MVRDV Media Galaxy, New York, 2001 ()
The introduction of the computer turns modern office spaces into relatively shady, gloomy, flickering zones. This undermines the typical plan of the traditional Manhattan tower: the reverse becomes more appropriate, creating work spaces that are surrounded by stairs, lifts, and shafts.
It will lead to an open shady plan surrounded by a communication wrap: an accessible skin, in which all communication, all servicing, and all structure is positioned and therefore externalized.
The new art and media realms are so connected with every day life, with positions anywhere on the globe and with the rapidly changing state of the art of technology, institutionalizing is the last thing to happen, unless of course it can be an Institution of Change.
The very combination of education, research, development, communication and exhibiting of the Eyebeam Institute seems a phenomenal answer to this.
Media and architecture form a contrasting combination: quicksilver versus inertia, melting pot versus traditionalism.
However, both deal with space; imitating or mimicking new media does not seem the direction for architecture: no project ages faster than an ultra-modern media-based architectural image. A practical approach seems more rewarding over the long haul.
By using the ultimate limits of given urban zoning, the volume permits for an oversizing that allows for interior voids, that can become a collective zone throughout the building, accentuating an endless interior, in which all functions, both Eyebeams and the tenants, can be addressed.
This envelop turns the Institute into a landmark within its surroundings. Its directness, its pragmatism, its informalness and its boldness connects with the direct, pragmatic, informal and relatively bold characteristics of the neighborhood.
The skin is perforated to give light into the hollow tower. Computerized shutters allow for any composition of light: from super dark to heavenly light, from holistic to individual. By adding acoustical material to the shutters any acoustical treatment of the hollow tower can be made: from a personalized and intimate sound level to a dramatic collective cathedral-like sound.
By positioning the lifts in two locations, it becomes possible to direct the two separate streams: one for the Eyebeam Institute, one for the other tenants.
By hanging hollow beams with office spaces within this hollow tower, closed, separable spaces can be combined with more open communicative environments on top. They act as structurally inhabitable props in which the skin opens to the environment: eye-beams with views to the surrounding. Their different positions, both in height as in direction, allow for different perspectives of the city, rebalancing the introverted nature of the new media. By rounding any corner it will be able to continue any projection easily from wall to ceiling to floor and vice versa.
This operation can realize a catalogue of rentable spaces, while having them part of the overall Eyebeam enterprise.
Singular straight beams. Double or triple height beams with interior mezzanines. Crossing beams that realize meeting points. Stair rooms with terraces that combine intimacy with collective views of the surrounding streets. High narrow rooms allow for intimate encounters. And so on.
This differentiation gives a collection of spaces for different sizes and usages and addresses the different users and programs within the seemingly endless interior world. The beams are situated on different levels and are directed towards specified viewpoints in the surrounding, connecting the workspaces in the beams with the environment. This division combines intimacy with an omnipresent working, an overwhelming universe, like on the net. A giant bee-hive.
The chosen fire engineering strategy makes it possible to interpret the atrium as a workable space. The cathedral like effect follows the logic of eternity: it avoids a fashionable and rapidly outdating architecture.
Any composition becomes possible, from concentrated to clustered to splintered.
It combines the intimate with grandeur. It turns the hollow tower into a galaxy for changing media.
Animation Wieland & Gouwens www.wieland-gouwens.nl
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