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Aedes studio: www.aedesstudio.com
Red Apple
The Red Apple is a winning competition entry for a brick-covered residential building. It is located near the city center between a park and a stadium, amidst concrete blocks from the 70 s.
The concept took as a starting point the interpretation of the brick in the context of this one-layered historical environment. Though started from scratch, the project acts as though it was a renovation of an existing brick factory. The light shafts atop remind of chimney-stacks, as does the void space in the heart of the building, though inverted and exaggerated in scale. A similar reference in scales could be traced throughout the entire building in the relation between the protruding bricks of the Flemish bond and the narrow metal balconies; between the regular window openings and their larger counterparts in the double-height glazings of the living rooms. This system of references is encoded and carried out by the smallest building block the brick, from which all other dimensions and sizes are derived.
Juxtaposed to the brick bond is the regular grid of the windows, some of which are missing at casual places, while others are exaggerated to the size of the double-height glazings. Another antinomy in the concept is the inside-outside relationship. The solidity of the wall is interrupted by the loggias, and its rhythm by the casual huge openings. In the brick-scale the boundary is permeable on the cantilevers, where the Flemish bond headers are popping halfway out, and their shadows creating a wet effect. At the ground level the boundary between inside and outside becomes even more blurred. The entire space around the building and partly inside it is regarded as intermediate, inside and outside at the same time, thus turning into a proper semi-public and semi-private area given back to the neighbourhood.
CREDITS
ARCHITECTS: aedes studio / Sofia, Bulgaria, est.2004/
LOCATION: Sofia, Bulgaria
SURFACE: 11.000 mA?
YEAR / STATUS: 2013 / completed
STRUCTURE: concrete
MATERIALS: brick/metal/concrete
PROJECT TEAM: Plamen Bratkov / Rossitza Bratkova / Nedko Nedev
CLIENT: Sofbuild
PARTNER / CONSULTANTS: Iliya Alashki, structural eng.
PHOTOGRAPHY: aedes studio / Nedyalko Nedyalkov / Tzvetomir Dzhermanov
