel Combarel
La Fondazione Renzo Piano
is supported by
The Stavros Niarchos Foundation
and The Fondazione Barbara
Cappochin for the production
of the exhibition
43
The partners
Bernard Plattner
Partner, Director
Antoine Chaaya
Partner, Director
Renzo Piano was born in Genoa in 1937 into a
family of builders.
While studying at Politecnico of Milan University,
he worked in the office of Franco Albini.
In 1971, he set up the “Piano & Rogers” office
in London together with Richard Rogers, with
whom he won the competition for the Centre
Pompidou. He subsequently moved to Paris.
From the early 1970s to the 1990s, he worked
with the engineer Peter Rice, sharing the Atelier
Piano & Rice from 1977 to 1981.
In 1981, the “Renzo Piano Building Workshop”
was established, with 150 staff and offices in
Paris, Genoa, and New York.
He has received numerous awards and
recognitions among which: the Royal Gold Medal
at the RIBA in London (1989), the Kyoto Prize in
Kyoto, Japan (1990), the Goodwill Ambassador
of UNESCO (1994), the Praemium Imperiale in
Tokyo, Japan (1995), the Pritzker Architecture
Prize at the White House in Washington (1998),
the Leone d’oro alla Carriera in Venice (2000),
the Gold Medal AIA in Washington (2008)
and the Sonning Prize in Copenhagen (2009).
Since 2004 he has also been working for the
Renzo Piano Foundation, a non-profit
organization dedicated to the promotion of the
architectural profession through educational
programs and educational activities. The new
headquarters was established in Punta Nave
(Genoa), in June 2008.
In September 2013 Renzo Piano was appointed
senator for life by the Italian President Giorgio
Napolitano and in May 2014 he received the
Columbia University Honorary Degree.
Bernard Plattner was born in Bern, Switzerland,
in 1946. He studied architecture at ETH in Zürich
and started working with Piano & Rogers on the
Pompidou Center. Since then, he has continued
to work with Renzo Piano in the Paris office.
He became a Partner in 1989. A sampling of his
notable projects includes: the Rue de Meaux
Housing in Paris, the Beyeler Foundation Museum
in Basel, the reconstruction of the Potsdamer
Platz area in Berlin, the Zentrum Paul Klee in Bern
and the New York Times Building. He also oversaw
the construction of the Pathé Foundation in Paris.
He is now responsible for a number of large scale
projects in Europe including the new Courthouse
in Paris, a mixed-use development in Vienna and
the Float office building in Düsseldorf.
Born in 1960, Antoine Chaaya studied
architecture at the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik
(USEK) in Lebanon and after graduating joined
the Paris office in 1987. He worked as lead
architect on a variety of projects including the
Kanak Cultural Center in New Caledonia and the
Potsdamer Platz project in Berlin.
Since becoming a Partner in 1997, he has been
responsible for many projects including the
“Il Sole 24 Ore” headquarters in Milan and the
Los Angeles County Museum of Art expansion.
Current projects include three academic buildings
for Columbia University, a residential project in
Miami and a mixed-use development in Beirut.
He has lectured in Lebanon and in the USA,
including talks at Columbia University’s Graduate
School of Architecture. He was also recently
an invited participant in “The Museum as”,
an international symposium organized by
the Sursock Museum in Beirut.
RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP Renzo Piano
Founding Partner,
Chairman
Mark Carroll
Partner, Director
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1956, Mark
Carroll received both his Bachelor of Sciences in
Architecture and his Master of Architecture from
the Clemson University, South Carolina.
He received his Laurea in Architettura from the
University of Genoa in 1983. He joined the Genoa
office in 1981 working initially on the Menil
Collection in Houston. As a project director, he was
subsequently involved in many projects including
the Aquarium in Genoa and the Fiat Lingotto
factory conversion in Turin. Since becoming a
partner in 1992, he has overseen a broad range
of projects including the Cy Twombly Pavilion in
Houston, Aurora Place in Sydney, the High Museum
expansion in Atlanta, the new California Academy
of Sciences in San Francisco, the Harvard Arts
Museums in Cambridge, the expansion of the
Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth and the new
Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.
He has also contributed to the design of several
significant masterplanning projects including the
Woodruff Arts Center in Atlanta and the ex-Falk
areas in Milan. He is currently working on the new
headquarters for JNBY in Hangzhou, China,
the Centro Botín in Santander and the Academy
Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles.
He has been a visiting critic at many universities
in Italy, Switzerland as well as in the USA. He also
lectures widely. In 2013 he received the Architecture
Alumni Achievement Award from his alma mater.
LA MÉTHODE PIANO
Philippe Goubet
Partner, Director
Born in France in 1964, Philippe Goubet studied
business administration at HEC in Paris.
He joined RPBW in 1989, working in Genoa as
a controller. From 1988 to 1992, he also spent
a lot of his time in Japan, supervising the Osaka
office’s day-to-day business.
In 1995, he moved to RPBW’s Paris office and
became a Partner. He is currently the Managing
Director of the three offices. 44
Elisabetta Trezzani
Partner, Director
Joost Moolhuijzen
Partner, Director
Joost Moolhuijzen was born in Amstelveen, in
the Netherlands, in 1960. He studied architecture
at the Delft University of Technology and after
graduating worked in London with Michael
Squire from 1987 to 1990. He joined RPBW’s Paris
office in 1990, working on a number of important
projects including the Cité Internationale
development in Lyon. He subsequently worked
as lead architect on the Potsdamer Platz project
in Berlin.
Since becoming a Partner in 1997, Joost has
overseen a wide range of projects including the
Modern Wing of the Art Institute of Chicago and
the masterplan for Columbia University’s
Manhattanville development. He was the partner
in charge, from inception to completion, of the
Shard in London, completed in 2012. He is now
responsible for the Fubon Tower in Taipei and a
mixed-use residential project in London.
Born in 1968, Elisabetta Trezzani studied
architecture at the Politecnico in Milan,
graduating in 1994. She joined RPBW in Genoa in
1998 working initially on the design of the Aurora
Place Buildings in Sydney. She was subsequently
involved in the design and construction of the
addition to the High Museum in Atlanta, where
she ran the site office until the project’s
completion in 2005.
On returning to Genoa, she was made an
Associate and a Partner in 2011. Together with
Mark Carroll, she led the teams working on the
new Whitney Museum of American Art in New
York and the Harvard Art Museums in
Cambridge. She also worked on the RPBW
exhibitions in Rome, Atlanta, Milan and New
York. She is currently working on the SoHo
residential tower project in New York and the
Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los
Angeles.
Antonio Belvedere
Partner, Director
Giorgio Grandi
Partner
Giorgio Bianchi
Partner
Born in 1957, Giorgio Bianchi studied
architecture in Genoa. He joined RPBW in 1985
and was based in Genoa until 1994, working on
most of the major projects of that time including
the re-development of Genoa Old Harbour. In
1995, he moved to RPBW’s Paris office to work on
the design of the Stage Theater am Potsdamer
Platz in Berlin.
Since becoming a partner in 1997, he has been
responsible for numerous projects including the
rehabilitation of Center Pompidou in Paris, the
Morgan Library expansion in New York and an
important private residential building in
Colorado. He has worked on the design of all
RPBW exhibitions since 2000. He is currently
leading the team working on the Stavros
Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center in Athens
and the Kum & Go headquarters in Des Moines.
He has been invited to lecture at many
universities including Milan Politecnico and
Columbia University’s Graduate School of
Architecture.
Emanuela Baglietto
Partner
Born in 1969, Antonio Belvedere graduated in
architecture from the University of Florence.
He joined RPBW’s Paris office in 1999, working
on phase two of the Fiat Lingotto factory
conversion project, particularly on the design
of the Polytechnic and the Pinacoteca Agnelli.
He was subsequently lead architect on the
masterplan for Columbia University’s
Manhattanville development in New York.
Following promotion to Associate in 2004,
he worked on the masterplan for the ex-Falck
area in Milan. He became a Partner in 2011.
Recently completed projects include the Valletta
City Gate in Malta. He is now leading the design
of the Bishop Ranch project in California,
a Performing Arts Center in India and most
recently, a cultural project in Russia.
He has also lectured widely, in France and Italy.
Born in 1957, Giorgio Grandi studied at the Genoa
School of Architecture and joined RPBW’s Genoa
office in 1984. He worked as lead architect on
various projects including the re-development
of the Genoa Harbour for the 1992 Colombus
International Exposition.
He became a partner in 1992 and was responsible
for some of the most significant projects in Italy
including the Padre Pio Pilgrimage Church in
Foggia, the Banca Popolare di Lodi headquarters
and the Pirelli Factory in Turin. Current projects
include the masterplan for the ex-Falck area in
Milan, a children’s hospice in Bologna and
residential buildings in Lisbon.
Born in 1960, Emanuela Baglietto studied at the
Genoa School of Architecture and joined RPBW’s
Genoa office in 1988. She worked as lead
architect on numerous projects and
competitions including the Credito Industriale
Sardo headquarters in Cagliari.
She became a partner in 1997. She has been
responsible for many built projects in Europe and
in the USA, including the Mercedes-Benz Design
Center in Stuttgart, the Nasher Sculpture Center
in Dallas, the expansion of the Isabella Stewart
Gardner Museum in Boston and the Astrup
Fearnley Museum in Oslo. Recent projects
include the design of the Centro Botín in
Santander. She is now in charge of a major
residential project in Sydney.
45
Pratical
informations
Renzo Piano Building Workshop.
The Piano method
& du patrimoine
45, avenue du président Wilson,
Paris 16e
The Cité is open every day except
Tuesday and 1st January, 1st Mai
and 25 December.
Ticket prices of the exhibition :
full price : 9 € / reduced price : 6 €
Presse contacts
Claudine Colin Communication
Lola Véniel
[email protected]
0033 (0)1 42 72 60 01
0033 (0)6 85 90 39 69
& du patrimoine
Fabien Tison Le Roux
[email protected]
0033 (0)1 58 51 52 85
0033 (0)6 23 76 59 80
Caroline Loizel
[email protected]
0033 (0)1 58 51 52 82
0033 (0)6 86 75 11 29
Ph : Tim Griffith
Workshop Architects
47
CITÉ DE L’ARCHITECTURE & DU PATRIMOINE
PALAIS DE CHAILLOT – 45 AVENUE DU PRÉSIDENT WILSON
PARIS 16e – MO TROCADÉRO
CITECHAILLOT.FR

Press release - Renzo Piano Building Workshop

Transcription

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