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Text: Ștefan Ghenciulescu

The charm, the issues, and the potential of the suburbs. Densification in a fragile environment

Let me tell you a story about the school of architecture and the suburbs. A few years ago, following a very inspired choice by the department, the workshop of the “Ion Mincu” University of Architecture with the 2nd -year students had the locations of both 1st-semester projects in the Andronache neighbourhood, towards the North-Eastern margin of Bucharest.

Project: Zeppelin
Text: Constantin Goagea
Photo: Andrei Mărgulescu

Old Bucharest remains visible to this day in the irregularity of many streets and in the architectural typology of some houses. Next to the Stelian-Lucaci church, somewhere close to Calea Călărași, there lies one of those pieces of town where one can still find, in the path of streets and property limits, the 19th-century specific urban model

The building is both inside and outside the mountain, it’an object and a limit, a margin and a gate. And its walls have been shaped by its columns

Project, text: Salvador Ventura de Blas, Pau Llimona, Yoshihide Kobanawa, Kaoru Kobanawa
Photo: @KOBFUJI Architects

Text: Ștefan Ghenciulescu
Photo: Georgiana Ghenciulescu, Ștefan Ghenciulescu

No, I did not cry at the exhibition. Well, I teared up a bit, at the end, when, after a “silent disco” tour, when each visitor was practically alone with the exhibits and the music and talks coming from the wireless headsets, we arrived in a large round room where you could see on a circular screen a loop with the end ofone of their last concerts, including David Gilmour – the one from back then and the only one – thanking the audience.

Project: Larix Studio
Text: Köllő Miklós
Photo: Köllő Miklós, Szigeti Vajk-István

An exercise in landscape transparency, by which a relatively large volume gets acquainted with the scale of the place, and especially with the cultural landscape in Transylvania’s Székler Region.

What would architecture students do without the plans and scale models of Junya Ishigami? It’s hard to be in a studio jury in which you could not recognize the model – detailed, delicate and transparent drawings, ethereal scale models that combine abstraction and reduction to the essence with naturalism.

(A) The night image of the Lech ski resort has been improved by a new LED lighting concept. Zumtobel in cooperation with Dieter Bartenbach, the consultant specialist, has developed a customized outdoor illumination solution, providing a new image both to the town of Lech, and to the river bearing the same name. A specially-created control system adjusts the light levels depending on the time of day or night, for lighting conditions to be perfect at any time.

Project: RoundRobin studio
Text: Anca Mihalache
Photo: Radu Malașincu

A bit of history

The main part of original building was built in around 1825, as the Haberdashers’ Almshouses. Later in the 19c the building was used as a school, and in 1898 this was purchased by the London County Council for use as Shoreditch Technical Institute.

Project: Mount Fuji Architecture Studio
Text: Masahiro Harada
Foto: Mitsumasa Fujitsuka & Mount Fuji Architects Studio

Text: Ștefan Ghenciulescu
Photo: Cosmin Dragomir

Romania suffers from a terrible lack of museums. Not only are there few museums made, if any; more than 100 museums or memorial houses have disappeared over the twenty-something years, especially through retrocessions (and out of the authorities’ lack of interest in purchasing them). Under these conditions, a new museum, especially a museum of modern and contemporary art, is an event. Should true architecture also show up there, so much the better.

Text: Dorin Ștefan Adam, Elena Viziteu
Photo: Laurian Ghinițoiu

Most tourists and Alba Iulia locals taking a stroll through the magnificent Vauban citadel are happy with the main public spaces – plazas and streets. Few of them realise that the place is much richer and much more complex – a sophisticated and labyrinthine system of spaces, with wide arched halls within the walls, passages leading to places that are undisclosed on a first walk.

Text: Mihai Duțescu
Foto: Andrei Mărgulescu, Mihai Duțescu
Plans: survey by the students of the atelier of Prof. Mircea Ochinciuc, 3rd year, Ion Mincu University, Bucharest, 2009-2010; assistants: Melania Dulămea, Mihia Duțescu, Adrian Moleavin