Excerpt: Better Together, an architectural project by VIVE Design Studio and Nirostina Nisani, features an exposed facade that functions as a window display, revealing interior building activities. Different functions are stacked vertically, creating an internally connected space. Using plants and natural materials, the design aims to create a clearer, airier space, reducing maintenance costs and enhancing its aesthetic appeal.
Project Description
[Text as submitted by architect] It is a 6-storey building with a total use area of 1,000 sq.m.. The building is programmed to be a one-stop service. It’s a combination of retail, cafe, co-working space and meeting room together in one building. Due to site limitation, functions are designed to stack vertically spreading area usage, but those functions are designed to overlap intentionally, loosely creating an internal vertically space connected, the 1st and 2nd floor are stationary retail, the 3rd and 4th floors are cafe and co-working space, while the 5th floor are meeting room and auditorium.
The storage room and office are pushed up onto the 6th floor. The interior space proposal is reflected in the form of external architecture, conceptually revealing the activities of the whole building simultaneously from outside. The facade is exposed to work as a window display of the building and the section where different activities are happening together. The space overlaps inside, causing the mass of the buildings that interlock each other, creating uniqueness from the neighbouring buildings.
At the same time communicate with simple shapes, in order to maintain the facade of the surrounding context, the new building quietly fills the emptiness but can still be detected. The front of the building opens up a narrow entrance to make it airier by showing double volume and round columns that support the front through to the 2nd floor additionally. Moreover, the 3rd area is also designed to open mass to show double volume repeatedly by adding a bright red spiral staircase connecting the interior space with an airy corridor that can see the continuity to the 4th floor.
The opening of the 3rd floor into an outdoor area and the floating plants in the middle of the building make the building look clearlier and airier in a narrow and limited space which is the main purpose of the building design. The material selection of the building emphasizes on showing the material naturally to reduce the cost of maintenance (low maintenance).
Exposing concrete walls and ceiling contrasts with the white epoxy floor, sleek and neat, combination of materials creating a perfect balance of both aesthetics and suitability. To make space more welcome by inserting stones and woods into the interior. In addition, white and black mosaic tiles with different scale and arrangement make the space wider.
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