Melbourne, completion February 2020
RMIT University has a pedagogical ambition of connecting ideas with technical knowledge. This vision underpins the refurbishment of Building 515 on the Brunswick campus, designed by Paul Morgan Architects in collaboration with Studio Roland Snooks and Zilka Studio. The project co-locates Product Design, Fashion and Textiles, and Industrial Design students in an innovative teaching and research space which integrates the, traditionally separate, functions of studio, maker-space and workshops.
The design of the project draws on and reflects innovations developed through RMIT’s research into advanced design processes and fabrication techniques. In particular the studios are wrapped in intricate, algorithmically designed, 3D printed polymer walls. These are an expression of new design potential enabled by an innovative robotic large-scale 3D printing technique developed at RMIT by Roland Snooks.
In combining structure and ornament these advanced manufacturing techniques are used to create polymer surfaces that express design and technological innovation and assists with wayfinding (rather than signage) — students travel through a translucent polymer ‘ravine’ that in turn allows natural daylight into the studios. The application of these techniques to architectural design support RMIT’s strategic positioning as a leader in design, technology and enterprise.
Paul Morgan Architects / Studio Roland Snooks / Zilka Studio
Studio Roland Snooks Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Laura Harper (Design Director), Dasong Wang, Stella Yang, Charlie Boman
Photos by Peter Bennetts
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Melbourne, 2018
Floe draws on the atmospheric effects of the Antarctic landscape to create a speculative architectural installation designed in response to a sound work by Philip Samartzis. The project explores the architectural implications of algorithmic design through robotic 3D fabrication. The translucent skin of the tower comprises seventy unique overlapping semi-clear polymer panels printed by robot.
The sound work was recorded by Samartzis in Antarctica. By recording and representing the many sounds of Antarctica’s constantly shifting ice shelves, glaciers, icebergs and sea ice, Samartzis challenges the perception of Antarctica as an unchanging landscape, suspended in time and place.
Design Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Charlie Boman, Sean Guy, Austynn MacHado, Venkatesh Natarajan, Gabriele Mirra.
Structural Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann (Sascha Bohnenberger).
Sound Art: Philip Samartzis
Construction: RMIT University, School of Architecture and Urban Design Workshops (Lead by Kevin O'Connor) + RMIT Architectural Robotics Lab.
The project was generously supported by RMIT University School of Architecture and Design (Dean - Martyn Hook) and the National Gallery of Victoria.
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Melbourne, completion September 2017
SensiLab is a 500m2 research facility located at Monash University's Caulfield campus. The open plan work space of the lab is structured and punctuated by a series of objects containing acoustically isolated functions including an imaging studio, deep immersion cinema. These objects are clad in CNC cut enamel coated panels.
SensiLab was designed as part of a larger redevelopment of Monash's Art Design and Architecture faculty, undertaken in collaboration with NMBW architecture Studio.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Mel Iraheta, Sean Guy, Andres Rivera, Marc Gibson, Braden Scott.
Photos by Peter Bennetts, Tom Roe and Studio Roland Snooks
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Melbourne, 2017
This sound studio consists of a recording room and control/listening room. The faceted form of the studio is clad in CNC milled acoustic foam. The pattern of which is generated through a reaction diffusion algorithm.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Marc Gibson, Braden Scott, Mel Iraheta, Sean Guy, Andres Rivera.
Photos by Peter Bennetts, Tom Roe and Studio Roland Snooks
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Melbourne, completion September 2017
SensiLab Studio is a robotically 3D printed polymer meeting room located at Monash University in Melbourne. This is a pioneering project in the application of 3D printed polymers to permanent building structures. The polymer panels have passed the relevant fire and building codes within Australia.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Sean Guy, Mel Iraheta, Marc Gibson, Andres Rivera, Austynn MacHado.
Research and fabrication of the 3D printed panels were undertaken by RMIT Architecture and the Architectural Robotics Lab.
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Mexico City, 2010-2012
Role: Design Computation Consultancy: Roland Snooks + Robert Stuart-Smith (Kokkugia ltd)
Architects: Rojkind Arquitectos.
The Liverpool shopping centre facade achieves visual dynamism whilst safeguarding a geometrically rational concept. Working with an already established cylindrical building form, Rojkind Arquitectos engaged Robert Stuart-Smith and Roland Snooks to develop the facade geometry comprised of developable surfaces. A generative algorithm was written that enabled numerous iterations of the facade to be generated with inbuilt geometrical constraints that ensured the facade geometry would remain within a given range of complexity.
Design Computation consultancy directors: Roland Snooks, Robert Stuart-Smith
Design Computation consultancy team: Casey Rehm
Architect: Rojkind Arquitectos
Facade Engineering: Studio NYL
Facade Contractor/Fabrication: Zahner Metals
Structural Engineering: Emrsa
photographs ©rojkind arquitectos, photo by Paul Rivera
Mexico City, 2009-2011
Role: Design Computation Consultancy: Roland Snooks + Robert Stuart-Smith (Kokkugia ltd)
Architects: Rojkind Arquitectos.
This facade for a restaurant in Mexico City employs parametric variation to create a shifting play of light and shadow. Consulting to Rojkind Arquitectos, Roland Snooks and Robert Stuart-Smith developed the geometry for the two layers of diagrid through a custom computational approach.
Design Computation Consultancy Directors: Roland Snooks + Robert Stuart-Smith
Architects: Rojkind Arquitectos + Esrawe Studio
Construction: ZDA Desarrollo + Arquitectura [Yuri Zagorin]
Structural engineering: Juan Felipe Heredia
Facade engineering: Grupo MAS [ing. Eduardo Flores]
M.E.P: Quantum Diseño
photographs ©rojkind arquitectos, photo by Paul Rivera
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Melbourne, 2015 (completion 2016)
This Meeting Pavilion will be an intimate space for discussion and debate. Not a neutral space, but one that is rich in crafted detail. The exterior shell will be fabricated from fibre-composite materials creating a depth and subtle translucency, with the interior lined in quilted fabric.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Marc Gibson, Ashan Perera, Andres Rivera, Ben Verzijl.
Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann Sascha Bohnenberger
Client: RMIT University.
This project is supported by RMIT Architecture and Design and d___Lab
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Melbourne, competition shortlist 2021
This project draws on processes of geological formation to explore methods of making and fabrication which results in specific, intriguing and effective tectonic and formal characteristics.This public artwork combines 3D printed sandstone with intricate inlaid metal detail.
Processes of deposition, where layers of sand accumulate over time are explored through sand 3D printing; the positive and negative relationship between valleys, cracks and hollows which become filled are explored through processes of casting metal into sand formwork; and processes of erosion are explored through the combination of hard and soft materials.
Shortlisted (August 2021) for the Merinda Station Integrated Art Project, as part of the LXR program in Melbourne.
Design Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Laura Harper (Design Director), Marc Gibson.
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Malibu, California, 2011-2013
This single family house overlooks the Pacific Ocean from a steep site in Malibu. The main living area of the house is situated on the lower level which is defined by an ornate ceiling that reaches down to support the stair and stretch to become a chimney and exterior column. Robotic fabrication techniques are used in the construction of the kitchen's timber paneling and the formwork for the intricate ceiling.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Casey Rehm, Armin Senoner, Tommaso Casucci, Marc Gibson.
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Kiev, Ukraine, 2010
This speculative project reconsiders the monument as object, instead positing the formation of an immersive space of remembrance, a space that emerges from the landscape and is carved from within a somber stone monolith – an inverted monument. This project explores the emergence of a space, rich with intricate detail, reflecting the culmination of individual differences within a multitude. The project is structured by a series of contrasts, such as the intensive memorial space in opposition to the reflective exhibition space, or the smoothness of the stone facade in opposition to the intricacy of the bronze memorial.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Casey Rehm, Fleet Hower, Bryant Netter
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Melbourne, in progress 2017
This bouldering wall for Monash University will be fabricated from GRC incorporating a complex pattern of climbing hand-holds.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Marc Gibson, Andres Rivera, Braden Scott.
Structural Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann Engineers (Sascha Bohnenberger).
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Melbourne, 2014
The composite fibre installation compresses surface, structure and ornament into one intricate and irreducible assemblage. The complexity of the project is made possible through the development of robotic fabrication techniques including the extrusion of the fine-scale surface articulation. The surface gains its strength through the location of the articulation that operate as structural beams within the surface. This strategy enables the surface to remain only a few millimetres thick while spanning and cantilevering considerable distances.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Cam Newnham, Drew Busmire, Amaury Thomas, Pei She Lee.
Structural Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann Engineers / Sascha Bohnenberger, Clemens Preisinger, Robert Vierlinger.
Fibreglass Fabrication: Composite Constructions / Steve Campbell
Client: RMIT Design Hub / Curators: Fleur Watson + Kate Rhodes
RMIT Fabrication Team: Wen Yap, Milou van Min, Franco Zagato, Farah Rozhan, Sebastian Nicht, Jack Mansfield-Hung, Chris Ferris, Jesse Thomas, Emily Cipriani, Scohldun Beaver, Yee Shuian Sang, Say Huang Tan, Tim Cameron, Simone Tchonova, Kei Jin Pook, Yuxi Cheng, Jonathan Kim, Pat Anglin, Matt Ellis, Vincent Lai, Edmund Olowo, Fahimeh Mosavari, Sanghan Gang, Lijun Loy, Stephen Annett, Tuyen Tran.
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Melbourne, installation design 2016
This 3D printed installation was designed by Studio Roland Snooks as part of a collaboration with Elenberg Fraser for the design of the lobby of the Myriad Tower.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Marc Gibson, Braden Scott, Bec DiNapoli
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Melbourne, 2016
This public art project is a dynamic, expressive symbol for the community of Boroondara. The intricate detail of this sculptural form acts as a foil to the solidity of the town hall and attempts to express and respond to the dynamic self-organising nature of contemporary society. The sculpture is a symbol of collective behaviour – a swarm or flock of small elements, from which a collective form emerges. This project offers an alternative civic symbol to the adjacent building – a bottom-up logic in opposition to the classical hierarchies of the historic town hall. A fine network of golden veins are embedded within the translucent skin of the form. This skin refracts light and glisten in the sunlight, casting an intricate pattern of shadows on the ground. The project is an expression of possibilities of the emerging technologies of robotic fabrication and large-scale 3D printing.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Marc Gibson, Matt Kohman
Structural Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann / Sascha Bohnenberger
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Paris, 2018
project description coming…
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Melbourne, competition 2017
project description coming soon...
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Sean Guy, Marc Gibson, Braden Scott.
Structural Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann Engineers (Sascha Bohnenberger).
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Melbourne, competition (commendation) 2016
This pavilion for the National Gallery of Victoria explores a complex systems approach to tectonics, where surface, structure and ornament emerge from the one system to create an intricate irreducible whole. The pavilion is defined by boulder-like volumes that delaminate or flake into surfaces and unravel at their edges creating a balance between mass and filigree. Fibre-reinforced polymer prototypes for the pavilion have been developed through direct deposition robotic fabrication techniques.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Marc Gibson, Matt Kohman, Susanna Brolhani, Venkatesh Natarajan.
Structural Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann Engineers (Sascha Bohnenberger).
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London, 2015
This pedestrian and cycling bridge over the Thames in London blends between the typologies of arch, truss and cable, creating an innovative structural model that opens up new possibilities for architectural expression. The bridge’s hybrid structure does not apply specific elements to structural roles (such as cable, mast, arch etc), instead these various structural roles operate through a cloud of components – a fuzzy hybrid. This blurred condition masks the structural logic and instead focuses attention on the experience of this immersive space.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Cam Newnham, Marc Gibson, Drew Busmire, Ben Verzijl.
Engineering: Bollinger+Grohmann / Simon Ruppert (Director), Sascha Bohnenberger (Director), Rafael Pastrana, Tommaso Pagnacco.
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Houston, completion 2016
The Full Blown ceiling installation is formed by a turbulent flow of petals. The installation is comprised of a steel skeleton which attaches to six hundred acrylic petals. The steel skeleton is formed through an agentBody algorithm which creates a complex and varied pattern through the self-organisation of the bodies. This pattern shifts in and out of focus as it is viewed through the translucent petals.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Drew Busmire, Cam Newnham, Ashan Perera, Andres Rivera, Ben Verzijl, Pei She Lee.
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Melbourne, installation, 2013
The Composite Swarm installation is an architectural prototype exploring the relationship of robotic fabrication, composite materials and algorithmic design. The complexity of the form and the excess of ornament make the prototype structurally efficient and minimize the amount of material used. The prototype is 2.5 meters tall, with a surface thickness of less than 1mm. A swarm algorithm based on the self-organizing behavior of ants was developed for the project to negotiate between and compresses surface, structure and ornament into a single irreducible form.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), James Pazzi, Marc Gibson.
Fabrication Team: Roland Snooks, James Pazzi, Marc Gibson, Michael Ferreyra, Dave Smith, Benjamin Verzijl, Tess O’Meara, Matthew Lochert, Jack Dowling, Steph Lancuba, Kelvin Chai, Desameddin Mohamed, Anastasiya Vituseevych, I Kio Kung, Kendra Reid, Min Ji Lee, Mercedes Mambort, Patrick Anglin, Nil Corominas Faja, Nathan Demoel.
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Tallinn, installation 2015
Composite Skeleton is a composite fibre prototype developed for the Talliin Architecture Biennale and exhibited in Estonia. The translucent skin of the prototype is 0.25mm thick and provides the shear strength of the project, while the black skeleton is 2mm thick.
This project was supported by: RMIT University School of Architecture and Design and the Tallinn Architecture Biennale. The prototype was designed by Kokkugia and fabricated by students within the RMIT studio 'Composite Pavilion' taught by Roland Snooks and Cam Newnham.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Cam Newnham, Yian Chen, James Hall, Zhao Fei, Shibo Du, Sebastian Nicht, Wentao Guo, Han Chen, Andre Cheung, Ziyu Meng, Elisa Perez Mosos, Bowen Nie, Jack Bakker.
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Shanghai, installation, 2015
Brass Swarm is an experimental prototype developed through self-organisational algorithmic design processes and robotic fabrication. The project explores spatial self-organisation, emergent tectonics and the relationship between robotic and algorithmic behavior.
A multi-agent algorithmic strategy for spatial self-organisation was developed, from which topological surfaces emerge. This manifold swarm strategy self-organises clouds of agents into coherent, continuous surfaces, and complex spatial division. These spatial agents simultaneously generate the intricate tectonics of the project. Each agent has a body that is capable of interacting and connecting to the bodies of the surrounding agents. The interaction of these agentBodies generates intricate ornamental and structural networks.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Cam Newnham, Ben Verzijl
Fabrication Team: Zhao Sheng, Cai Yuan Zhen, Tang Yan Chao, Chen yu Lan, Xu Lei, Yan Lei, Zhang Wu
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Wellington, installation 2015
The Laminar Bodies installation was exhibited at the Adam Gallery in Wellington in 2015. The project explores the translation of algorithmically generated complex geometry into surfaces fabricated from laser cut steel sheet. The complex curvature of the form is achieved through the lamination of relatively small sheet steel components that assemble to form the highly intricate computational geometry. This local flatness of the geometry limits the structural depth and necessitates creating structural strength through surface curvature. Consequently an algorithmic strategy was developed to generate surfaces with a high degree of curvature.
This project was supported by: RMIT University School of Architecture and Design, Victoria University of Wellington, and the Adam Art Gallery (Wellington). Laminar Bodies was commissioned and curated by Simon Twose.
Design Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Ashan Perera, Ben Verzijl, Andres Rivera.
Fabrication Team: Valentina Soana, Derek Kawiti, Judyta Cichocka, Mint Wallace, Daniel Crooks, Minh Nguyen.
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Melbourne, 2014
The Future Is Here is a traveling exhibition developed by the Design Museum (London) which was hosted an co-curated in Melbourne at the RMIT Design Hub in 2014 - Studio Roland Snooks was engaged to develop the exhibition design. The exhibition explores notions of mass-customisation and the influence on design of emerging technologies such as 3D printing and robotic fabrication. The exhibition design leverages new fabrication techniques to enable the production of differentiation, non-repeating patterns and unique (mass-customised) forms.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Cam Newnham, Drew Busmire, Pei She Lee.
Fabrication Team: Wen Yap, Farah Rozhan, Milou van Min, Franco Zagato, Simone Tchonova, Jesse Thomas, Emily Cipriani, Scohldun Beaver, Yee Shuian Sang, Chris Ferris.
Client: RMIT Design Hub / Curators: Fleur Watson + Kate Rhodes
Photography: Tobias Titz
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Astana, Kazakhstan, 2013
This project responds to a brief for a national symbol for Kazakhstan to be built for the Astana Expo in 2017. The expo theme explores the post-fossil fuel energy paradigm. This nation monument visualises and generates wind energy through a field of metallic piezoelectric rods that sway in the wind. This horizontal turbulent cloud emerges from a field of hairs generated through a computational process that draws from the turbulent and laminar flow of fluids.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Michael Ferreyra, Armin Senoner, Zak Kljakovic, Marc Gibson, James Pazzi.
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Beijing, China, 2011
This shortlisted competition entry for the National Art Museum of China, explores the diffuse nature of form through the analogy of the cloud. The result is a formless form, in opposition to the monumental nature of the surrounding Beijing Olympic site. The primary galleries are housed in a series of interlocking concrete beams wrapped in the cloud skin. The resulting interstitial space operates as circulation and informal exhibition space for installations.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director) + Robert Stuart-Smith (Design Director) Nicholette Chan, J Fleet Hower, Xiaotian Huang, Dane Zeiler, Leonid Krykhtin, Edwin Liu, Josef Musil, Ekaterina Obedkova, Casey Rehm, Gilles Retsin, Sophia Tang.
In collaboration with Studio Pei Zhu
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Melbourne, Australia, 2013
This project is for the design of an educational foundation that works with disadvantaged children. The brief called for a fitout of an existing warehouse to create non-institutional atmosphere in which the spaces are not discretely partitioned. The response to this provocation is a swarm of components that wrap, filter, and divide space to create a series of different teaching areas. This swarm is fabricated from EPS foam blocks that are carved with a hotwire by an industrial robot. The use of reprogrammable robots enable the components to intersect uniquely to produce highly affordable variation in space and formal expression.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), James Pazzi, Amaury Thomas, Armin Senoner.
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Melbourne, Australia, 2012
In collaboration with MvS Architects
The single surface of this proposal for Flinders Street Station in Melbourne mediates between the city and river, wrapping to enclose program and opening to allow light to the station below.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Adrian Cortez, Farzin Lotfi-Jam, Fleet Hower.
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Yeosu, South Korea, 2010
In collaboration with: Tom Wiscombe Architecture
This project for a thematic pavilion for the Yeosu 2012 Expo is the result of a collaboration between Roland Snooks and Tom Wiscombe, intended to capitalize on both shared sensibilities as well as individual expertise. It is an exploration of messy computation in the sense that the project is the result of moving in and out of the realms of model and algorithm. The project explores the use of advanced fibre composite surfaces in the construction of structure and skin.
Design Directors: Roland Snooks + Tom Wiscombe
Project Team: Pablo Kohan, Fleet Hower, Ricardo Sosa (Studio Roland Snooks), David Stamatis, Chris Eskew, Brent Lucy, Graham Thompson, Zeynep Aksöz (Tom Wiscombe Design)
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Astana, Kazakhstan, 2013
In collaboration with RS-SDesign.
project description coming soon...
Hong Kong, China, 2008
This cast in situ concrete shell provides the structure, sun-shading, and a series of enclosed balconies within a fibrous bundle of strands. The project compresses the structural and tectonic hierarchies of contemporary tower design into a single shell whose articulation self-organizes in response to an often conflicting set of criteria. The shell alleviates the need for internal columns providing clear span office space, while the varied pattern of the shell creates distinctive characteristics for each space.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Robert Stuart-Smith (Design Director), Juan De Marco.
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Yeosu, South Korea, 2010
In collaboration with:
Emergent Architecture
Kokkugia Design Director: Roland Snooks
Emergent Principal: Tom Wiscombe
Kokkugia Project Team: Pablo Kohan, J Fleet Hower, Ricardo Sosa
Emergent Project Team: David Stamatis, Chris Eskew, Brent Lucy, Graham Thompson, Zeynep Aksöz
This project is the result of a collaboration between EMERGENT and KOKKUGIA, intended to capitalize on both shared sensibilities as well as individual expertise. It is an exploration of messy computation in the sense that the project is the result of moving in and out of the realms of designing and scripting. It represents a loose, open-ended way of working that biases effects over self-justifying processes.
Taipei, Taiwan, 2008
This project attempts to dissolve the normative conditions of spatial enclosure to create a performance venue and public space of spectacle. The proposal engages generative techniques drawn from the geological and cultural context to generate a vibrant space of performance and social interaction. The flows of the 19th century water course of Keelung River provided the impetus for a process which erodes a monolithic base in the generation of a public space carved between the auditoriums. This incision creates a gradient of enclosure and public access weaving together public plaza and theater foyers.
Project Team: Roland Snooks (Design Director), Robert Stuart-Smith (Design Director), Brad Rothenberg, Elliot White, Matt Howard
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